The Story of How a SoundCloud Discovery Created the Soundtrack of the Year.
Understanding the magic behind Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's music.
Hey everyone!
After diving deep into Expedition 33's marketing success and interviewing their Marketing Director about how they sold 3.3M copies, I kept coming back to one question: what made players so emotionally invested that they became evangelists (I mean, check the subreddit)?
One of the reasons was Lorien Testard's soundtrack.
As a lifelong gamer who plays across most genres, I've learned throughout my career and as a gamer that music influences how players connect with games in ways most people underestimate. Dyouring my time as lead communications manager for Dark Souls 3, we shifted from "die die die" messaging to "challenging" positioning, also thanks to music partnerships with creators like Smooth McGroove: this video, and this one, weren’t entirely organic (despite the absence of “ad” tag); it came out of a partnership I signed with him.
Fun fact: we managed to persuade FromSoftware to share the sheet music with us before the game's release - and if you know FS, I am incredibly proud of that!
This soundtrack resonated with me deeply due to the themes it explores: grief, anger, hope, denial and love. So I researched everything.
Here's my analysis of how they created 154 tracks that rival AAA productions while helping a small French studio punch far above their weight class. This is my personal read on the soundtrack and the creative process behind it, based on my research.
Yes, I'm structuring this in three acts to match the game itself, minus all those epilogue sequences which bamboozle you every time.
Quick disclaimer: I'm not musically educated and couldn't play an instrument if my life depended on it. I've watched videos where highly trained people argue that Testard wasn't as technically skilled as some producers or arrangers. I know what moves me, and I understand how music works in the context of games and marketing.
Act 1: Building the Foundation
Here's what stands out about 2025: a 30-person studio releasing their debut game and outselling AAA giants. A composer was discovered on via SoundCloud creating a massive soundtrack that rivals the biggest orchestral productions. A soundtrack so integral to a game's success.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 achieved exactly that.
In Expedition 33's case, that element has a name: Lorien Testard, and the 8+ hour musical epic he composed from nothing.
A Serendipitous Discovery
The story begins in 2020 with a forum post that would reshape everything. Lorien Testard, working as a guitar teacher by day, had been religiously composing video game music every week for a year. Fifty tracks uploaded to SoundCloud. Zero industry connections. Just pure passion and a disciplined commitment to improving his craft.
One day, he shared a composition on an indie gaming forum. Guillaume Broche, Game Director at Sandfall Interactive, happened to see it.
This wasn't a carefully orchestrated talent search or an expensive recruitment campaign. Broche reached out directly, asking if Testard would be interested in composing the soundtrack for their upcoming project.
That project became Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.
Early Integration as Competitive Advantage
Most game studios treat music like wallpaper. Gorgeous, expensive wallpaper that gets applied after everything else is built. Composers typically get hired when the game is 70-80% complete, handed a pile of gameplay footage, and asked to "make it sound epic, bro"
Sandfall Interactive took a different approach. They treated music as foundational design.
Testard wasn't just composing music. He was receiving early concept art, script fragments, and character designs. He was in creative meetings alongside art directors and narrative designers. The music wasn't being retrofitted to the game; it was co-evolving with the game.
When music co-evolves with game design, narrative, and art direction, the score can respond to and even inform other development aspects organically. This beats adding music as a reactive layer later in the process.
The collaborative nature of this process sometimes led to unexpected discoveries. In one notable instance, Testard had discarded a composition for the character Goblu, relegating it to what he called his "trash folder." Guillaume Broche discovered the track during one of their creative sessions and immediately recognised its potential, championing it for inclusion in the final soundtrack. This anecdote illustrates how the close creative partnership enabled a continuous refinement process, where even "failed" compositions could be rescued and reimagined.
