Life is Strange

[TheDirtyHobo]

They're pretty similar, but also completely different; it's like comparing PSX Resident Evil to Tomb Raider because they both have tank controls and some gunplay. LiS is more about surrealism and serendipity, Telltale games are about just making you feel fucking awful (I haven't played Borderlands, though).

[Krazy]

Are the Telltale games this good?

In my opinion, no.

[Aevis]

Hard to compare. I loved the first The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us. Both are a couple steps below LiS in terms of graphics and gameplay mechanics, but deliver superb stories in very engaging worlds. I haven't played any of the others, but heard Borderlands is quality while TWD2 and GoT are mediocre.

I'm glad that LiS received all the hype, as it hopefully challenges Telltale to evolve and go beyond their simple interactive movie mechanics, no matter how good their movies are.

[avelle]

They announced a tentative release date for Episode 5 today. October 20th.

http://eu.square-enix.com/en/blog/li...ber-20-release

Hi, It's Luc from Dontnod Entertainment here,

We’ve seen that a lot of you can’t wait to play the Life is Strange finale and are eagerly awaiting a release date. The episode is getting closer to submission and we have almost completed development.

We don’t normally announce a date until we know the game is 100% ready but in the spirit of Max’s birthday (today) we wanted to let you know early that we are aiming to release Episode 5 ‘Polarized’ October 20.

http://eu.square-enix.com/sites/defa...2f77b1925d.png

Many things can change in the lead up to release but the team are working really hard to try and hit this date. We know the wait may be a bit longer than some of you were hoping for but we want to ensure Episode 5 is the best it can be.

Your tweets, comments and messages have kept us going through this busy stage of development and we can’t thank you enough for your continued support.

We are super excited for you to play the finale and we hope you enjoy the ride! We couldn’t have foreseen the great reaction Life is Strange has had so far, the community is fantastic and we love seeing/reading your reactions to each episode.

Share your thoughts, photos or anticipation for Episode 5 using #LISFinale

Follow our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Tumblr pages for further news nearer release.

Thank you

-Luc

Life is Strange Producer – Dontnod Entertainment

[Seravi Edalborez]

Hard to compare. I loved the first The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us. Both are a couple steps below LiS in terms of graphics and gameplay mechanics, but deliver superb stories in very engaging worlds. I haven't played any of the others, but heard Borderlands is quality while TWD2 and GoT are mediocre.

I'm glad that LiS received all the hype, as it hopefully challenges Telltale to evolve and go beyond their simple interactive movie mechanics, no matter how good their movies are.

This is a pretty apt description of Telltale's stuff. It is extremely linear with choices and events being more about shock value than "consequence". TWD2 is really guilty of this where a lot of choices/conflict pop up just because "we need players to make a choice or something, too much exposition". If you can get invested into the respective universes... Wolf Among Us, TWD/2, GoT, and Borderlands are all ok on their own. Pretty big over-reliance on QTEs though.

Life Is Strange is definitely on the next level though. It does still have a status quo where choices only matter so much, but there is enough breadth that it feels like it does actually matter. Maybe subjective. I spent hours on each episode where you can finish most entire Telltale games in a few hours.

[TheDirtyHobo]

Holy shit the final episode gets pretty fucking crazy. Some serious Twin Peaks finale-type shit going on. I was not prepared.

[Tyrath]

I have to wait till I'm home from work to play it >_<

[Chrius]

I should probably play through episode 2, I really enjoyed 1 and then got distracted by netflix and there wasn't even chill

[Tyrath]

You ain't seen nothing yet man. Get going.

[avelle]

Saw that Episode 5 was unlocked last night around 10pm and dove in until completion. All I have to say is wow.

[Aevis]

Full Twin Peaks and I loved every minute. My GOTY 2015! Serious final spoiler:

Spoiler: show

That final decision... I couldn't bring myself to do the "right" thing and sacrifice Chloe. Checked that ending on YT and it's may more powerful than the sacrifice arcadia bay one. That feels more like an afterthought and I almost wish they wouldn't give the choice. It's also the only logical solution. Remove the origin of the butterfly effect. On the other hand I simply had to save Chloe because I thought, fuck it, didn't do all this shit for nothing. I'm not letting you die once more. All my feels.

