Life is Strange

Oh wow, I forgot to mention my thoughts on the game despite episode one being released months ago.

I'm really enjoying this sequel so far, but it is really anxiety producing. The lack of rewind superpowers means that every crisis is far more intense.

I was worried that I would be constantly making unfair comparisons between the Diaz brothers and Max and Chloe, but the Diazes are worthy protagonists in their own right.

My main trepedition is that since the brothers are traveling, it's hard to get too attached to the side characters because we probably won't be seeing them after we leave the places where they live. Hopefully Brody will return at some point and Cassidy and her pals will be present throughout the game.

You can't buy single episodes? That is a bit weird.

The second episode fell flat for me. A lot of the conversations felt kind of unprovoked and unnatural. Like the Dad unloading all his baggage onto Sean just came out of nowhere.It felt like they were either trying to recap Captain Spirit in case you didn't play it, or maybe make excuses for Chis's Dad?

The game tries to tell you Claire is judgemental or something, but she's shown to be so nice, and Sean seems grateful enough to her that her "boring rules" seemed pretty reasonable. And she gets over you using Daniel's powers to save Stephen pretty fast soooo they're wrong?. Even the "no phones or internet" rule made sense because after the Blogger's advice from episode 1 you could assume the police were watching their internet history. And the game vindicates Claire anyway, because Sean and Daniel had to run from the cops, because they didn't follow her advice about not going out in public..

Maybe they just didn't give you enough time to get a sense that Claire was being overbearing, or maybe it was meant to be a slice of life episode and you just didn't get enough to do with the Captain Spirit characters to enjoy seeing them again. I'm not sure, but I don't feel like it worked.

Chris standing in front of the Cop car to save you was cool though.

Edited by xanderiskander on Jan 30th 2019 at 12:21:00 PM

Yeah, it wasn't the best episode.

I didn't get the last bit you mentioned. The Diazes simply went out the back, talked briefly to Chris on their way through his yard, and got away without being seen (as far as I know).

I think that happens if you keep the secret instead of telling Daniel to stop lying to Chris. So he ends up believing he can use superpowers to stop the cop car. But it might have been a different choice too.

Between Kingdom Hearts 3, Devil May Cry 5, and this, I've been avoiding gaming news like the plague.

Has the reaction to LIS 2 been tame compared to the first one? This thread at least seems less active. The LIS subreddit is full of fanart for the first game rather than the second (which is kind of why I still lurk there instead of going cold turkey).

I'm enjoying it quite a bit.

I think the reason for it getting less hype than the original is that it's a completely new cast and story. Also, the gaps between episode releases are much longer than the original, so there's less to talk about at the moment.

Speaking of which, [[https://twitter.com/LifeIsStrange/status/1108760182358564865 DONTNOD announced today that Episode 3 comes out May 9, Episode 4 comes out August 22, and Episode 5 comes out December 3.

Yeah, the longer gap between episodes is the main thing killing the hype, I think, and, well, I just haven't engaged with it as much. I think maybe it's the road trip thing; you're constantly meeting new characters with no opportunities to learn more about them and get drawn into their lives as well as the protagonists' lives.

I'm surprised the controversy about how you're required to buy the season pass to get episodes 2-5 didn't kill the new game. Did they do away with that?

The season pass deal combined with the large gap in episodic releases did season 2 no favors. Especially when it seems like the reason for it was making every episode at least 3 hours long. I don't feel like you need the extra hour to convey the information every episode so far focused on really.

As much as I enjoyed little moments like these

They hurt Before the Storm. I'm usually in favor of Original Flavor but, as I was using this to distract myself from coursework, I realized:

The "moments of calm" work better for Max because of her power. Her asides are usually profound and introspective. At one point Max wishes for little moments frozen in time. Not only does it make sense for an anxious college student we see her get her wish in Episode 2. These reflective moments represent her ability and add to the game's magical realism.

Chloe doesn't have this luxury. Chloe's asides are funny (like looking at the painting in Rachel's living room) but rarely profound. Some of them set the mood (the junkyard) but that could have easily been conveyed in other ways. Rather than owning the patent on time travel she's stuck in the moment.

Backtalk, leaving graffiti, having dreams of her dad, all of these things make sense for her. Her connection with Rachel, too, is symbolized as a rapidly-growing fire, constantly in motion, seizing all it touches - and in the end, against all odds, it sort of succeeds. Exactly the opposite of Max who kept trying to stop things from happening without damaging the fabric of reality, to which she fails.