The Bold Cultural Choice
While most fantasy RPGs chase the generic orchestral sound of Hollywood blockbusters, Testard made a choice that carried significant risk: he went distinctly French. (Which allows me to use one my favourite and most used memes)
Belle Époque aesthetics. French lyrics throughout. An accordion in a fantasy RPG. An alto saxophone representing the Gestral culture. These were choices that should have alienated mainstream audiences. Accordion in a fantasy RPG? French lyrics for global players? Instead, they became one of the exact reasons people fell in love with the game.
This cultural authenticity hits differently than other standout soundtracks. While Persona 5 made UI and style feel cohesively stick to modern Japan, Expedition 33 makes the entire French identity feel lived-in, like you're inhabiting a real (haha) place rather than visiting a theme park. While Nier made you cry with its ethereal vocals (I remember certain scenes vividly), this game makes you cry and gives you 154 tracks to obsess over, each one contributing to a massive emotional tapestry.
Technical Ambition on a Small Budget
Small studios typically can't afford the kind of adaptive music systems that AAA productions take for granted. Dynamic soundtracks require significant programming resources, extensive testing, and technical expertise that 30-person teams often lack.
Sandfall invested in one anyway.
Testard designed a system where battle music could soften during extended encounters, giving players "space to breathe" before building to climactic crescendos. Here's what this feels like in practice: You're struggling with a challenging boss fight, the epic battle theme building tension. But after two minutes of fighting, instead of that same loop driving you insane, the music softens, giving your brain space to breathe. Then, when you finally land that perfect combo sequence, it roars back to life like the game itself is celebrating with you.
Multiple environmental themes per area. Unique boss compositions for every major encounter. Music that actively responded to player actions rather than simply looping.
This was ambitious beyond what most debut studios attempt.
The foundation was set. But all the technical innovation and cultural authenticity in the world means nothing without the right creative vision to bring it to life.
Act 2: The Creative Evolution
Eighteen months into development, Testard made a decision that would transform everything. He needed a vocalist who could do more than perform; he needed a creative partner who could help shape the emotional core of the entire experience.
Enter Alice Duport-Percier.
The Voice That Became the World
Testard describes the human voice as "the instrument that moves him most emotionally, capable of expressing the full range of human emotions, from fragility to anger, despair to acceptance." For Expedition 33, he wanted the voice to be "at the heart of the music, almost as if it were the voice of the world itself."
Most composers would hire a session vocalist, hand them the sheet music, and call it a day. Testard took a different approach: he made Duport-Percier a co-composer.
Her credentials were impeccable: trained at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Lyon, co-founder of award-winning early music ensembles, and operatic performer. She had also collaborated with Grissini Project, a group known for their high-quality, emotionally powerful covers of game soundtracks. But more importantly, she was passionate about interactive media composition.
The working relationship was crucial. Testard would provide instrumental tracks and lyrics along with his feelings about the song's emotional context. Duport-Percier would then create vocal lines guided by her artistic sensitivity. She wasn't just interpreting his vision; she was co-creating it.
Take Lumière, the central hub city. Most games give you one theme and call it done. Here, arriving at dawn, you are greeted with hopeful strings and gentle vocals that make you want to explore every corner. Return at midnight, and haunting, ethereal vocals transform the same streets into something mysterious and melancholic. It's the same place, but the music makes it feel like a completely different emotional experience.
A Smart Character Integration Choice
Perhaps the most thoughtful collaboration decision involved Ben Starr, voice actor for the character Verso. Instead of hiring a separate vocalist for Verso's song "Until Next Life," Testard had Starr perform it himself alongside Duport-Percier.
This blurred the line between character and performer in a way that deepened immersion. Players weren't hearing someone sing about Verso; they were hearing Verso sing his own story. Testard praised Starr's "raw and human voice" for adding "the weight and weariness of Verso into the song."
This storytelling technique would prove crucial for the narrative challenges ahead.
Planting the Emotional Seed
Early in the game, players encounter a seemingly simple song: "Continuer à t'aimer." It appears during a character introduction moment when Sophie and Gustave are having a chat, with Lune playing the melody. Sophie even jokingly suggests that Gustave might have had an affair with Lune at some point, adding a layer of playful tension to the moment.
