3.5/5 ★ – TheCriticalPandaBoi's review of Life is Strange.

Sorry, I know it’s been awhile since I wrote a video game review but I really haven’t been playing much single player games and the games i have played I have not finished *cough* Silent Hill 2 *cough* but I have been playing the recent game in the Life is Strange series and since I’m going to go for the platinum trophy for it and it requires a second playthrough, i thought I’d review the whole series, starting with the first game!! I don’t talk about it often enough but I actually have a soft spot for these games, originally I never wanted to admit that since it’s very teen drama and cringe at points but I can’t help it, I’m sucked into these games and it’s like an annoying addiction. So, I remember the first time I played Life is Strange, I thought it was really damn silly, i actually played the first episode for free due to it being free on the PlayStation Store, and then one of the monthly games was the complete edition of the entire game later down the line so I remember playing the first episode for 40 minutes and thought it was shit. But it wasn’t until 2022 when I was addicted to getting the platinum trophy for games, I needed to 100% complete some games and I went through my gaming library and re-downloaded it, as well as impulsively buying Before the Storm, Life is Strange 2 and True Colours. I actually got up the achievement list for this review to tell y’all the exact date i 100%ed the game, it was July 23rd 2022, I mention the date because that’s when I found out that i actually really liked it. Not perfect, if somebody came to me and told me they hated the game and called me mentally deranged for being apart of the fanbase then i honestly wouldn’t blame you due to the many many flaws that you really gotta be someone who doesn’t mind that, it’s very much an acquired taste for some people. Probably the biggest appeal of the game that i have is the actual gameplay mechanics, so, Life is Strange is a choice based game with the unique twist of having time travel powers, it’s a very simple idea but I actually really think it’s used in smart and unique ways to spice up what a generic formula would feel like. I’d argue that because of the time travel ability in the game, Life is Strange is one of the best choice based games from the gameplay standpoint, it’s not the best overall because I still think the Telltale Walking Dead games and Until Dawn is superior from a story standpoint and how the choices should actually matter but i think this game does manage to have the best gameplay to me. The time travel can be used to undo your choices that you picked and might not like the outcome for, and I think the option to have that is very nice because it gives you a lot more flexibility and control of your choices and I think that’s so unique! Sometimes the logic of the time travel is all over the place, but I’m not a fucking scientist, I don’t know what’s logical and what’s not and I’m personally not in the mood to give myself a headache from overthinking and over analysing it. I brought up the story originally and honestly, going back to that, i actually think the story is quite good, it’s definitely way better thought out than something like fucking Riverdale which is pretty easy to do in all honesty but still. There’s this somewhat whimsical feel to the game, I don’t know what it is about combining this mystery and supernatural elements with a teenage drama, so it’s pretty much what made Stranger Things work but without the Stephen King horror elements to it. The town and setting of Arcadia Bay is also really nice, the way they use it makes it feel very lived in despite the fact we tend to only visit like, 9 different locations, they somehow manage making something that feels so small so lived in. I’m also a massive fan of the soundtrack that these games have, all of these games, not just this one, have a really soothing and calming OST while also balancing it out with some nice licensed music too!! Another thing I really like about the game is the art style, the environments and atmosphere feels like you’re looking at a painting or comic book, it just feels very unique to me and I really do like the way it looks, even in the games today, they keep the art style of the environments, but obviously it definitely looks better in other games but i really do like it here. I have no issues with the character designs or anything, it’s more to do with the very stiff facial expressions, like you can’t see any sort of emotion on anybody’s face, besides Kate Marsh, but then again, she still only has 1 emotion in her face. Everyone kinda lacks facial expressions which really goes against the emotion that some of the characters genuinely have, because there’s no secret a lot of the voice acting in this game is shockingly terrible but there are some genuine voice performances that are very good. Like i mentioned, Kate Marsh had a brilliant vocal performance by Dayeanne Hutton and it really does make Kate more likeable and just wanna see her thrive due to the context of what happens in the game, you wanna see her at her best and it really makes us feel bad for her and again, it’s to do with the performance and how it reacts to the tragic bullying her character experiences. There’s no secret that Life is Strange tends to tackle sensitive topics, and this game has themes of bullying and suicide that I do think is handled as well as it can be, it’s always gonna be a touchy subject matter and I don’t feel like I’m educated enough to talk about it but for me, there’s worse examples of tackling the topic, after all, 13 Reasons Why exists. Stowing away from the darker subject matter, let’s get back to talking about the performances, I think Cissy Jones does a fantastic job in this game as Joyce Price, she’s actually probably too good in all honesty, every time she was on screen, she absolutely gave it her all, and she’s a side