It’s difficult to overstate just what a monumental year 2025 was for Sandfall Interactive and their RPG release Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which blew both fans and critics away thanks to its unique blend of exciting gameplay and stunning visuals.
Though the always difficult conversation around AI recently put a bit of a dampener on things and removed the game from consideration at the Indie Game Awards, the immense success the team experienced beforehand has left plenty of credit in the bank for the game’s audience.
That said, the team who created the game will likely want to have a bit of a rest and to enjoy the fruits of their labour, so it will certainly be sometime before we see another project from the developer itself.
This leaves fans turning to other places to get the same kind of fix and they think they have identified a potential spiritual successor who could hit all the right notes.
Sword and Fairy 4: Remake Could Be a Sleeper Hit
Over on Twitter/X, user GermanStrands shared a trailer for the upcoming release of the Sword and Fairy 4 Remake, claiming that it instantly gives them “Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 vibes,” something which should prick up the ears of the game’s horde of fans – and they’re far from the only person making the claim.
If you read that sentence and find yourself thinking ‘what is Sword and Fairy 4,’ don’t worry, you haven’t missed a major piece of news over the last few years.
The original game was released all the way back in 2007 as The Legend of Sword and Fairy 4, only being made for sale in the Chinese market initially with a true Western version never seeing the light of day in any form.
This latest effort is being made in Unreal Engine 5, and it should have full localisation features when it does release.
It’s absolutely fair to say that the gameplay we have seen so far does highly resemble Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and whether it’s a coincidence or not, it’s a very encouraging sign for the developer that their game could have plenty of mechanics to appeal to a Western audience.
You can view the Steam page for the original right now, but all of the descriptions are written in Mandarin Chinese, so you will have to translate them directly.
We don’t have a release date for this remake just yet, but many expect it to arrive at some point in 2026 on both PC and consoles. Here’s hoping it manages to hit all the same notes as Sandfall Interactive’s spectacular effort.
