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Life is Strange | Spoiler Thread

Guys I know no spoilers in this thread, but?
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Just some food for thought.

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Yeah, there was a debate about this earlier in the thread and I'm on the side that the storm is due to Chloe surviving, and not necessarily the act of time manipulation itself.

But that means, by my interpretation, that shit will continue to get fucked around Chloe and Max while she continues to live, so Max will have to perpetually protect Chloe by manipulating time, and Chloe will always be put in circumstances of grave danger that Max needs to stop. I prefer to think about it like that for the "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay" ending.

Ugh, that better not be the case. That just makes me really depressed to think that. I would just hope that it was a one off thing that the tornado disaster was just the effect from the cause of Chloe being saved that one time. A one time cause and effect...but if it's just gonna keep happening, no >_< I don't want that.
 
I wasn't a dick to Warren even if I friendzoned him. It might've been different depending on your choices.

This is one of the things I feel is underappreciated about Episode 5. There are clearly tons of continuity nods but they're so subtle as to be invisible. People are conditioned to think "ending" = "10 minutes of cut scenes before the credits roll explaining how everything worked out" but that makes for poor storytelling.

The choices could've been communicated better, sure, but I don't think it's right to say your choices didn't matter.
 
Ugh, that better not be the case. That just makes me really depressed to think that. I would just hope that it was a one off thing that the tornado disaster was just the effect from the cause of Chloe being saved that one time. A one time cause and effect...but if it's just gonna keep happening, no >_< I don't want that.

If we're going with the possibility that "fate" wants Chloe dead, there's also the suggestion I had before that the timelines operate on equivalent exchange and the sacrifice of Arcadia Bay is enough to appease "fate" and lay off Chloe.

I still prefer the idea that the universe wants Chloe dead, though. That sounds like fun times.
 
Sacrifice Arcadia Bay timeline = Rick and Morty starring Max and Chloe.
 
Let it be known that I am against Max going super saiyan or full Time Lord.
Max is against that too, for the most part you are only forced to use the rewind power when someone will die or Chloe forces you. Ok well that and some puzzles. Mainly though, death and Chloe are the things that force Max to use her power, it really didn't seem like she wanted to save/destroy the world or go all power mad.
 
If we're going with the possibility that "fate" wants Chloe dead, there's also the suggestion I had before that the timelines operate on equivalent exchange and the sacrifice of Arcadia Bay is enough to appease "fate" and lay off Chloe.

I still prefer the idea that the universe wants Chloe dead, though. That sounds like fun times.

Fuck the universe, Chloe doesn't deserve to die. Weird how Dontnod got me to care so much about a character voice by Ashly Burch =P lol

It's weird though, if the tornado was directly caused by Chloe surviving when she meant to be killed by Nathan, then why was Max having visions of it before that even happened the first time. Again, this feels like the weakest part of the story that I just wish wasn't there. I would've preferred it to be a groundhog day scenario where Max had to mature enough as a person to realize what the perfect outcome would be before she could move on from the disaster or something.
 
there was a very early concept art, either leaked or put into something, that showed Max in a hospital gown in episode 5. It kind of looked like the that movie Chronicle. I wish that was still one of the endings lol
 
A sad thing to think about is in the game world everyone has a set destiny and mucking with "THE PLAN" causes everything to go out of wack.

IE: Everything about you is already set in stone as far as the universe is concerned and free will is just an illusion.

Like Final Destination movies. Death has a plan and if you mess with death still finds a way.
 
is dontnod done with this for good then,i know they announced vampyr but was this always intended to be a one off thing?
 
Fuck it I'm saving Chloe. I can't bring myself to sacrifice her. I'm too weak and too attached. I openly admit that haha. I really liked the episode but I agree there are some flaws. I think out of all the episodes this was the weakest. Still probably one of my favourite games of all time. It's just so special, charming, thought provoking, and absolutely delightful at times. And I'll never forget it.
 
A sad thing to think about is in the game world everyone has a set destiny and mucking with "THE PLAN" causes everything to go out of wack.

Except part of the plan was you getting powers.

So theoretically, it's all set about by a local time-warping deer god that cares about stopping Jefferson from going too far, but hates Chloe because while Chloe was at school, she threw a burger wrapper at the totem.

Dick move, Chloe. Dick move.
 
Fuck it I'm saving Chloe. I can't bring myself to sacrifice her. I'm too weak and too attached. I openly admit that haha. I really liked the episode but I agree there are some flaws. I think out of all the episodes this was the weakest. Still probably one of my favourite games of all time. It's just so special, charming, thought provoking, and absolutely delightful at times. And I'll never forget it.

you made the only acceptable choice...good job!
 
