I don't know, everyone but Warren and Jefferson in that section are just slightly rude. This is not how Max thinks about him on the surface. But somewhere in here she knows what that guy really is. And the other person who patrolled there David and Dogguy where people she had in some form fear for. You didn't see Chloe's mum trying to get her.
Life is Strange | Spoiler Thread
- Thread starter Dr. Buni
- Start date
By this definition, Max's "real" feelings about Chloe would be that she's an ungrateful nuisance, who actually doesn't like her and would rather be hanging out with cool people, like Victoria, Nathan, Jefferson, or even Warren (as seen in the Dark Room section of the nightmare). And that is clearly not the case.
It's a deliberately over-the-top nightmare section, showing the worst possible versions of all the characters. Don't look too hard into it.
It's a deliberately over-the-top nightmare section, showing the worst possible versions of all the characters. Don't look too hard into it.
Samuel is patrolling too. It's pretty much the entire male cast.
But you also have like mentioned, the Chloe rejecting her nightmare. Or you have Kate's brief sequence. Not in the stealth section but also not divorced from the general themes of the moment.
BronsonLee
Member
Fucking lol at Warren's section in that shit
GO AAAAAAAAAAAAAPPE
GO AAAAAAAAAAAAAPPE
Well, it can be certainly be different for your Max, but for my Max the dream sequence was her deeply hidden fears and thoughts and my Max is certainly thinking of Warren as a creep. The others males - besides Jefferson - had fears connected to them too, but nobody had something explicit like Warrens locker.
The nightmare is all her insecurities and irrational fears amplified into larger-than-life forms, like the kind people usually experience with but don't pay much attention to because they're, well, baseless.
So she doesn't think Warren is a creep, but maybe a few times she got creep vibes and that manifested in the nightmare as GO APE APE APE.
No one is a saint who thinks the best of people around her them all the time.
So she doesn't think Warren is a creep, but maybe a few times she got creep vibes and that manifested in the nightmare as GO APE APE APE.
No one is a saint who thinks the best of people around her them all the time.
SolVanderlyn
Thanos acquires the fully powered Infinity Gauntlet in The Avengers: Infinity War, but loses when all the superheroes team up together to stop him.
Choices did have long term effects, moreso than any other choice driven adventure game that's out right now. Characters constantly reference past things you did and certain choices in earlier episodes completely change things in later episodes.
The end might undo all of that but for 4 episodes we definitely got the game that was promoted.
Warren spooky
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck Warren!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AlphaDragoon
Member
People are seriously trying to pin stuff from Max's nightmare on the actual characters? Jesus. :/
Cut content.
Check some of my earlier posts in this thread. I've linked some videos with audio files. The original story was that the Prescott family planned the storm (Nathan knew about it).John Kowalski
Banned
But where does this idea come from? There's not really any indication that things will continue to spiral out of control. Max got a vision of the tornado and it happened, but she didn't get any other visions. I took the "save Chloe" ending to be the end of it all, for better or worse.
Also, if season 2 were to feature Max and Chloe again(I know it won't, but if it did), they should totally call it (Mad) Max: Beyond Arcadia Bay.
KazenY2J
Member
That's pretty
Warren spooky
ape.
Manny Calavera
Member
I understand what you're saying and can't really argue with that but unfortunately that's how it goes with the choice based games. Still I think in Life is Strange the choices mattered more than in this type of games in general where the choice is often a mere illusion of choice. Especially the choices you made in the first four episodes. But I don't think every little choice has long term consequences in real life either so I don't really expect them to have in games. Still I say that every choice in the game mattered for Max and made her grow as a person. I think all the choices she made were a path leading her to the final choice.
Manny Calavera
Member
I think most of us did..
comadorcrack
Neo Member
It was a solid ending, but I never really liked chloe so the choice was easy for me.
bananafactory
Banned
Not sure how everyone else felt about this episode since I just finished it, but overall I found it very disappointing.
The retreads on previous situations/locations were interesting but felt tedious. The intro of the episode in the dark room has almost no interaction or choices to make. Max's nosebleeds and physical toll end up getting brushed aside and there's no actual consequence to her health in the end, something that surprised me because the game kept hinting at it.
Aside from all that, the ending is my biggest gripe. At first I chose to sacrifice Arcadia Bay under the justification that I'd done enough screwing with time, I wasn't going to go back AGAIN. And all that happens is the tornado washes through town and Chloe and Max drive off peacefully in her truck smiling and holding hands? What about all the people in the town? Who lived? Who died? Do they even care?
So I replayed with sacrificing Chloe and it feels like that was intended as "the real ending". Far more closure in it and makes the other ending feel incredibly underbaked, like an afterthought. Other than that it's OK but I've never been a fan of "everything that happened didn't really happen" since there's now a new reality and none of the things you did in the entire game actually occurred.
