I have very few complaints about Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s incredible gameplay, especially when it comes to the depth of possible character builds and dynamic playstyle options. However, there’s one missing feature that is a glaring oversight given the sheer number of weapons, Pictos, and Luminas in the game that players can use to customize their builds for each character. The fact that there’s no functional loadout feature in Clair Obscur is not only surprising, but it’s also the only major issue that makes the late stages of the game a bit frustrating at times.

Clair Obscur has no shortage of incredible weapons, and players can design a unique build and strategy around every single one of them if they feel so inclined. The same goes for each character’s unique set of skills, which can be mixed and matched to individual preferences. This sounds great in theory, but can become time-consuming when you start to think about the various number of Lumina effects and Pictos available to complement a particular weapon and skill set. Without saveable loadouts, players can too easily lose or forget their “perfect” build if they want to experiment with something new.

It’s Hard To Believe Clair Obscur Doesn’t Have Loadouts

Loadouts Would Make Experimenting With New Builds Much More Fun

There are dozens of weapons and hundreds of Pictos and Lumina passives in Clair Obscur, which is part of what makes the game’s combat system so dynamic and customizable. This level of customization is why Clair Obscur has replay value and why every player is able to approach combat with their own strategy and playstyle in mind. When you find a weapon you love and get all the pieces in place, it’s very satisfying, even more so when you’re able to synergize all of your character builds and come up with the perfect party composition.

This is why it’s so hard to believe that you can’t save loadouts for each character in Clair Obscur. Landing on a favorite combination of weapons, skills, Pictos, and Luminas doesn’t happen without quite a bit of effort on the player’s part, and without loadouts, changing things up feels like you could lose that perfect setup and never get it back. Remembering your favorite weapon isn’t too difficult, but remembering the exact Luminas and skills to complement that weapon is a different story. Short of writing each Lumina down or favoriting all of them, players don’t have many options.

Luminas & Pictos Don’t Have A Great Filtering System

Lack Of A Better Lumina & Pictos Filter Exacerbates The Loadout Issue

One issue that makes missing loadouts a bigger problem is that the filtering system for Pictos and Luminas isn’t great. You can filter these and even tag your favorite options, but the filters are somewhat obscure (sorry). Also, there are simply so many Luminas and Pictos that you might end up with dozens of favorites, rendering the feature more or less irrelevant. Even with an improved filtering or favorite system, loadouts would substantially improve the experience of selecting Pictos and Luminas.

In the early game, this isn’t as much of an issue because options are more limited. But once you enter the endgame or New Game Plus, the number of options can be overwhelming. Further, as you gain access to more Colour of Lumina upgrades, you’ll be able to equip dozens of effects on a single character, and the game doesn’t give you any useful way to keep track of these.

Players should not feel discouraged from rebuilding their party.

By the time you reach the later stages of the game, you might even be afraid to change up your build instead of feeling encouraged to play around with new options out of fear you’ll never get back to your previous setup. This is problematic for a game that gives you so many options for customizing builds, and it’s something only a functioning build loadout mechanic can fix.

With The Level Of Build Customization In Clair Obscur, Loadouts Are Essential

If Sandfall Doesn’t Add Loadouts, Modders Need To Step It Up

With literally hundreds of Pictos and passive Lumina effects, countless weapons for each character, and a massive number of skills for each character, re-speccing a character and starting a build over from scratch is a huge undertaking. Players should not feel discouraged from rebuilding their party, and loadouts would give them the ability to mess around with new playstyles worry-free. This is a feature that I think should be near the top of developer Sandfall Interactive’s priority list, and given its willingness to provide players with quality of life updates like difficulty modifiers, it’s not out of the question.

If that doesn’t happen, however, it’s going to fall on modders for Clair Obscur to come up with some sort of loadout system, though this seems like a daunting task that might not be possible with a simple mod. Ultimately, a useful loadout system or saved loadout mechanic is one of the most glaring oversights in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and it’s something that would help players across the board and throughout the entire game. Whether we ever get a loadout feature remains to be seen, but I’ll keep my fingers crossed.