Life is Strange

What's important to me is that Rachel at least returns whatever Chloe feels for her, because of how it relates to Chloe's behavior in the first game. It also informs me that Rachel isn't that much of a chameleon to Chloe.

I don't doubt they end up friends, or at least Life Is Strange gave me the impression they were friends up until Rachel's disappearance. I also got the impression that while Chloe was madly in love with Rachel, Rachel didn't know this and didn't feel the same, which is why I don't want this game to end up with them together, and at least in part why I won't be doing anything to send them down that path.

Speaking more of Rachel, I find it interesting that her dad is the District Attorney. I hope that comes back into play by the time this ends, because I wonder what happened to him and what investigating he did into Rachel's disappearance.

Well we know from the first game that her family stopped looking for her at some point in the OG timeline whereas in the timeline where Chloe's dad didn't die they were still looking for her during the events of the game. I'm not sure we'll even get far enough in the timeline for Rachel to disappear since there are only three episodes and Life is Strange itself takes place three years in the future.

Also something I just considered. Rachel having wind/fire powers would explain why Chloe is relatively relaxed about Max having time travel powers.

I dunno, if both my best friends turned out to have fucking superpowers, I'd flip my shit the second time more than the first.

And yeah, presumably we won't get anywhere near Rachel's disappearance here, because I'm assuming that it's sticking with the one episode equals one day thing.

Yeah, Mixtape Mode... is kind of worthless. I thought there was an option to play whatever music you wanted during any scene. Instead it's just Chloe in her room smoking a cigarette. She doesn't even have a music player with her so the scene doesn't really make sense.

I haven't picked all of the options to see what the fail conditions are yet. Principal Wells seems like the only one where Chloe could ostensibly "lose."

Psh, I told those kids to roleplay with somebody else. And now I regret it.

I started with a lie and decided that this was going to be Chloe's turn to start opening up to Rachel. Great, now I've got to go back and check this out too.

edited 1st Sep '17 6:32:35 PM by Soble

Just started. I picked the 'Iluminati' outfit. Its similar enough to Season 1 Chloe, but it's lack of jacket, hair, and hat show us she's not quite there yet. I felt like it was nice and appropriate.

I'd considered wearing the Firewalker shirt, but I figured someone might call us on that one.

I'm shocked Blackwell is setting up a crummy stage in the front courtyard and just... leaving everything out? They live in Oregon... On the coast. It could rain any second so the props and everything would be washed out and the stage itself looks like the piece of shit stage my middle school called a drama club. And the Mrs. Grant went on a thing about 'They're pumping so much money into the Arts and not the sciences' and I really wondered why she was wanting to war over what looks like a $5 donation.

I never even tried different outfits, just stuck with the first thing, the raven shirt.

I kind of don't like how some of the choices look when presented later.

'You bought pot from Frank/You didn't slip the money into your mother's purse'... Well, my intention was more to pay off the debt, not buy drugs. Thanks game...

Then there was You were mean to your mother and I kind of felt that was disingenuous because Chloe did tell her how she felt and its pretty clear Chloe is very uncomfortable with David taking the place of William and, while she's an ass about it, she's not wrong. I liked that scene because it felt pretty accurate to arguments I've had with parents and seen with others. I suppose I'm more frustrated with Joyce now because it seems... fairly obvious from Chloe's dialogue what her problem is and it doesn't feel like Joyce is realizing that Chloe is still deeply mourning William and trying to force David, someone who is obviously maladjusted and clearly has the wrong approach to dealing with Chloe or... people, is just the wrong idea. Yes, I realize that maybe Joyce has mourned and moved on and found someone who makes her happy (I'll come back to that), but its clear Chloe hasn't and forcing everything on Chloe just makes Joyce feel kind of unsympathetic. I'm not saying Joyce's decisions should revolve around Chloe, but Joyce isn't approaching the problem with any level of self-awareness to what the actual problem is and its glaring.

On top of that, what DOES Joyce see in David??? This wasn't discussed in Season 1 and that's fine because David was a character that always felt like I was seeing only a portion of who he was and some non-Max/Chloe scenes showed dimension (Post-school suicide, David is crying and Joyce holds him). However, now we're seeing the start of Joyce and David's relationship and his opening line is... about how long women take to get ready and its not said in a joking tone either. It makes me wonder...

Anyway, lots of new school characters. I have mixed feelings. On one hand, Mikey and Steph seem cool, but others... I wish we had more characters returning from Season 1 if just so we got more depth to characters who already had little screen time. Develop those characters before adding new ones or something. You probably could have replaced Drew with Logan and we wouldn't have lost anything. And it ends up making me wonder where some of these characters are later during Season 1.

The estranged father of Rachel has to come up. They wouldn't end the episode on the woman sitting close to a forest fire with a cigarette let alone give her such a specifically designed character model if she wasn't important or mysterious in some way.

Does the episode sneak peak ALWAYS end on 'I want my fucking money' or is that a choice thing? Because I did take the money at the beginning to pay back Frank, but that's an optional thing, not something you have to do. I suppose they could just have had someone else take the money if you don't, but railroading is the term there.

I'm not sure if Rachel has powers. The wind ONLY kicks in when she screams. If it had been continuous from the first scream like the wind picking up, maybe. But the wind visual effects only appear as she screams. So... ?

I suppose my only thing is that I don't know where this is going exactly. If its just to show Rachel and Chloe's relationship, that could be done in a single one-shot episode. So, there's probably something bigger here. Meaning I'd imagine we'll have some major plot twists coming up. But, I keep running into the issue all prequels have; We know where this ends and there are limits on what groundshaking possibilities there are due to the continuing story. So where could this possibly go that it warrented no mention in Season 1?