I'm just upset that *my* ending felt cold and incomplete and out of touch with the entire series. If you're not going to make it satisfying, then don't give me the choice. Anyways, that's my initial reaction. We'll see how I feel when I sit on it for a bit.
The retreads on previous situations/locations were interesting but felt tedious. The intro of the episode in the dark room has almost no interaction or choices to make. Max's nosebleeds and physical toll end up getting brushed aside and there's no actual consequence to her health in the end, something that surprised me because the game kept hinting at it.
Aside from all that, the ending is my biggest gripe. At first I chose to sacrifice Arcadia Bay under the justification that I'd done enough screwing with time, I wasn't going to go back AGAIN. And all that happens is the tornado washes through town and Chloe and Max drive off peacefully in her truck smiling and holding hands? What about all the people in the town? Who lived? Who died? Do they even care?
So I replayed with sacrificing Chloe and it feels like that was intended as "the real ending". Far more closure in it and makes the other ending feel incredibly underbaked, like an afterthought. Other than that it's OK but I've never been a fan of "everything that happened didn't really happen" since there's now a new reality and none of the things you did in the entire game actually occurred.
I'm just upset that *my* ending felt cold and incomplete and out of touch with the entire series. If you're not going to make it satisfying, then don't give me the choice. Anyways, that's my initial reaction. We'll see how I feel when I sit on it for a bit.
Cut content.
Well I'm glad that didn't happen.
That's fucking stupid.
That stress is very much intentional in those other games, it's very appropriate and I like its place in a game like that. Another thing, is that from memory this game never had the option to pick silence, so giving you time (and forcing you) to respond is something I appreciated. It was fitting given the dreamlike, deliberate pace and tone the game has, especially during the first few episodes their's quite a calm and soothing undercurrent -- also considering you can rewind time, a timer would be incredibly redundant, it would turn it into a quicktime event once you know how you want to respond after a rewind.
TharpDaddy
Member
Something that I really liked about this game is that the choices didn't have a timer attached to them. I hate in something like the Walking Dead where I had limited time to make a choice, it stresses me out. I much prefer how Life is Strange did it where you had time to think about and consider the choices, even in dire situations.
Dontnod explained that the "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay" ending felt half baked because of budget and time constraints.
Personally I chose the SAB ending first and I was puzzled by how Max and Chloe just drive off, seemingly not giving a fuck at how her family and friends were just killed lol.
I replayed and chose the SC ending and it felt better. I kinda wish I'd chosen that at first though as I wouldn't have felt the emotion, something which I didn't feel as I was still puzzled by the other ending.
bananafactory
Banned
That makes sense. It just felt like a big "fuck you" to me because that was my choice. There was no guarantee that sacrificing Chloe would fix anything, I thought it was just a theory, and with all the shit we'd been through there's no way I was going to go back and undo it all just on the off-chance that it fixes things (when it has NEVER EVER fixed everything before without more consequences). The episode had other problems as well but the ending was by far my biggest complaint. Such a sour note to end on.
Again, if they want the "Chloe dies" choice to be the real ending, then just give us that.
Played this with my partner last night, and found it enjoyable if very linear. He decided to save Chloe as he thought that was more important to Max; I would have saved Arcadia Bay and sarificed Chloe, since it felt to me like she was destined to die.
Watching the Sacrifice Chloe ending didn't make me all too sad, because a) I didn't like Chloe nearly as much as Max did, and b) I'd gotten attached to the other characters like Warren, Kate, Joyce, Frank and especially David. The game did a great job at fleshing out the side characters, I felt, so it made sense to spare them all instead.
I really enjoyed the nightmare sequence (gave me Arkham Asylum vibes) and was actually hoping that the end would take a more Donnie Darko-like route. It was nice to see the time-travel repercussions on Max's mental health being acknowledged and I did find some of those moments very chilling, even if it felt like a big thematic and tonal change. Getting a text message from Pompidou made me laugh though
What's funny is that, whilst it's easy to pick apart this game for all its flaws, I still enjoyed it a lot and would recommend it to most people. It's been a while since I played something so touching, interesting and earnest.
Watching the Sacrifice Chloe ending didn't make me all too sad, because a) I didn't like Chloe nearly as much as Max did, and b) I'd gotten attached to the other characters like Warren, Kate, Joyce, Frank and especially David. The game did a great job at fleshing out the side characters, I felt, so it made sense to spare them all instead.