Huh? I'm looking at the playthrough again and what I said seems to be accurate: https://youtu.be/iMp4CgdBmEo?t=31m20s

Unless you were addressing a point I wasn't.

But now, with the knowledge that she loses her memories after these jumps, I'm confused why she remembered everything about Jefferson after that time bubble.

She only loses the memories for the intervening period between the point in the future she jumped from to the point in the past she jumped to. As soon as time catches up to where she jumped from she gets them back. So from her perspective she remembers everything, from the perspective of other people, she has gaps in her memory.
 
A sad thing to think about is in the game world everyone has a set destiny and mucking with "THE PLAN" causes everything to go out of wack.

IE: Everything about you is already set in stone as far as the universe is concerned and free will is just an illusion.

Like Final Destination movies. Death has a plan and if you mess with death still finds a way.

Well, I don't think that "fate" is a sentient entity with a plan but I am quite sure that we live in a deterministic universe so, basically, there is only one way in which things can play out. (Of course, in reality, none of Life is Strange's time travel stuff could actually happen - even if someone developed time travel technology - but that's a different topic :p.)
 
you made the only acceptable choice...good job!

I feel slightly better haha. In my mind I sacrificed the town by destroying it but didn't kill everyone. I'm hoping people survived... Lol. :/

It goes to show Dontnod did good if they managed to get me so attached to a character that I don't want to waste what they had together. If that makes sense. There was so much joy to be had with characters throughout the episodes that I just didn't want to take that all away. Because if Chloe was sacrificed. Max, in my mind would be a mess and bring sadness to everyone round her instead.

That's how I'm justifying my decision anyway. The fact I'm trying to justify my decision speaks a thousand words to be honest!
 
She only loses the memories for the intervening period between the point in the future she jumped from to the point in the past she jumped to. As soon as time catches up to where she jumped from she gets them back. So from her perspective she remembers everything, from the perspective of other people, she has gaps in her memory.

Yes, but she jumped to that point in time from the Dark Room to the start of episode 1. The part where time catches up to where she jumped from doesn't match up.

Basically, the Dark Room sequence is at the start of episode 5, right? She jumped from there to the beginning of episode 1, where there's the time bubble where she acts like an ass to Jefferson and gives her picture to him. That time bubble fades out, but the subsequent picture sequence shows that Jefferson has been arrested. But Max shouldn't have maintained her memories of Jefferson after the time bubble, so how was it that she contacted the authorities about him afterwards if, as you say, she only remembers what happened in the past "as soon as time catches up to where she jumped from"?
 
Well this was easily the worst episode for me. I enjoyed psycho Jefferson and the ruined city, but the nightmare dragged on and became annoying to play through. And in the end you just choose one of two unsatisfactory endings, so much for your previous choices. We never even learn why Max received her power, since evidently the only way to save the town is to never fucking use it in the first place!
Us never learning how Max got her powers isn't a bad thing. The explanation why someone gets superpowers like time manipulation is never a good one in a grounded story like this ("It's a mutation!", "it's an ancient Indian burial ground and Chloe dying at the spot set some ancient powers free!", "It was unlocked by the power of love"). It's usually just best to leave it as a mystery, so everyone can come up with their own explanations if they want to, or go with some explanation that doesn't even need any magic mumbo jumbo to be real (i.e. the whole story is simply about Max having a mental breakdown after she sees her old best friend die and the story is just a coping mechanism that leads into her accepting Chloe's death)

And I don't really think the resolution to the story was lackluster. It was very much in line with what they were building with the story. It wasn't some "save the cheerleader, save the world" kind of story where Max finding a way of saving a single person would prevent a looming future disaster from happening. It was always meant to be the opposite. Insisting on trying to save Chloe just threw the area further & further into chaos and pushed Max to her limits and Max needed to accept Chloe's fate. And if you chose to sacrifice the town, then who knows what kind of death & chaos those two would bring with them to where ever they go? Maybe it wouldn't be limited to Arcadia Bay.

Thought it was shit. I hate that they tried to redeem everybody in this game at the 11th hour. He still killed Rachel, and technically even Chloe. He's still an irredeemable piece of garbage even if he got buttmad and sent a weepy voicemail.
Eh? That kind of thing doesn't redeem anyone from having killed people, but it does explain their behaviour and gives it a nicely tragic "he was fucked up and did horrible things, but in a better world he would've gotten the help he needed" ending and him trying to warn Max & him being apologetic shows that he wasn't rotten to the core like some people who kill others are. It doesn't redeem him at all, but it does give him a more humane story, which makes it that much more tragic (instead of just being the fucktard rich asshole with a gun). There was clearly some part in there that had the potential to be a good person, but unfortunately circumstances & his tendencies & failure to get the right kind of help to those lead him to become a sick & twisted fucker.

is dontnod done with this for good then,i know they announced vampyr but was this always intended to be a one off thing?
They might do Life is Strange 2, but they've said that would probably be with a new cast of characters & in a different setting.
 