They would be wrong to dismiss it as just another character moment.
When you first hear "Continuer à t'aimer" during this introduction, it feels like simple character development. By the time you reach the "Une vie" trilogy and that same melody has transformed into a desperate, earth-shattering plea, you realise you've been emotionally set up most cleverly. It's like the composers planted an emotional seed that bloomed into devastation.
This melody would become an integral part of the emotional DNA of the entire soundtrack, reappearing in various forms throughout the journey. But its true significance wouldn't be revealed until the epic 11-minute "Une vie" trilogy near the game's climax, where the sentence "continuer à t'aimer" becomes a desperate plea between tragic characters.
But even this pales compared to the narrative challenge Testard was about to face.
Notable Thematic Material
The soundtrack is rich with memorable themes that define characters, locations, and emotional states:
The main theme, "Alicia," stands out with its ethereal vocals and use of an old language from the Occitan region in France, aiming to convey emotion beyond lyrical meaning, a technique reminiscent of the Nier soundtracks.
"Lumière" serves as a central location theme with multiple variations across the soundtrack, suggesting a "mini-soundtrack within a soundtrack" approach for this key area. This allows for deeper environmental storytelling and emotional contouring within the zone, reflecting different times of day, specific sub-locations, or evolving narrative circumstances, rather than relying on a single static theme.
The Gestral music is characterised by its playful and quirky energy, with titles such as "Gestral Beach - I'd Rather Play Pétanque!" "Gestral Beach - My Grandma Hits Harder!" and "Ancient Sanctuary - Megabot#33." The infamous "Mime song" also features the accordion, a deliberate nod to French stereotypes that Testard described as "both a duty and a guilty pleasure."
Music for the Sirène dungeon, including tracks like "Sirène - Robe de Jour" and "Sirène - Robe de Nuit," was crafted to express "softness," utilising classical guitar and the low whistle to evoke an intimate and ethereal atmosphere, with the Sirène's voice spatialized within the game world. As an Axon created by Renoir, Sirène's musical treatment reflects the artificial yet emotionally resonant nature of these constructed beings.
The "Visages" suite of tracks explores different emotions through paired instrumental "Nocturnes" and vocal "Arias." "Nocturne" in classical music often implies a dreamy or melancholic instrumental piece, while an "Aria" is typically a highly expressive solo vocal piece. As another Axon creation of Renoir's, Visages represents pure emotional architecture made manifest, providing a rich palette for emotional scoring in an area linked to Surrealism and emotional expression.
Production Innovation
Testard employed innovative production techniques, such as layering up to 12 different piano sounds to create unique timbres. The core musical styles blend lyrical orchestral pieces for emotional moments and exploration, prog-rock for boss battles, and ambient soundscapes for atmosphere, alongside French Chanson and surprising electronic/dance tracks.
The Ultimate Test
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A Complex Compositional Challenge
Before diving into the narrative complexity, consider this structural masterstroke: the entire soundtrack begins with "Alicia" (Disc 1, Track 1) and ends with "Maelle" (Disc 3, Track 26). This isn't a coincidence; it represents the protagonist's complete transformation from her true identity (Alicia Dessendre) to her chosen self (Maelle). Fun fact I found while reading Reddit: apparently, the lyrics are the same, except that in the beginning, they are in an old language from the Occitan region, and then they are in French at the end.
Here's the narrative bomb that Testard's musical architecture had to support: the entire world players explore, the characters they love, the conflicts they invest in, might all be an elaborate construct born from grief. The "painted world" revelation changes how we see everything as a form of escapism and coping mechanism.
This presents an unprecedented compositional challenge. How do you create music that fosters genuine emotional investment in a world that the narrative might ultimately frame as "less real"? How do you make players care deeply about characters whose struggles might be reframed as elaborate psychological processing?
Most composers would either telegraph the artificial nature early (ruining the emotional investment) or ignore it entirely (making the revelation feel disconnected from the musical experience).
