Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's "untranslatable" inspiration is finally getting an English release after 22 years

A cult classic book that served as a major inspiration for Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - you know, the game that won basically every GOTY award out there - is finally getting its first English translation.

Alain Damasio's Horde of the Counterwind, originally published as La Horde du Contrevent, became a beloved French novel more than two decades ago. It'll soon become available to the English-speaking world when a hardback copy of the book finally hits store shelves on October 13 in the US (you can find it on Abrams Books) or November 12 in the UK (and here's an Amazon link)

"Twenty-three adventurers––some trained since birth, some gathered up over the course of an interminable journey––climb endlessly against the wind that plagues their desert homeland. Their only purpose: to make it to the Upper Reaches and identify the wind’s mysterious source. Thirty-three hordes before them have tried and failed over the course of 800 years," the novel's blurb reads. "The brave warriors of this wildly imaginative universe must learn to coexist and fight to survive. Each Horde member has a unique personality and a precise duty, and collaborating as a unit is their only hope."

Alain Damasio's sci-fi cult classic deals with many of the same ideas as Sandfall Interactive's RPG. Grief and tragedy, an impending doom, a voyage to stop everyone's inevitable deaths.

For more than 20 years, the book's often been considered impossible to translate thanks to its unconventional wordplay - even the novel's English translator, Alexander Dickow, once called it "untranslatable." Much has changed in the decade since that proclamation, it seems, since he's now giving it his best shot.

Sandfall Interactive co-founder and lead programmer Tom Guillermin cited Horde of the Counterwind as an influence on Clair Obscur shortly before the game became a mammoth hit. "A story about venturing into the unknown on a dangerous adventure" fits both the book and the game, he noted in an interview with Unreal Engine at the time. That's on top of the inspirations that stemmed from Final Fantasy, Persona, Lost Odyssey, and Attack on Titan, of course.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 on Switch 2 is a "big technical challenge" because many Unreal Engine features "don't work," leads say, but Sandfall is "interested" in pulling it off

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