I really enjoyed the nightmare sequence (gave me Arkham Asylum vibes) and was actually hoping that the end would take a more Donnie Darko-like route. It was nice to see the time-travel repercussions on Max's mental health being acknowledged and I did find some of those moments very chilling, even if it felt like a big thematic and tonal change. Getting a text message from Pompidou made me laugh though
What's funny is that, whilst it's easy to pick apart this game for all its flaws, I still enjoyed it a lot and would recommend it to most people. It's been a while since I played something so touching, interesting and earnest.
Galactic Fork
A little fluff between the ears never did any harm...
Life is Strange had a high focus on social interactions, and how you interact with people does affect them in the long term. And how did this have choices that mattered more than in others? How was the choice less of an illusion, no matter what, all roads lead to the same two options, kill Chloe, or kill everybody else. How is it different than the ME3 ending, where no matter what choices you made during the series, the ending was still Red Blue or Green. At least in ME, some of the choices you made continued to affect people past the ending.
But anyway, our main difference is that you're focused on how it affected Max, I'm more concerned with how Max's choices affected the world around her.
Also, it pisses me off that no matter what, Chloe and David will never have a good Step father\step daughter relationship that the game paved the way for... One or the other has to die. And no matter what they have no chance to reconcile before it happens.
I don't think I agree with this.
The point is that Max uses her idiosyncratic time travel ability to make things better for people - help Alyssa, help Kate, foil Nathan etc - or not, depending on your choices - and the game pushes the 'your choices matter' narrative because that's what Max believes. That's what we all believe.
But the realisation at the end is that the choices were invasive and damaging. Max realises this and the narrative changes from 'your choices matter' to 'your choices cause another/bigger problem'. They mattered but even positive actions weren't the 'right' thing to do. That's the 'twist'. Those choices created a perfect literal storm no matter what actions you took. Player agency/human agency is a fallacy.
I love time travel narratives where the point is that time travel fucks shit up. Primer is great for this. (And Life Is Strange.)
FYI I haven't played the scrifice Arcadia Bay ending, only the sacrifice Chloe ending.
bananafactory
Banned
This is exactly what I thought. It's awful.
ZombieSupaStar
Member
they should have gone full flip the table mode, and had the tornado still hit in the chloe ending.
yep, the ending makes the game for me a waste of time, and unsatisfying.
yep, the ending makes the game for me a waste of time, and unsatisfying.
I know I'm fighting a redundant fight, considering everything I can say can be dismissed with the developers final say. But given that the Sacrifice Arcadia Bay ending was my first choice and the first ending I saw, I was quite satisfied. I found a lot of content to read into in that scene -- In regards to the reason they didn't investigate friends and family or notably seem concerned, I feel that them driving away in a seemingly nonchalant fashion was very representative of their (Max & Chloe's) dismissal of everything that wasn't them, anything not Max and Chloe no longer matters to either of them, Max actively picked Chloe over the Bay and there's no looking back, Chloe appreciates Max's sacrifice and is very intent on moving on with her. Although on the other hand, the closeups of Max in the car, there's visible concern, My Max cares about generally everyone in the town, my Max also cares for Chloe above everything else though, but there's a guilt, a weight on her, Chloe is a living reminder of that, while also being everything she cares about in the world, Max's scene in the Diner in the nightmare is representative of how she might feel here. Max and Chloe's relationship is now potentially very complicated because of it. I read the scene as quite ambiguous, whether it was the right decision or not is impossible to say, and neither of them have to answer that question, they're just moving on, together.
Whether or not Dontnod say the ending isn't meant to be ambiguous, or was supposed to be more elaborate doesn't change what the ending is and what I saw, at least not to me, it was incredibly effective and powerful, and builds off the strength of these two characters, and the inhabitants of the Bay at large -- and having an ending rely on the strength and culmination of the characters -- rather than the strength and culmination of the plot, isn't a bad thing at all.
bananafactory
Banned
Well I chose the other choice and it is somehow even more unsatisfying. Both endings suck.
I just finished it and this is almost exactly how I feel about the ending. I chose the sacrifice Arcadia Bay ending and it was not a satisfying conclusion at all. They just drive off in the truck and that's it? I then watched the sacrifice Chloe ending and it looks like this is supposed to be the good ending? It makes me feel like the whole game was pointless. Max gains this time altering power and the conclusion of the game is that she never should have used it in the first place and should have just allowed her best friend to die? That's weak writing.
I thought episode 5 was the weakest of the 5. Not much interaction or meaningful choices to make until the very end. I didn't like either endings, I think they pay a disserve to episodes 1-4.
bananafactory
Banned
A lot of it could have been fixed if Chloe just jumps off the cliff to sacrifice herself and the weather suddenly clears because she's finally dead.
That way Chloe goes out heroically and still has all of her memories and time with Max, while Max can say goodbye to her rather than huddling in a fucking bathroom while she gets shot. And everything you did still happened.