Another way I visualize this:

Max

• has visions of the future - vision/wakefulness
• is constantly trying to prevent the future while inwardly spectating about whether she's doing good or evil
• has gameplay where stops to reflect the world figuratively "paused" around her oh yeah, she can time travel

Chloe

• has dreams about a figure from her past - dreams/slumber
• laments her future and outwardly commits to just hitting bottom at top speed
• has gameplay where she stops to reflect does not computer ERROR

tl,dr - the calm moments should have been replaced with Backtalk and Chloe doing things like playing D&D

Edited by Soble on Apr 1st 2019 at 9:24:12 AM

Episode 3 teaser

It also confirms that episodes are available separately from now on (Ep 2 is already available separately).

Did anyone else play this episode on PC and had their Xbox One controller suddenly not work after working fine with the previous episodes (and with other games)?

Good episode overall.

• I like the hippies and hope that they'll be sticking around. This game needs a supporting cast.
• Holy shit Sean is bi! Nothing happened between him and Finn though. Presumably I would have had more options to flirt with Finn if I approved of his plan.
• Was also surprised by the nudity.
• Sean slept with Cass. That was kind of uncomfortable, given that he's a minor and she seems to be an adult, but it was in character for Sean, so I did it.
• I had Daniel use his powers to stop Merrill and Big Joe. Daniel got shot in the shoulder, and went berserk, collapsing the buildling and seemingly killing everyone, although judging by the decisions screen and the preview, Sean, Cass, and Finn are just injured.
• If the hippies do stick around, I do hope that Finn doesn't suffer the fate of Telltale's determinant characters. Dontnod's generally been much better about having your decisions matter, so I'm not too worried.

I knew it was a dumb decision to try and rob Merrill, but I figured having no money was equally dangerous, and I had confidence in Daniel's powers.

I appreciate how going along with Finn's plan (and admitting it) ruins your chances with Cass. She just leaves you freezing in the lake. I'm used to Bioware games where you can make decisions ideologically opposed to everything they stand for, but still have a relationship because you got enough approval through talking. But here, if you fuck it up, you fucked it up.

So no sex for Sean.

Edited by SilentColossus on May 11th 2019 at 5:26:35 AM

I haven't really looking into Li S 2. Is it any good? What's the main conceit of it?

That was kind of my big worry about the series going into a second season was that they either would ruin the original by trying to continue it, or they'd start with a clean slate but just not capture the magic of the original.

Most complaints I've seen are either by people who don't like the game because they think the racism the main characters face isn't realistic (Even though it is.) or because of the season pass situation (Though that got fixed.).

To be fair, the season pass thing was ridiculous.

For me, they haven't recaptured the magic of the original. I can't really pin down why not either, other than the time passed between episodes both in the game and between actual releases. Each episode feels like a self-contained thing, there's much less of an overall arc this time (season one's being what happened to Rachel Amber), and as a result there's a slightly disjointed feel to it. So far, no episodes have ended on any kind of cliffhanger or anything like, if I remember right, season one's usually did, and combined with the fact that it's been three to four months between episodes for s2 instead of six weeks for s1, I'm just not anticipating each episode as much.

So yeah, I'm just not as invested in this season. I find myself making the decisions based more on what I want to happen than what I think Sean would do, and I don't agonise much over them either.

That said, this probably was my favourite episode so far.

• I didn't go along with Finn's plan. Joe didn't follow us, and everyone was injured but no-one was killed.
• Sean got laid.
• I had no idea it was possible for Sean to kiss Finn until I saw the choice review at the end, and since I didn't get those kind of vibes from their interactions at all, it felt to me like another thing put in to please the shippers out there, and the people who want everyone to be gay for gayness' sake (that probably makes me sound like an arsehole).

Edited by artfulscruff on May 12th 2019 at 6:11:19 PM

I'm going to go out on a limb and state that Life is Strange 2 isn't as good as the previous two games. You can't bottle lightning with likable characters and Chloe/Max are two characters that both male as well as female gamers adored. They were immensely relatable and the mysteries of the town were something a lot of people wanted to know about.

Bluntly the brothers seem to be nice people but aren't....as interesting.

There were also a bunch of mysteries in Arcadia Bay I think people still wanted to explore.

"(that probably makes me sound like an arsehole)"

Kinda does. People wanting to be represented aren't asking for "everyone to be gay for gayness' sake".

In fact, that argument basically places cisgender heterosexuality as some sort of default you have justify leaving.

Edited by Bisected8 on May 12th 2019 at 10:08:46 AM

Kind of what I was thinking, but maybe in more passive words.

Like, fandoms don't tend to just make characters gay for the sake of making everyone gay, it's more a response to the LACK of gay characters in the vast majority of media that causes gay fans to have to look at the characters they're given either for 'de-coding' a character's sexuality from what was acceptable in the published context, or trying to imagine better representation instead of quite simply fighting over the rotten and negligible scraps that gay fandoms are given.

