Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Video Game Beat Sheet Analysis
Cory Milles
Why we chose to do a Save the Cat!® beat sheet analysis of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 received a history-making 13 nominations at the 2025 Game of the Year Awards, ultimately winning nine of them. It’s been hailed as a masterpiece by many, and not just for the gameplay, but also for the music and art direction. Most notably, it has an engaging and unique story, one that causes players to step outside their comfort zone and into the grief of the characters.
With actors such as Andy Serkis and Charlie Cox providing voices, Clair Obscur demonstrates that games can combine entertaining gameplay with powerful narratives to create something truly memorable.
Writers: Jennifer Svedberg-Yen, Guillaume Broche, Victor Deleard
Director: Guillaume Broche
Genre
Golden Fleece
A hero and their team embark on a quest to win a prize or accomplish a mission. Sports movies, quests, and road trips are all the stuff of the Golden Fleece genre. The mission has a definable “road” and there should be a “prize” or “finish line” that the audience can track. But Golden Fleeces are always about something internal—a hero goes “on the road” in search of one thing and winds up discovering something else: themselves.
The 3 elements of a Golden Fleece story
- A road spanning oceans, time—or across the street—so long as it demarcates growth. It often includes a “Road Apple” that stops the trip cold.
- A team or a buddy the hero needs to be guided along the way. Usually, it’s those who represent the things the hero doesn’t have: skill, experience, or attitude.
- A prize that’s sought and is something primal: going home, securing a treasure, or re-gaining a birthright.
Save the Cat! Beat Sheet Analysis for Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Opening Image
The story opens in belle epoque France, but something is different. The setting is strange and unsettling. Even the Eiffel Tower is bent into a twisted shape.
Set-Up
The story takes place in Lumiere, a French city that lingers in the shadow of the Monolith, a tall stone pillar with a bright yellow number emblazoned on it. Each year, the Paintress wakes and writes a new number on the Monolith, one less than before. And each time she paints a new number, people of that age or older will disappear, a moment known as the Gommage (French for “erase”).
This day, the Paintress will write the number “33” on the Monolith. The love of Gustave’s life, Sophie, is 33, and he wants to be with her in her final moments.
Theme Stated
As Gustave cherishes this final time with Sophie, they discuss his upcoming expedition. Every year, warriors leave Lumiere with the intent on destroying the Paintress and saving those who remain. While there are many themes present in this rich story, one thing Gustave tells Sophie hints at an overarching thematic premise.
“We’ll break the cycle,” he tells her, “so she can’t steal anyone else’s future.”
On the surface, he is speaking about stopping the Paintress and the Gommage, but as the story goes deeper, this same statement actually applies to something bigger: breaking the cycles in our lives that hurt us and steal from our wellbeing.
Set-Up (cont'd)
People gather at the harbor for the Gommage. Gustave and Maelle meet with other characters who will be a part of Expedition 33, and their personalities and backstories are revealed. As Gustave and Sophie stand together, the Monolith looming on the horizon, the Paintress wakes, writes the number “33,” and the Gommage occurs. Gustave watches as Sophie disappears before his eyes, vanishing into flower petals.
Soon after, the expedition boards the ships, embarking to the Continent to vanquish the Paintress. While it might be a suicide mission, they go with the motto, “For those who come after.”
Catalyst
Upon arriving on the beach of the Continent, the expeditioners are surprised to see a man who has clearly aged. At that moment, the man and creatures called Nevrons slaughter the expeditioners.
Debate
Gustave awakes alone in a meadow, where he must fight creatures he encounters. Soon, he discovers the bodies of his fellow expeditioners, drained of chroma, their life force. He searches for any survivors, desperately seeking answers about how the man on the beach could have reached such an old age.
Is it even possible? Was this mission be in vain? How will he face the journey ahead, alone?
As he comes upon a pile of corpses of his fallen brethren, he mourns Maelle, who joined the journey with him despite being so young and having the possibility of a future.
Despondent, Gustave places his back against the pile of bodies and pulls out his gun, ready to take his own life, hope gone. At that moment, another surviving expeditioner joins him, his friend Lune.
Break into Two
If Lune has survived, it’s possible others, including Maelle, could be alive as well. Filled with new determination and resolve, the two press on. “When one falls, we continue,” Lune reminds him.