Testard chose a third path: emotional authenticity regardless of reality.
A Thoughtful Musical Approach
Rather than musically hinting at the world's constructed nature, Testard committed fully to making every emotion, every character struggle, every moment of beauty feel absolutely genuine. This creates what could be called "complicit immersion": the music makes players care so deeply about the painted world that when its true nature is revealed, the emotional investment doesn't feel betrayed.
Instead, it feels tragically authentic to the characters' experience within their constructed reality.
The musical architecture Testard built supports this approach effectively. Themes like "Continuer à t'aimer" plant emotional seeds that bloom into devastating significance during the "Une vie" trilogy, regardless of the world's reality. When players understand the painted world's true nature, their attachment doesn't diminish; it transforms into something deeper and more complex.
Lune's Tragic Arc Through Music
A poignant example of this approach is the thematic connection between character and melody. The song "Continuer à t'aimer" appears early in the game, establishing this melody as a theme of enduring love and commitment. The track is associated with Lune's character, but its true emotional weight becomes clear later.
Depending on narrative choices, Lune's character arc can lead to darker places, creating a tragic irony where the character connected to a song about eternal love may ultimately embody its opposite. In Verso's ending, the final image players see of Lune is one of pure, unfiltered hatred directed toward him. The character whose theme spoke of continuing to love has been consumed by its antithesis.
The "Une Vie" Trilogy: Where Everything Converges
The three 11-minute epic tracks ("Une vie à t'aimer," "Une vie à peindre," "Une vie à rêver") represent the culmination of Testard's musical architecture. Here, the "continuer à t'aimer" motif reaches its full emotional power, becoming a desperate plea between the Paintress (Aline) and the Curator (Renoir).
What began as Lune's gentle song has transformed into the musical representation of love persisting through tragedy, creation emerging from pain, and dreams becoming both salvation and trap.
The trilogy features duets between Duport-Percier and Victor Borba (known for his work on Devil May Cry 5's "Bury the Light"), whose contrasting vocal styles enhance the emotional climax of major story confrontations. The central refrain echoing Lune's earlier performance transforms the trilogy into the culmination of themes established from the game's beginning.
The Music Box Metaphor
Throughout the final disc, numerous character themes appear in "Music Box" versions: "Verso (Music Box)," "Lullaby for my Sister (Music Box)," "Gustave (Music Box)," "Lumière (Music Box)," "Sciel (Music Box)," "Lune (Music Box)," and "Alicia (Music Box)." Music box arrangements in soundtracks often evoke nostalgia, childhood innocence, fragility, cherished memories, or a haunting sense of something lost. Their concentration on Disc 3, alongside tracks with titles like "We Lost," "Dolorosa," "Lettre à Maelle," "It's Time to Stop Painting," and "Aux Lendemains non Écrits," strongly suggests that this disc musically supports the game's emotional ending.
These miniaturised, fragile renditions serve as subtle musical metaphors for memory and artifice, but they're presented as nostalgic rather than revealing. This suggests Testard prioritised emotional truth over narrative "honesty": a choice that makes any revelations more impactful because players' attachment feels genuine, not manipulated.
The result is a soundtrack that works regardless of how players interpret the narrative's reality. Whether the painted world is "real" or not becomes irrelevant; the emotions it generates are authentic, and that's what matters for the musical experience.
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As someone who considers this soundtrack among the all-time greats alongside Persona 5 and the Warcraft series, what strikes me most is the emotional management. Persona 5 makes you feel stylish and rebellious. Warcraft makes you feel epic and heroic. Expedition 33 makes you feel the entire spectrum of human emotions, then changes how we see those feelings without invalidating them. That's not just good composition; that's emotional storytelling mastery.
Of course, not every choice landed perfectly. Some players found the French lyrics created a disconnection during emotional climaxes, particularly for non-French-speaking audiences. The 154-track scope, while comprehensive, can feel overwhelming for casual listeners. The dynamic music system, innovative as it was, had technical hiccups at launch that required post-release patches. And the cultural specificity, while distinctive, meant the game's musical identity wouldn't resonate equally across all global markets.
