Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Director Says There is Still Prejudice Towards Turn-Based RPGs - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 06 August 2025 / 4,575 Views
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 creative director Guillaume Broche in an interview with Automaton believes there is still a prejudice against turn-based RPGs despite the increased sales in the genre.
"I could talk about the prejudice forever," said Broche. "Personally speaking, I think Japanese turn-based RPGs were super popular up until the Xbox 360 era. But around the time open-world games started getting more popular through gaming media, [JRPGs] started being considered 'uncool.'"
Broche says Persona is one of the more successful examples of the genre, but says turn-based JRPGs have a long way to go to regain the popularity it once had.
"While they do still sell a large number of copies, with the Persona series as a prime example, I feel like the prejudice against turn-based RPGs isn’t completely gone," said Broche.
He added, "It’s not like we added the parry system and built such a narrative experience because we wanted to avoid our game facing prejudice. We just did it because we wanted to do it."
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 sold over 3.3 million units in 33 days. The game released for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC via Steam and Epic Games Store, and Xbox Game Pass on April 24.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
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Outside of Clair Obscur and Baldur's Gate 3, I haven't really played many turn-based RPGs lately, but I still play a lot of turn-based strategy games, and I've always loved the feeling of having to think ahead and strategize on what my next move is going to be. Even several turns ahead theorizing on what the enemy will potentially do. It really makes you think and it's quite the rewarding feeling.
I guess it has a lot to do with the instant gratification that the younger generation is used to, but it is good to see that there is still an audience that is pushing to try to normalize turn-based games.
Most modern crpgs are now turn-based. Josh Sawyer even talked about turn-based "winning in the end" over real-time-with-pause. for a while they were all real time with pause from baldur's gate 1 through dragon age origins and fallout tactics even being developed as a real time title with turn-based mode being a last second addition. Now it seems to have reversed and even Planescape: Torment's spiritual successor Torment Tides of Numenera went for turn-based gameplay.
Yeah, basically the Divinity titles showed the superiority of turn-based system for CRPGs. Even back in the time I loved Baldur's Gate 1+2 (and still do), but even back then I found the fighting confusing and felt a loss of control. That is probably because I didn't realize I gave them new commands to early and cancelled the previous command in the process. Because BG1+2 had turns, they just applied them to real time. So the best strategy is (and so says every strategy guide) to wait the full turn for their actions to complete and then pause to give new commands - which practically makes them turn-based.
Pokemon? I mean seems to me like turn based RPGs are doing well enough. Clair Obscur was great though and I hope it does really well.
I agree with this sentiment. I've lost track of the amount of times I've read "turn based was just because of system limitations, its a relic of the past" or "turn based it outdated" ect. It's lost that coolness factor it used to have. However its not really due to the games imo, some of the best and most memorable games to me, have been turn based.
Checked the question asked, as it's always good for context. Nowadmitting, it's via google translate (can't read Japanese) but they asked about the idea of "turn based combat being boring". Instant gratification gaming wining out I guess, nothing beat a quick death match in CoD in the late 2000s.
But I do feel the idea of "JRPGs turn based being super popular" might come with an asterisk. Final Fantasy was popular. Dragon Quest was big but more so in Japan than the west, then what was there really? Persona was a small franchise. Things shifted and Persona 5's style and cool factor seemed to win out more than it's combat, which while good is more simplistic than pretty much any FF game I've played.
I do hope the future of turn based combat isn't just "add parry/dodge" to everything but same could be said about action games.
Divinity/Baldur Gate also have an interesting take on turn based combat where character placement has a big influence as well. Refanzio also had an interesting system. Nintendo also made another Mario and Luigi game, which is turn based.
Overall I think it's mostly the lack of FF that fires this debate. However With Like A Dragon, MH stories and the Indy space we see plenty of good turn based RPG's with moderate to a lot of financial success.
BG3 is a turn based, yes but tactical turn-based games don't seem to get the same "it's dated" bullcrap like 3-4 characters standing in a row waiting their turn turn-based. But your other examples are well on point.
But on the last bit, totally. It's not even lack of FF, it's lack of turn based FF. The biggest JRPG in the business, the what many consider the pinnacle of turn based RPG gaming isn't a turn based game anymore.
The point of that was "instant gratification" part. Yes lots beat it, agreed, no competitive game is anywhere near my favourite games, but not if your appeal as a developer is to catch the attention of the dopamine instant highs that many modern publishers want to get the attention of the vast majority of gamers.
For all of it's success, FF games only ever sold around 10 or so mil, CoD sells double that each year.
That said: Sandfall, can you port Clair Obscur to Switch 2? Switch is a platform of many turn based RPGs (Octopath, SMT and the like) and it seems with DQ1+2 and Octopath Zero Switch 2 is on the same trajectory. So you find an audience there. I am sure another million sales or so could be achieved.
Meanwhile Baldur's Gate 3 (sure it's a DND game so it's one inevitably turn based) sold an enormous amount of units. The Like A Dragon series (main games) also do quite decently as do Monster Hunter World titles.
There is simply not a lot AAA Devs (excluding pokemon) making turn based games anymore, but overall highly rated turn based games tend to sell quite well.
Ironically, I wanted to play this game until I learned it jumped on the parry/dodge bandwagon.
there's a long history of turn-based rpgs having dodge/block/parry systems going back to super mario rpg. Nor is it uncommmon for modern ones since the current like a dragon games also have action commands and significant real time elements.
So I have to like parry/dodge in my turn-based RPGs because it was in Mario and a handful of other games? Why can't I not like a particular mechanism? Do I HAVE to like it because other people like it or I will be downvoted? No, fuck that.
