About

Expedition 33 Israel Memes refers to disparaging memes implying that the video game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was made by Israelis, won the awards it did at The Game Awards 2025 because of Israeli votes or is "Spiritually Israeli" for sweeping The Game Awards 2025. After The Game Awards aired in mid-December 2025, some people online started criticizing the awards show for awarding nearly every major award to Expedition 33 and criticizing the game in general, despite its general acclaim from players and critics alike.

Some of the most viral memes disparagingly referenced the game alongside Israel, which, in the case of the memes, is a negative comparison due to the Hamas-Israel Conflict. The memes are not based in reality and are meant to be ironic and trollish, as the game was not made by Israeli developers, but rather the French studio Sandfall Interactive.

Origin

On December 11th, 2025, The Game Awards 2025 aired. The French indie RPG Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won nine awards total, including "Game of the Year," "Best Game Direction," "Best Narrative," "Best Art Direction," "Best Score and Music," "Best Performance," "Best Independent Game," "Best Debut Indie Game" and "Best Role Playing Game."

The game's many wins inspired notable criticism from numerous viewers, who felt that other games were deserving of some of the awards.

That night, X^[1] / Twitter user @lexotakup2 posted a meme showing an AI-generated image of an Israeli superhero under the caption, "and the game award for best indie game goes to… Clair Obscur Expedition 33," garnering over 56,000 likes in five days. The meme disparagingly suggests that the game was rigged to win by Israel.

Spread

The memes attributing Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 to Israel following The Game Awards event in mid-December 2025 continued to spread online over the following days.

On December 12th, 2025, TikToker^[2] @d3athst44r posted a similar meme to X user @lexotakup2 using both the Israeli superhero image and an image of an Israeli lion, garnering over 750,000 views in four days.

That day, Instagram^[3] user mfpharao posted a meme captioned, "Netanyahu GENUINELY summoning a billion gajillion IDF soldiers to vote for Expedition 33 in every single category at the game awards," garnering over 6,800 likes in four days.

On December 14th, X^[4] user @Vondyispog posted an Aryan Kpop Demon Hunters SYBAU meme under the caption, "Expedition 33 fans when you mention Israel (or the age of consent)," garnering over 23,000 likes in two days.

On December 16th, 2025, Redditor Cursed_69420 made a post to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[5] subreddit asking about the memes labeling Expedition 33 as Israeli, garnering over 350 upvotes in under a day. The top-voted answer from Redditor EvenSpoonier stated:

answer: Basically, some fans are mad that their favorite game didn't win, and are taking it out on the winner. Undertones more or less match a latter-day GamerGate, complete with the unsettling political undertones. The fans of Western action-RPG Kingdom Come: Deliverance II seem to be taking most of the heat for this, particularly since the JRPG-styled E33 beat it for Best Role-Playing Game. Though some posts from their faction have fanned the flames, it's unclear how much actually comes from them.

Having posted a few meme shots is pretty much as far as the KDC2 social media team has gone, though. Unsettling insinuations that Israel somehow got involved in the voting is a TikTok thing. Really, it's standard Internet-hate-machine nonsense. That pretty much sums it up.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References