I didn't even know that taking money and putting it wherever was an option. I never found any. There were a few things like that that I didn't even know were options because I never found them, but it was the same in the first game too, and it's my fault for not exploring thoroughly, not the game's fault for not leading me there.

I highly doubt something like that will be caused by a choice. It has to be a major event unconnected from the money thing.

edited 2nd Sep '17 5:59:46 PM by VeryMelon

Well, if you paid off the money, why would it be Frank? If you never took the money, why would it be the shirt vendor?

...this song punched me right in the kidneys. Spanish Sahara didn't bother me this much and that one was used during a funeral procession.

It's interesting how in spite of Chloe being a pretty terrible person (and heck, Rachel being worse) that people end up connecting with her. Reuniting with a childhood friend/emotional pillar to go on some big adventure is something a lot of people probably fantasize about between coffee breaks and water cooler conversations.

More importantly - I just discovered there was a dynamic PS 4 theme for this game that apparently only went to people who pre-ordered. And you can't even get it off the store yet apparently. If I had known I woulda been all over that. Now I have to mentally superimpose Before the Storm's main menu over my Playstation home screen like a peasant. :(

edited 8th Sep '17 8:32:01 PM by Soble

I preordered and didn't know, or at least forgot, there was a theme :P It's a pretty nice one too. It's actually sorta neutral, like it doesn't have the name and the characters all over it, I could use it as my theme forever.

Well, even assholes can be relatable. Chloe is in mourning and a teenager. Its hard not to feel something to that. Admitedly, her attitude in the first season got a little grating at times because she treated Max like the enemy, but she hasn't done that yet in this time period and she's a lot younger. The scars of what she's going through are a lot fresher.

Hence why I didn't like the post-episode wording; I think its wrong to say she chose to argue with her mother if the alternative is not telling her mother how she feels. If that results in an argument, so be it, but Chloe shouldn't feel bad about saying 'I'm uncomfortable with the guy you're dating'. Was she a bit of an ass? Yes. But she's not wrong exactly either...

I'm sorry? You take that back right now! Nothing will beat the GOD of all sad songs that is Spanish Sahara!!!. But I get your point. Spanish Sahara is just straightforward tears. This one is... unsettling.
I'm assuming you're talking bout the "You were mean to Joyce" thing? I agree. "Mean" implies vindictiveness. Chloe's Brutal Honesty is not that.

(3) Gaaauh.

(2) Assholes can be relatable, yes. But I feel like there's been similar characters I've seen torn apart on this forum and others. I guess I shouldn't be surprised others can relate to a trouble adolescence.

The post-episode wording doesn't really bother me, but it could have been better-worded. I was more surprised that I ended up in the lower percentage between the two choices: "Chloe told Rachel she cares/Chloe told Rachel she wants to bang - 25%/75%".

Oh don't get me wrong, I cried like a little girl when that song played. It's just... I think I was "prepared" for it because I wound up looking up a lot of the music before I'd actually finished the episode, and I'd read a comment that said, "I still can't listen to Spanish Sahara" in reference to the end of the game. So I kind of expected it.

I did not expect for a scene of a teenage girl waking up in the morning in her own bed to be so depressing. It's weird - the stakes aren't as high, I know where the story's going, and yet Chloe and Rachel's angst seems to hurt me deeper than seeing Max get railroaded by the universe.

edited 9th Sep '17 12:01:51 PM by Soble

It makes a lot of sense though. With Spanish Sahara (and the funeral scene) at least you get that ray of light at the end. With No Below (and the waking up scene), it's pure pitch darkness - a somewhat Downer Beginning to a "Shaggy Dog" Story. Hope we'll at least get some sort of satisfaction at the end of this game.

edited 9th Sep '17 12:34:10 PM by HottoKenai

Been watching a Let's Play of this for the past couple days to see what all the hype's about. Loving it so far, but I just passed the alternate timeline sequence and something Just Bugs Me. Namely, why does William have to die to save Chloe? The way Max's powers work is that she moves in time, but not in space, right? So why couldn't she rewind to a time between William's accident and Chloe's, and prevent Chloe's accident thereby saving both of them?

That's a bit of a plot hole in some aspects - we know that Max is able to/is forced to relocate herself from the very beginning when she moves from the bathroom to the classroom, using her Primary Rewind.

The Photo Rewind only lets her affect a limited area around the picture's point of origin. As to why Max can't use it to save William, fear of the butterfly effect. and the fact that she doesn't have any other photos to get her there in the alternate timeline.

Though theoretically she might just be able to take more photos...

edited 11th Sep '17 10:51:14 AM by Soble

Max wouldn't be in any of those photos between events. There'd be no way to time travel because she wasn't there.

There's a pretty strong theme in the game that Chloe is constantly being put into situations that would result in her death about the time when Max shows up, and the only way to stop it is if Max changes the result using her time travel powers.

So if the accident doesn't lead to her death in the present, something else would.

Which brings up the question of what happens if you sacrifice Arcadia Bay. Does Max still have her power? Is the universe still out to get Chloe? Or has letting the storm hit the town "paid the price" for Chloe's life?

edited 11th Sep '17 10:59:38 AM by HottoKenai

Great question! It's once of my bigger gripes with the game because the endings are absolutely terrible and are either contradictory or give so little information as to what happens that it's virtually a non-answer.

edited 11th Sep '17 11:03:48 AM by EpicBleye

The best(?) thing to happen, in my opinion, would be for Max to lose her power in both endings. As cool as her power was, I think she deserve a normal life after all that shit, with or without Chloe.
As for the endings, while they were both depressing and predictable, I was actually fine with them, since it was clear that this was what the devs intended from the start. A happy Take a Third Option ending might have cheapen the story somehow.