Then flesh out the "sacrifice Arcadia Bay" ending more and you've got yourself a much improved ending, even if the rest of the episode still has the same problems.
Except that your proposed scene sits at odds with Kate's entire arc.
It's also very self indulgent.
bananafactory
Banned
I'm sure there's a better solution, I'm not a professional writer. I just don't like that she died without any of the memories that were made. The Chloe you grew to knew just gets erased from existence.
Both endings seem a mite too hand-wavey, but I think sacrificing Chloe was pretty powerful. It's problematic, in that it makes pretty much every choice Max has made over the past week slightly superfluous...but she is still making a choice in the bathroom, so it's not as if her rewind power ended up being pointless. It did serve a point: it showed her that while she could change things and save Chloe, that course of action would scar an entire town. Letting Chloe die saves Kate and Nathan, avenges Rachel, secures the safety of the dozens of people you meet in passing over the game. The nightmare sequence does a thorough job of showing who will be hurt by the storm, and so many die. As much as Max loves Chloe in the game, Chloe's final speech made it easy to sacrifice her while still believing she understood why. With the sacrificing Chloe ending, Max has grown enough to accept Chloe's death as something she can't change without inflicting huge amounts of damage—basically the ultimate lesson ends up being the timeworn AA staple Serenity Prayer. Not that that ending is the explicitly right choice, but the way the two drive away from carnage in the other ending with uncertain looks on their faces said to me that it was a choice made out of fear. I think the sacrificing Chloe ending is way more satisfying because it means tangible growth for Max.
So I liked the ending, and most all of the final chapter. Jefferson's evilness was way overplayed and kitschy, but the spiraling trip through alternate realities and collapsed time and Max's subconscious was wild and thrilling and disarming.
So I liked the ending, and most all of the final chapter. Jefferson's evilness was way overplayed and kitschy, but the spiraling trip through alternate realities and collapsed time and Max's subconscious was wild and thrilling and disarming.
But did she? Chloe promises to somehow remember what they went through, beyond any changes in reality and beyond death. And then the butterfly shows up at her funeral. Was a clear and pat sign to me that in some cosmic way, Chloe knew how much Max loved her.
Although Chloe did have the hope filled memory of a living Rachel Amber, someone she cared for just as much (if not more) than Max. At the point she died (in the bathroom), she still held out hope (whether denial or not) that she was alive -- and could even come back to her. That (albeit false) memory arguably means just as much as the memory of Chloe & Max, at least that's what I'm willing to believe, given what we're told of Chloe & Rachel's relationship.
Basically, you want a happier ending?
bananafactory
Banned
It doesn't have to be happy. Like I said, you can still kill Chloe, destroy the town, whatever. I just would like an ending that doesn't conclude with "lol nothing you did in the the whole game actually happened".
It makes me feel like I wasted my time.
Of course - I accept that many of you probably liked it, that's fine. I'm just expressing my own dissastisfaction.
Galactic Fork
A little fluff between the ears never did any harm...
Yeah... we're in agreement then. We're both saying they promoted choices having meaning, but at the end they said, "ha ha just kidding, it all meant nothing!" The difference is you think it was on purpose as a "twist" where I just think it was poor follow through.
Both endings happen. The timeline in which Arcadia Bay gets destroyed continues, whether Max chooses to stay in it or not. Just like the paralyzed Chloe timeline continues on after you "undo" it by sacrificing William again. Even if you sacrifice Chloe in the end, the Chloe you left behind in the "AB gets destroyed" timeline lives on, and she and that Max presumably leave just like they do in the other ending. Haven't any of you played S
?
OMA
Galactic Fork
A little fluff between the ears never did any harm...
Random question: Do Max and Chloe kiss in all the sacrifice Chloe endings? Or is that based on how you treat Warren?
Based on both I think. You have to be close to Chloe and distant from Warren.
There's also that great moment when Max is confronting herself where she accuses herself of using the power just to get people to like herwhich isn't entirely true but is absolutely a valid deep subconscious fear of Max's. I know I used time travel to make friends with Daniel and Victoria and Alyssa and Taylor. And while some of that involved comforting them and genuinely wanting them to feel better, there's something insincere about the fact that Max can do that with anybody thanks to her power. Max opting not to use her power is her realizing that the relationships that matter will grow and survive without super powers.
Unlike the tagged game -- I don't think that the continuation, simultaneous existence, and legitimacy of the timelines is at the core of the games story and themes. I don't think it's at all necessary to think about the time travel in LiS, it's more a tool for the the delivery of the coming-of-age story -- where as the tagged game makes this one of the core tenants of its story, it very much want's you to think about the outcome and repercussions.
You can kiss Warren and kiss Chloe.