character in the game. Ashley Birch as Chloe Price is absolutely electric, which is crazy because she’s more of a supporting role but she actually takes more of the spotlight from Max, which is the character we play as. And then we get to Max Caulfield herself, i don’t think Hannah Telle does a bad job, she’s not the best performance in the game but I know for an absolute fact that’s to do with the writing, because the dialogue fucking sucks balls. Here we go into my next point, the writing is actually terrible, there’s not a single character that sounds realistic or even sounds like how a teenager talks, it shines more when we talk about god damn Victoria Chase, I’ve never heard someone talk so fucking obnoxiously in my life, when that woman said “sad face” out loud in the first episode, I was sat there with sad face due to how depressed she makes me feel. Granted, it doesn’t get more annoying than Victoria, I can bare the dialogue because I’ve definitely heard worse, just don’t revisit Victoria in any future games, in my head, she’s canonically homeless somewhere, I just hate Victoria, she’s annoying as fuck and she can go fuck herselfie, as SHE QUOTED BY THE WAY! Remember when i said that I thought the game was shit when I first played it back in whenever I did? Yeah, that’s because the first episode is actually dog shit, anything past the first episode is actually pretty good in my opinion. The game also has a really weird villain problem? They portray David as this villain VERY HEAVILY but you can truly tell that he’s not a bad guy, if anything he gets a really good character arc that I was surprised to see personally. But then you get the most cartoonishly silly villains i have seen, I have clowned on Victoria too much already even though i feel like she’s one of gods best jokes, Nathan Prescott is also insufferable, every opportunity I had to grass on Nathan, I took it because he’s the definition of a daft prick, I also just let Warren beat the shit out of him because I just really didn’t like him. I will say though, there is a twist villain which I don’t wanna go into details about and spoil it but I think it was a very interesting twist, I think Im the only person in the fanbase that actually liked the twist but hey, it’s my opinion. There’s also this lingering mystery about the missing student, Rachel Amber that I personally think feels like an afterthought for the first few episodes kinda? But that’s only half of the complaint because i genuinely think some of the drama they pulled with it was pretty alright! Surprisingly, there was several moments where the game had really good drama, I was sucked into the game and was very invested by the drama, not all the time, but i really enjoyed most of it! I hear a lot of complaints online about the character of Chloe and before I end the review, I wanna say that i actually really liked Chloe, she’s a really shitty person, but she’s probably the most darkest and deepest character in Life is Strange, while I don’t think it’s justified, she tries stealing money from a handicap fund so it’s not at all justified but you really do start seeing her development as a character and she starts improving with the help of Max, so I really do like how over the 5 episodes, she constantly improves and develops. And now, we get to the divided endings, and I won’t spoil either of the endings but I will tell y’all what ending I chose and why. So, this might REALLY piss off the people who shipped Max and Chloe as a couple but I chose the Bay ending, there’s 2 endings, the Bay ending and the Bae ending and the reason why I chose Bay is because to me, it’s the most definitive and emotional ending to the story which I really wanted, if you prefer the Bae ending then more power to you but I personally preferred the emotional ending. I’m going to rate the episodes and give them my quick thoughts now because I know people will want my opinion on them individually. EPISODE ONE: CHRYSALIS: For an introduction point for the game, this episode is shit, it really does feel like it wasn’t going anywhere and it just felt so underwhelmingly written, the dialogue and the performances are absolutely at its worst in this episode. I’ll give it a 1.5 out of 5 stars. EPISODE TWO: OUT OF TIME: This is a vast improvement over the first episode and really feels like the game gets going with a lot more memorable moments, despite having moments where it feels like we’re fucking around for most of the episode, it goes in hand with developing our characters. I’ll give it a 3.5 out of 5 stars. EPISODE THREE: CHAOS THEORY: I’d say this is on par with the second episode for me, I’d say it’s dragged down by the boring swimming pool shenanigans that Max and Chloe had but the ending and the first glimpses of the romantic relationship between our two leads carry it back up. I’ll give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. EPISODE FOUR: DARK ROOM: This is the best episode of the game easily, i loved seeing the time paradox’s and the consequences from the prior episode, and i really do like the twist of the ending, which is gonna be an unpopular opinion. I’ll give it a 4 out of 5 stars. EPISODE FIVE: POLARIZED: Yea, besides the great ending that i had to choose, this episode is really all over the place and messy and some parts just felt like unnecessary filler, about an hour of the episode probably could’ve been cut due to how pointless a majority of the things they through at the episode felt. I’ll give it 2 out of 5 stars. Here’s my quick ranking of the episodes: 1. Episode Four: Dark Room 2. Episode Three: Chaos Theory 3. Episode Two: Out of Time 4. Episode Five: Polarized 5. Episode One: Chrysalis Overall, Life is Strange is one of those games where I feel like it’s worth playing for yourself and form your opinion on it, it’s a game that I like despite it’s flaws, it’s not my favourite game in the series but it’s definitely a decent start to them!