Also, you know shit's about to go down when dogs are messaging you.

[avelle]

Full Twin Peaks and I loved every minute. My GOTY 2015! Serious final spoiler:

Spoiler: show

That final decision... I couldn't bring myself to do the "right" thing and sacrifice Chloe. Checked that ending on YT and it's may more powerful than the sacrifice arcadia bay one. That feels more like an afterthought and I almost wish they wouldn't give the choice. It's also the only logical solution. Remove the origin of the butterfly effect. On the other hand I simply had to save Chloe because I thought, fuck it, didn't do all this shit for nothing. I'm not letting you die once more. All my feels.

Also, you know shit's about to go down when dogs are messaging you.

Spoiler: show

I made the same decision you did. There was no fucking way I was sacrificing Chloe after that wild ride. And it seems to me like people definitely could have survived that tornado. I guess I will need to check out the other ending though and see what happens.

I am still unclear on one thing though. In the very beginning of the game Max has this vision of a tornado coming towards Arcadia Bay. If the tornado represents the decisions she's made to rewind time to shape the world as she saw fit, why was the tornado even a thing before she started using her rewind power? That seems a little chicken before the egg to me. Was her original dream just a premonition?

[TheDirtyHobo]

Spoiler: show

I personally would've killed the fuck out of Chloe, I didn't like her that much myself (though this episode did a lot for her character, I think), but I felt like it was much more consistent with the narrative to spare her and let Arcadia Bay get wrecked; it would feel like a waste for all the horrible traumatic shit Max had to go through this week to have her end up dying anyways. And I'm a sucker for "Consequences be damned, I'm going to save what I have that's right in front of me" stories.

But talking to my friend about it, she raised the point that it doesn't matter if Chloe ends up dead, the story and Max getting her powers is more about Max's catharsis. Without them, she would've just ended up dead, but now she got to spend a week with her old friend, to make ammends, and to (optionally) fall in love.

[Tyrath]

Spoiler: show

I chose to save Chloe and yeah that ending looked so rushed. The one where Chloe dies is where they get their big kiss

Fuck that though. Many off screen kisses will be had once I save Chloe. Fuck Arcadia Bay. I doubt too many people died in the tornado anyway.

[Tyrath]

Overall I'm pretty unhappy with the final ep I think

Spoiler: show

It fell to the Telltale/ME3 trap. Everything you ever did was made irrelevant for the final choice. And the ending I got was 3 mins long whereas the other one was nearly 10 mins. Highly disappointing ending to a great ride.

[Aevis]

Spoiler: show

While they were irrelevant for the final choice, I thought they did a pretty good job by altering most of the nightmare sequences based on your previous choices. It felt well crafted to me, to first show you a summary of everything you decided on and then have you make the ultimate decision. Just wish both endings were treated equally. Saving Chloe really tells you that you went with the wrong one. Double on that because they only (optionally) make out in the sacrifice one and I secretly hoped for some more girl on girl action when I chose to save her .

What I don't understand is the whole going to the diner and save as many as possible sequence. I thought those might survive if I choose to destroy the town, but it doesn't seem to have any relevance in either of the endings.

[Krazy]

This whole game was amazing and imo, shits all over anything Telltale has done.

[Xanthe]

Spoiler: show

I didn't feel like my choices up to the end were invalidated by my final decision. The entire journey to that point (objectively) was about learning what the heck was going on in Arcadia Bay with Jefferson and the Prescotts. Once we learned everything that we did we were able to set events in motion early to capture our perpetrators. The first (win the contest) and second (Warren's photo, don't enter the contest) times we did it however still left the butterfly effect in motion and we still got the storm. We wouldn't have been able to consider that final choice without the previous realizations.

[Aevis]

Spoiler: show

Some insight about the save Chloe ending from Michel Koch, Co-director of LiS:

[wipers]

Is this game like Heavy Rain ? I watched the trailer for it and got a big Heavy Rain vibe.