Overall I loved the game.

Max and Chloe are like two inseparable sides of the same medal, they belong together...

And FUCK IT, I wanted them to be together, so with my egoistic wish I let the storm have at it.

I just wish the whole decision making process was not just one decision at the end that decided the ending scene, but that the final decision was a cumulation of the little decisions across the whole game - like the "relationship bars" in Until Dawn, that grew or shrunk accordingly to your decisions, just that those bars are not visible to the player, maybe indicated by behavior of the characters...

Also I would have liked to have more than two endings, but maybe that was too ambitious for the scope of this project.

I just wish the game is very successful and DONTNOD are making another game in the same vein. <3
 
How did Max interact with Kate in episode 5 when it jumped back to the first classroom scene, in your game?

She just states how happy she is to see Kate alive again.

She was SO close to being over the edge in mine. When Victoria put the url in the bathroom, I left it there. It was one of my "Well, you can't change everything." moments. Boy, am I an asshole.

If you do everything right with Kate though, its my understanding is that you get pressed much less. Making her that much easier to save.

After I failed to save her I looked at a guide to see where I went wrong and the only thing I did wrong at all was choose the wrong bible verse. I had not noticed the bible in her room when you go to drop off her borrowed book so I did not see the notes she had made pertaining to those verses. It was a 50/50 for me and I guessed wrong.

SAVE HER. you're missing out on the hospital scene.

I will play the game again and save her. I didn't undo anything in my playthrough, I didn't even really use rewind except when I was forced and a little bit in the first episode when I was just learning the game.

Despite the fact that I obviously would of wanted to have Kate live and it was totally crushing to lose her in my case that episode, from a storytelling standpoint I thought it was fantastic. It was really foreboding for me too, because I had a feeling she would attempt suicide from the first episode. It just seemed like a natural dramatic arc for a character that was viciously bullied. So my entire ep.1 and ep.2 playthroughs I was trying to be as absolutely nice and supportive of Kate as possible, because I suspected my actions would determine whether or not she would kill herself and that suspicion was almost right. In the end I did not save her, but it felt fair because in life you don't have the ability to control those situations no matter how hard you try, it felt very real and powerful.
 
Huh? I'm looking at the playthrough again and what I said seems to be accurate: https://youtu.be/iMp4CgdBmEo?t=31m20s

Unless you were addressing a point I wasn't.

But now, with the knowledge that she loses her memories after these jumps, I'm confused why she remembered everything about Jefferson after that time bubble.

I think what people are missing (I think) is that when Nathan kills Chloe, he gets arrested, then he spills his guts about everything else. Thats how Jefferson gets busted and Kate's rep gets restored and she doesn't kill herself. Max doesn't have to remember the other timelines. By Chloe dying, everything else was supposed to get resolved.
 
Was I just naive, but did everyone else see the twist with Jefferson coming? I feel like I should have when it happened, but I don't know...he didn't seem too different than some teachers I've had, so it didn't really occur to me to suspect him.
 
Was I just naive, but did everyone else see the twist with Jefferson coming? I feel like I should have when it happened, but I don't know...he didn't seem too different than some teachers I've had, so it didn't really occur to me to suspect him.

I kinda suspected it, but the reveal was still exciting.
 
Chose to sacrifice Chloe. Made sense.

She just had to go. For the final time. Ended up with quite the sad ending too as a result.

The game truly delivered throughout. Yes, we never found out where Max's powers came from, but then again, we don't know why the plague in The Walking Dead spread either. It's all about the characters, and the game delivered in spades in that regard.

9.5/10 for the series.
 
I loved Obstacles, but I also really liked the opening when To All of You played. That was what first hooked me. Another very well thought out piece for the scene was when Mountains played during the scene where they found Rachel.
 
She just states how happy she is to see Kate alive again.

Ah, so it is different. Cool.

I think what people are missing (I think) is that when Nathan kills Chloe, he gets arrested, then he spills his guts about everything else. Thats how Jefferson gets busted and Kate's rep gets restored and she doesn't kill herself. Max doesn't have to remember the other timelines. By Chloe dying, everything else was supposed to get resolved.

That doesn't make sense, because Chloe is alive in the San Francisco travel timeline. Nathan didn't kill Chloe there; Max stopped him in the bathroom just like in the original timeline.
 
It'd be really stupid to have a second season that continued off of the bad ending. At least not without updating the ending ala Portal.