And, god, if you don't think gay fans can be 'terrible', look at any time a character is announced as gay. And this is coming from someone who IS LGBT+. You will almost always see some response of "This character isn't 'gay' enough" or some similar reply. And I'm critical but sympathetic to that kind of a response because I understand where it's coming from; We don't have enough gay characters. And EVERYONE wants to feel represented when one is announced. And when there is ONE gay character in your cast, they represent ALL of 'The Gays TM' so some parts of your audience will feel alienated when they feel like they're expected to relate to a character because they're gay, despite maybe not relating the the rest of the traits that surround that gay character.

For example, I've seen a lot of gay characters that get a response of "They're too straight" despite being a gay character. And while I think trying to judge a character based off their supposed hetero or homosexual traits entirely misses the point and is entirely disgusting for a variety of reasons, it really stems from a problem of 'The Gay Character' as though LGBT is somehow a singular character trait. We can't have just "Manly Gays" or "Yas Drag Queens" as some might put it specifically because neither one nor the other or even both encompasses the whole of the LGBT community. In fact, the solution to this is to make entire CASTS of characters with diverse sexuality so no one character feels like a mouth-piece or viewpoint of the gay community.

This also will lead to more interesting stories and conflicts to come out of gay storylines. One of the reasons why 'Coming out' or 'It sucks to be gay' storylines are so common is because they only really require one gay character to exist, maybe two if you pull a Bury Your Gays. But by having entire casts of gay characters, we can explore a lot of different issues across the community and possibly even discuss the exact above problem of singular gay representation; Characters go to a movie, one guy feels insulted because the gay character was x, y, and z and isn't what 'gay' means to him, while another could be gushing and super excited because he felt really represented in the character. Or you could put it with a lesbian character excited for a lesbian super-hero isn't sexualized or anything, while her male friend is frustrated that there's a lesbian super hero before any gay male ones and maybe discuss how few gay male characters exist, then counter with our lesbian character discussing quantity vs quality. And in general leading to some discussion of community pride and celebration that we should support each other when represented and that fighting over representation might do more damage than good.

You could do a LOT of really interesting conflicts and commentary if we have entire casts of gay characters. But since we basically never see that, all that potential is passed up. And I've only thrown out modern contemporary possibilities.

Sorry. Kind of totally went on tangent. I'm sorry.

To be honest, I do think LIS' appeal is in part because it's a:

• Nonviolent
• Female led
• Queer friendly

Game.

That made it feel very unique.

And explains the backlash against the two leads being male early on. At least the older brother is now bi in addition to being non-white, so hopefully those people have been placated.

The Life is Strange reddit notably has a very strong reaction to a "friendship only" Chloe and Max and how much they hate it.

For them it is one of the few queer games that really appeals to them.

It's why Before the Storm was really loved (even though that ends in Bury Your Gays).

This is probably gonna sound like a mess, I'm not especially good at getting points across.

Right or wrong I default to thinking people are straight, if I think about it all, until it's shown otherwise. I know that's probably not the right way to think, and probably it's a generational thing, and I hope you don't take it be any personal prejudice of mine, because it's not.

Of course representation is good, I just feel that in certain cases it comes off as a bit token, to me, and though I didn't express it well before, I think my problem with it is from a narrative/writing point of view, rather than it having anything to do with anyone's sexuality, just this example happens to involve a same-gender pair.

In the case of Sean and Finn, I didn't get any vibes that there was any attraction there from either character, compared to the very obvious front-and-centre attraction between Sean and Cassidy. Since no groundwork was laid for any kind of romantic or sexual encounter between them, seeing that such a thing was even possible just didn't make sense to me. Possibly it depends on the way the player chooses to have Sean behave. I had similar feelings about the possibility of a romance between Max and Chloe in season one; again, in my playthrough at least, there was no hint that they were anything more than friends, so that's the way I played it.

I thought I had more to say, but actually I think that's it. I hope it comes across as intended and that I haven't dug a hole for myself.

To perhaps begin digging a separate hole though, that's something that kinda winds me up; when one thing is praised for having female leads, while another is criticised for having male leads. Again, representation is good, but to my mind praising one thing while criticising another isn't equality. It shouldn't matter what gender or sexuality anyone is, but unfortunately we live in a world where it does matter, to people on both sides.

I don't blame you for feeling that way. Shipping Goggles and Homoerotic Subtext aren't subjects everyone is going to perceive the same way. I was going to say another issue was the determinate nature of Max and Sean's sexuality, but The Walking Dead: Season Four had male and female love interests for Clementine wit believable subtext for both. On the otherhand, that could tie back my the perception issue I mention before, but the point remains the writing didn't convince you of the direction others felt about the situation.

Edited by VeryMelon on May 13th 2019 at 9:53:42 AM