Life Really is Strange

Life is Strange is an interactive visual novel with 3D graphics and a twist: you can undo the decisions you made using time travel. The basic setting of the story goes like this:

You are a photography student in a renowned art high school in Oregon. During one of the lectures, you realize you have the ability to go back roughly 1 minute in time to make the future turn out how want it to. Using this power, you can either choose to help your friends or subvert your enemies, and you save a best friend more than once. No one else knows you have this ability except for your best friend, whom you indulged with the truth.

The story setting is realistic in terms of the characters, their troubles and how they act – I often times found myself comparing my real life colleagues with the fictional lives of these characters. The principal likes to follow the rules, but sometimes following the rules is not the best course of action. There is a janitor who speaks softly and is really in tune with nature. There is an annoying all-star girl with a gang of cheeky followers who think they are the most popular people on campus. And there is also the son of a extremely rich money baron with some extreme violence and personality issues.

Your best friend has a step-father, who is the security guard of the school. This family is depicted as one with some real bonding issues. The best friend is rebellious, likes messy rooms, punk rock and anime. She also engages in all manners of dangerous and illegal activity, such as playing with handguns in junkyards and selling illegal drugs.

While playing this game, I really felt like I was fighting the main character for control of her future. Very often, she thoughts are spoken to the player, and those thoughts are always at odds with what I am actually thinking, and that also makes me want to strangle the protagonist. The choices we are presented with are usually ternary – in other words we get 3 choices in every situation. Despite this, even though you as the player have the ability to change the past, you can’t change the future. Many of the game major events have to happen no matter what. In essence, by giving the player a chance to change fate, they become the arbiter of fate itself.

 

Just a guy that builds robots, video games, and everything in between.
1 comment
  1. This game is awesome. I haven’t played it yet, I’ve watched some playthroughs and I love the writing.

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