Also, when the hell did Max learn to drive? She doesn't even have a car. She takes the bus and Chloe drives her around.
 
Just finished it knew it would end with the butterfly photo. I saved Chloe because I'm selfish, I felt terrible as they were driving through Arcadia Bay. Went back and got the other ending that one feels like it was canon just by how much more there was to it.

Great game I loved every episode I think my favourite moment in the entire thing was when you first find out you can travel back in time through pictures and you save Chloe's Dad, that absolutely blew my mind when it happened.

Hope DONTNOD do another with a brand new set of characters and a new gameplay mechanic.
 
Chose to sacrifice Chloe. Made sense.

She just had to go. For the final time. Ended up with quite the sad ending too as a result.

The game truly delivered throughout. Yes, we never found out where Max's powers came from, but then again, we don't know why the plague in The Walking Dead spread either. It's all about the characters, and the game delivered in spades in that regard.

9.5/10 for the series.

Agree with everything here including the rating. Though it felt almost too much to sacrifice Chloe and I don't think I'll be able to do it on my future playthroughs.
 
What does everyone think is the best piece (and use) of music in the series? (licensed or otherwise)

thought sense of me by mudflow was very fitting, stellar music selection all round though

They might do Life is Strange 2, but they've said that would probably be with a new cast of characters & in a different setting.

thanks, after this and remember me im down to give anything else they do a shot
 
Ah, so it is different. Cool.



That doesn't make sense, because Chloe is alive in the San Francisco travel timeline. Nathan didn't kill Chloe there; Max stopped him in the bathroom just like in the original timeline.

It does, because Max doesn't have to fuck with time to make everything else work out. Thats kind of the game's whole point, at least it is to me.
 
I loved Obstacles, but I also really liked the opening when To All of You played. That was what first hooked me. Another very well thought out piece for the scene was when Mountains played during the scene where they found Rachel.

Was that when Max puts in headphones at the start of episode 1?
That scene in particular, walking down the corridor as the title screen came up over gameplay, really set the tone well.
 
It does, because Max doesn't have to fuck with time to make everything else work out.

But... how did Jefferson get busted before the San Francisco trip if Max doesn't keep her memories and Chloe is still alive?

Edit: I'm not talking about the final timeline, I'm talking exclusively about the San Francisco trip timeline.
 
Was I just naive, but did everyone else see the twist with Jefferson coming? I feel like I should have when it happened, but I don't know...he didn't seem too different than some teachers I've had, so it didn't really occur to me to suspect him.
I did have my suspisions after I saw him & Victoria late at night at the school, that maybe he wasn't quite the Super Cool, Awesome & Funny teacher & artist extraordinaire that he made himself out to be, that he could have a bad side & maybe he flirted with Rachel. But they didn't really focus on that too much after that single scene so I kinda forgot about it and didn't think about it afterwards.
 
Did you get anything for collecting all the bottles in the nightmare? I got stuck on the original puzzle and was like nope and just blew past that part.
 
Ah, so it is different. Cool.



That doesn't make sense, because Chloe is alive in the San Francisco travel timeline. Nathan didn't kill Chloe there; Max stopped him in the bathroom just like in the original timeline.

Might be talking about the final timeline at the end of the game?

And I'm not sure how getting rid of Jefferson actually saves Kate. She's was right on the edge of suicide anyway, and if Max literally can't remember to give Kate a speech about how much people care about her, then she's going to jump at some point because she's still all alone and getting bullied and having videos posted of her, and Max won't have any powers to save her.
 
But... how did Jefferson get busted before the San Francisco trip if Max doesn't keep her memories and Chloe is still alive?

She sent an anonymous tip to David while she was staring Jefferson down, right before she flashforwarded to the airplane.
And I'm not sure how getting rid of Jefferson actually saves Kate. She's was right on the edge of suicide anyway, and if Max literally can't remember to give Kate a speech about how much people care about her, then she's going to jump at some point because she's still all alone and getting bullied and having videos posted of her, and Max won't have any powers to save her.

It's possible Max talked her out of it again in a much more proactive way, or the controversy over Jefferson overshadowed the rumors about her, or the investigation turned up that she was a victim and everyone had a change of heart.

When they did the "photo/memories getting replaced" thing for that ending, they showed the one where Jefferson told off Kate. It was implied that while she was at risk, it was the confrontation with Jefferson that tipped her over. No confrontation/vindication at seeing Jefferson brought to justice = no suicide attempt.
 
But... how did Jefferson get busted before the San Francisco trip if Max doesn't keep her memories and Chloe is still alive?

Edit: I'm not talking about the final timeline, I'm talking exclusively about the San Francisco trip timeline.
Didn't Max send a text message revealing the Dark Room's location?
 
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