B Story
Later at the campfire, Lune discusses the man from the beach. Who is he? Why is he so old? What is his connection to the Paintress and the Nevrons? This mysterious man will be a key part of the story, helping the characters understand the thematic premise.
Fun and Games
The promise of the premise is unraveled as the characters explore this new upside-down antithesis world. As they fight creatures and press forward, they make discoveries about prior expeditions, discovering the journals left behind.
Soon, Gustave and Lune discover a message leading them to Maelle, but it could be a trap. Fueled by hope, they travel to the destination and find Maelle very much alive, living in the remnants of a mansion, looked after by a faceless individual known as The Curator who offers to aid them on their journey.
The three traverse onward, exploring the world as they make their way toward the Paintress. They encounter mystical creatures known as gestrals and find another member of their team, Sciel. They learn that they need the aid of a being known as Esquie, who can help them cross the sea to where the Paintress resides.
During the night, however, Maelle finds herself experiencing strange nightmares in which she encounters the man from the beach as he speaks with a young girl whose face is partially covered with a mask. They seem to be able to see Maelle, speaking to her directly and telling her that what happens is her fault.
Battling forward, the team learns to work together to use their unique abilities. Once again, Maelle dreams of the man and the masked girl, who speak about the expeditioners as “those who know not that they are not.” After much fighting, the team finds themselves at the precipice of a cliff bordering the sea. The Paintress is within reach.
Midpoint
As Maelle and Gustave share a warm moment alone atop the cliff, tossing rocks into the sea, victory seems within reach. Suddenly, Maelle finds herself restricted by a force field as the man from the beach appears, attacking Gustave.
Although Gustave attempts to fend the man off, he is outmatched. Just before the man delivers the final blow to Gustave, Gustave turns to Maelle and reminds her, “For those who come after.”
A and B Stories cross as Maelle experiences this false defeat, and the stakes are raised now that Gustave is gone. Who is this man, and why does he want them to fail? The time clocks tick as it begins to look like the group will not make it to the Paintress after all.
Bad Guys Close In
As Maelle bathes in her grief, a mysterious man shows up and stops the man from the beach. The stranger soon reveals that he is Verso, and the man from the beach is named Renoir. Verso claims that the two of them are from the first expedition, and Renoir believes that the Paintress has given them immortality, something he wishes to use to protect his family.
Verso joins the expeditioners, offering to help them defeat the Paintress. As the group faces the external bad guys, they also confront internal bad guys. It seems that Verso is hiding something, causing the rest of the group to be wary of him.
Maelle grapples with losing Gustave, angry that the others aren’t more upset about his death. Verso recruits his best friend, a gestral named Monoco, and they set off to a region known as Old Lumiere, where the Heart of the Paintress resides in the center. If they can destroy it, they can destroy her.
In Old Lumiere, the team is accidentally split up. Maelle finds herself in front of an untouched manor at the center of Old Lumiere, which she seems to recognize, though she doesn’t know how. As the door opens, Verso suddenly joins her side, but he is blasted back as Maelle is faced with Renoir and the masked girl, as well as a faceless woman much like The Curator.
Renoir says that Verso has not told Maelle the truth, and as the rest of the expedition arrives, it is revealed that Verso is Renoir’s son. Time freezes, and the masked girl attempts to communicate with Maelle until the manor vanishes, leaving the team behind in an empty field.
Maelle and Verso begin to bond, and he shares that his dream in life was to play the piano, not to fight in an expedition. As the journey increases in difficulty, Verso reveals that there might be one other way to get to the Heart of the Paintress: they can use the chroma of two Axons (powerful creatures) for The Curator to create a weapon to pierce the barrier to her island.
Though the fights are difficult, the group is determined. One of the Axons even plays to their internal bad guys, using a siren song to show them what they want most, briefly lulling them into a false sense of serenity until Verso snaps them out of it. Even so, the team is victorious, and they are finally able to penetrate the barrier surrounding the Paintress.
The night before their final attempt, Maelle has a vision of the faceless woman. She asks The Curator who he is but is only met with silence. As the team celebrates, Verso stands alone, looking toward the monolith. He’s soon joined by the masked girl, who gives him a letter for Maelle.
He removes her mask, insisting that his sister is beautiful and does not need a mask, and Renoir approaches. He reminds Verso of the risk, asking if it is worth it for Verso and his new friends.