(But I want to say… SKILL ISSUE? Nah, I’m kidding.)
Act 3: The Impact
What Testard and Sandfall achieved with Expedition 33's soundtrack offers valuable insights for how small studios can compete effectively with industry giants.
The Marketing Amplification Effect
Every musical choice enhanced the player experience while simultaneously supporting the broader marketing strategy:
The Ben Starr collaboration didn't just create crossover appeal with Final Fantasy audiences; it made Verso's story feel authentic
The French cultural identity didn't just give marketing clear positioning against generic fantasy competitors; it made the world feel genuine
The orchestral recordings and scope didn't just provide concrete metrics for "premium AA" positioning; they delivered on the promise of epic scope
The epic showcase pieces didn't just anchor trailer campaigns and Xbox event presentations; they gave players moments of genuine transcendence
Music wasn't just supporting the marketing; it was enabling it.
The Strategic Advantages
Early Integration as Competitive Weapon: By involving music in fundamental design decisions, small studios can create cohesion that larger productions often struggle to achieve due to compartmentalised development.
Cultural Identity as Market Differentiation: In a saturated market, distinctive cultural specificity cuts through noise more effectively than generic excellence. The French identity became a marketing asset, not a limitation.
Vocal Collaboration: Co-composer relationships with vocalists elevate beyond traditional performer arrangements, creating authentic emotional resonance that session work rarely achieves.
Dynamic Systems as Features: Adaptive music technology becomes marketable content, not just a technical improvement. Players and the press actively discuss the musical innovation as a selling point.
Epic Showcase Moments: The 11-minute "Une vie" trilogy provided memorable moments for promotional campaigns while demonstrating compositional ambition that rivals AAA productions.
Questions Worth Considering
Expedition 33's success raises interesting questions about industry assumptions:
Why do most studios still treat music as post-production polish rather than foundational architecture?
How many other forum discoveries are we missing due to traditional recruitment approaches?
What other cultural identities could cut through market saturation as effectively as Testard's French aesthetic?
Can this model scale, or does it require the specific circumstances of a passionate debut studio?
What This Suggests for Game Music
What Testard accomplished suggests that successful game music may increasingly come from deeper integration, stronger creative partnerships, and a willingness to embrace a distinctive identity over market-tested approaches.
The most memorable soundtracks often come from composers who understand that they're creating emotional architecture that supports both narrative complexity and player engagement.
Perhaps the most personal touch comes in "Aux Lendemains non Écrits," where Testard embedded his feelings about the story's themes of hope and moving forward. It's a reminder that, beneath all the technical innovation and strategic thinking, this soundtrack succeeds because it carries genuine emotional investment from its creator.
In an industry where we remember soundtracks like Chrono Trigger's timeless melodies or The Last of Us's intimate guitar work, Expedition 33 earns its place through something rarer: emotional honesty combined with technical brilliance. It doesn't just support the game; it becomes an integral part of the experience itself.
Key Takeaways
For Developers:
Integrate music into core design decisions from day one
Seek co-composer relationships, not just session performers
Embrace cultural specificity over generic appeal
Treat dynamic music systems as marketable features
For Publishers:
Musical quality becomes competitive differentiation
Soundtrack excellence supports premium positioning
Epic compositions provide marketing showcase moments
Cultural identity helps with market positioning
For Composers:
Early project involvement creates better integration opportunities
Collaborative relationships yield more authentic results
Cultural authenticity beats generic orchestral excellence
Understanding business context amplifies creative impact
The story of Expedition 33's soundtrack is ultimately about what becomes possible when creative vision meets strategic thinking, when passion intersects with business understanding, and when a small team refuses to accept the limitations that should constrain them. But also: a lot of luck and timing.
Sometimes the impossible needs someone brave enough to attempt it.
ahri called a 33x in the vidya pit
everyone confused