As the group breaks through the barrier, they find themselves in a tainted version of the lands they’ve travelled, all while they see the shadows of someone’s past: a woman painting, teaching her children to paint, talking to a man on a bench, an argument…
As they approach the Paintress, Renoir tries one final time to stop them before The Curator approaches and “erases” Renoir, who declares that he “loves them too.”
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All Is Lost
The team fights the Paintress and defeats her. As they return to Lumiere, it’s a false victory as they celebrate. Verso reads the note from his sister, Alicia, which explains to Maelle that the two are really one and the same. Rather than passing the note on, Verso tosses it into the water.
In the distance, the monolith collapses, and a wave of energy surges from it, sweeping over the citizens and gommaging them all. The whiff of death is everywhere as Maelle herself disappears.
Dark Night of the Soul
A flashback ensues as Alicia awakes, and soon more about her past is revealed. She wanders through her family’s mansion where her older sister Clea watches as their parents fight inside a painting, their physical bodies still alive in the real world but in a state of paralysis. Her parents are both Painters, powerful individuals who have the ability to create worlds inside a canvas.
As Alicia and Clea watch, it is revealed that the family is grappling with their grief of losing Verso, who died saving Alicia in a fire. Though Alicia lived, the tragedy left her scarred and unable to speak. Their mother, Ailene, threw herself into Verso’s painting to soothe her grief, while Renoir has attempted to force her back into the real world.
Clea and Alicia decide to take the canvas and hide it in a place where their mother will never find it again. As they do so, Alicia enters it and loses control, and the Paintress (her mother) turns her into a new, idealized version of Alicia: Maelle. This is where the story begins.
Back in the present, after the defeat of the Paintress, Verso remains alone, immortal as a creation of the Paintress. An older Maelle joins him, now knowing the truth that she and Alicia are one and the same. Like her mother, she has chosen to enter the canvas as Maelle.
She realizes that out of grief, her mother entered Verso’s canvas, creating other versions of Renoir, Alicia, and Verso in an attempt to have a happy life. In the real world, though, this grief has destroyed her family.
The Curator, revealed to be the real Renoir, appears, wanting Maelle out of the canvas before she loses herself like her mother Ailene. While Maelle is an avatar of her true self, Alicia, Verso is but a memory. Maelle insists that she will not fall into the same trap, choosing to break the cycle of grief, echoing the thematic premise. Together, Verso and Maelle flee.
Break into Three
As A and B Stories meet, Maelle realizes her powers as a Paintress and brings Lune and Sciel back to life. She knows that she must confront Renoir, who has all of the chroma to bring the world back in the painting to life.
Finale/Final Image
The team storms the castle of Old Lumiere to face Renoir, whose power seems limitless. Soon, Aileen arrives to fight alongside the team, and Renoir is defeated. Maelle tells him why she wants to stay, and he finally agrees to trust her rather than fight against her.
In a high tower surprise, Verso passes out of the painting into a void where he sees a faceless little boy painting. This is the last remaining piece of his soul, and he begs the boy to stop painting.
Maelle encounters him, and a dig, deep down moment occurs, one that impacts the outcome of the story. Verso is tired, wanting to end his immortal existence and destroy the canvas, while Maelle wants to keep living in it.
Here, the players are the ones who must execute the new plan and determine their fate.
If Maelle is chosen, a fight with Verso ensues, and as Maelle is victorious, Verso collapses, begging her to destroy the canvas, saying, “I don’t want this life!” over and over again.
The story jumps forward in time, and citizens of Lumiere gather at the concert hall to hear Verso play piano. As an aging Verso takes the stage, he casts a glance at Maelle, perhaps out of spite, and notices that her face is already beginning to show signs of difficulty sustaining the lives inside the canvas, just like Ailene’s.
If Verso is chosen, he fights until defeating Maelle, watching her gommage away with the rest of the canvas. Verso walks hand in hand with the little boy as they also disappear.
In the real world, the family grieves at the grave until only Alicia remains, waving goodbye to the apparitions of her friends as they disappear into nothing.
Both endings resonate with the theme, and they remind us that no matter what, grief is a difficult process and our choices in dealing with it impact our own lives and the lives of those around us.
NOW TRY IT ON YOUR STORY
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