Life is Strange 2 - Episode 2

Disclaimer:  This blog contains major spoilers for the “Life is Strange” series of video games.

"Previously on Life is Strange..."  I loved the way it did the recap this time.  In earlier games, it just showed you scenes from previous episodes, but this one presented it as if Sean is repeating an old legend, with sketches of wolves standing in for the main characters.

It opens with a scene reminiscent of Luke’s training on Dagobah.  Reach out with your mind young Padawan!  Let the Strange flow through you.  At one point Sean compliments Daniel by saying, "You'll be moving cars soon."  I knew right away this was foreshadowing, and it pays off at the end of the episode.  It's nothing big, but it's little touches like this that I love about the writing.  Some people will find it cheesy, but I like it.

And let’s get this out of the way… Mushroooooooom!  Nooooooooo! I had a feeling the puppy wasn’t going to stay with them for the whole season, but I’d hoped they’d find a new home for it somewhere.  And as far as I can tell, Mushroom’s demise can’t be prevented – it isn’t related to any of your choices.  Suddenly I miss being able to rewind time.  

Nice job, writers, you’ve just guaranteed that I’ll never convince my wife to play this game.  You know, if the first game's final choice had come down between "Sacrifice a Puppy" and "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay", I wouldn't have even had to think about it, the town would have been toast.

Granted, LiS1 also had the ability to kill a dog (on two separate occasions), but it was always a choice, not a foregone conclusion like in LiS2.  I’ll say it again, I don’t like tragedies.  And yet, I love the LiS series despite how depressing they can be at times.  I just feel that tragedy has to have a purpose.  If you’re just killing off characters to be “edgy” or to attract viewers, then you’re not really an artist.  You’re probably not even an adult.  Most teenagers go through a “death is cool” phase, but you’re supposed to grow out of it before you become a professional writer.  

But sometimes tragedy makes a story stronger.  This has been the case with the LiS games so far, and Mushroom’s death is no exception.  And "eaten by a cougar" is a pretty badass way to go, I suppose.  Daniel’s reaction to it really shows off his Anakin side, and the kid’s potential is terrifying.  Daniel, have a Chock-O-Crisp bar.  You’re not you when you’re angry.

We finally get to see how it ties in with Captain Spirit.  So, Sean and Daniel take a detour from their planned trek to Mexico, and instead stay with their grandparents for a while.  Captain Spirit's main character, Chris Eriksen, is their next door neighbor.  We get to see Captain Spirit’s climax again from a different perspective.  The whole side plot about Chris and his abusive father looks like it's going somewhere, but I don't know if this game will actually come back to it.  Sean and Daniel leave town at the end of the episode, and I don't see why they would return to this town.

At the Christmas tree lot, Sean runs into another bigot.  This one doesn't seem to be specifically racist - he seems to include Sean when he says things like "We have to take care of our own kind, first" - but he looks down on what he considers the lower class.  The game is actually pretty good at representing a variety of people with varying opinions.  I still think that bigots are going to decry this game as having a SJW message, but I really don't think they go overboard with it. 

Yeah, the kids run into their share of racists and other jerks.  But just looking around where I live, the story doesn’t seem far-fetched at all.  I’d like to say I can’t imagine people acting like this in real life, except I know they do.  I’ll personally never know just how accurate the game’s portrayal of bigotry is, because of my own privilege.  I love that the game lets me step into someone else’s shoes and experience life from their perspective, even if that perspective isn’t always pleasant.  I wish I could get certain other people to play this game, but the people who need this sort of revelation would never be interested.  

And we get more clues about Sean and Daniel’s mom.  This is a Chekov’s Gun that definitely will be resolved by the end of the season.  The game is still vague on why she left or what exactly is wrong with her, but she does know her kids are on the run.  And the kids have her P.O. box address.  

And here come the police, time to move on!  It reminds me of the Incredible Hulk 1978 TV series – a fugitive with uncontrollable powers (which manifest when he’s angry) hitchhikes from small town to small town, often finding himself in the position to help others.  Then Rod Serling’s head pops up, chewing his upper lip as he says, “Oh, and one other thing… did I mention this fugitive is a 9 year old boy?”  But I’m also reminded of Marvel’s Runaways, with a dash of Stand By Me.

I can’t help but worry that the final choice of Episode 5 will be “Sacrifice Daniel” or “Sacrifice Everyone Around Him”.  I can just see something really bad happening (maybe they find their mom, but she gets killed too), and Daniel completely losing control of his emotions as he destroys everything around him.  Then Sean will have to choose between letting Daniel get all his rage out (regardless of who else dies in the process), or killing Daniel himself.  Just a big ol’ mashup of the climaxes of Carrie, Firestarter, and X-Men 3.  It would be in keeping with LiS’s tradtion of both endings being somewhat tragic, but I hope I’m wrong just because...well, damn that's dark.

It still feels like not enough is happening in this game.  I’m trying to decide if that’s really true, or if it’s just because I’m not connecting with the characters as much as in the previous games.  In BtS, I didn’t mind just riding the rails with Rachel, or working on my truck, or just walking around campus, because I liked being Chloe.  And I do like Sean and Daniel, just not so much that I want to watch them walking through the forest all day.  It does bring up some memories of my childhood, when my brother and I would explore the woods around our house.  So I can relate, but it still doesn’t make me love it.

*sigh* You know what?  Scratch all of that last paragraph.  I have got to start judging this game on what it is, not what it isn’t.  I don’t tolerate it from other reviewers, so I’m refuse to be guilty of it myself.  Not every game can be tailor made to my tastes, and if it were bad enough that I wasn’t enjoying it, I’ll play something else.  And I am enjoying LiS2.

Control-wise, I’m a little worried about “Feature Creep”.  One of my favorite things about LiS1 was the simplicity of the controls.  You approach any interactive object, and a list of button presses appears on the screen.  The only other thing you needed to know in LiS1 was how to use the shoulder buttons to control time.  BtS was even simpler since it didn’t have time travel.  Captain Spirit made it a little more complicated again – you could hold down one of the shoulder buttons while interacting with certain objects to use your pretend super powers.  LiS2 also adds a couple of new functions.  Specifically, you have a button that makes it easier to find your brother, and another button to call his name when you can’t find him.  (And suddenly I’m reminded of the “Jason” button from Heavy Rain.)

So far, not too complicated.  But combined with the sketching talent (which is way more complicated to use than the talents in previous games), and the more robust inventory and money system, I do worry that future games in the series will gradually lose the simplicity that I love so much.  I mean, I love PS4’s Spider-Man game, but it takes a lot of fingers.  Not only does every button do something, but sometimes you have to hold down combinations of buttons to do other things, and after a while I just long for the days of Pac-Man.

However, it appears I was wrong about sketching being one of the achievement methods.  Only one of the first episode’s trophies was connected to sketching, the rest were about finding collectibles.  I don’t mind the sketching so much now that it’s mostly optional.  I’m not usually a big achievement hunter, but if I love the game and the trophies aren’t too difficult, I’ll try to collect them all.   I got the plats for LiS1 and BtS, so I’ll probably do it here, too.  I absolutely adore how this series lets you jump back to specific scenes after you finish an episode, so you can pick up your missing trophies.

I think I was also wrong about Daniel's powers being wind based, it looks like it's just a more general telekinesis.  In the first episode it always looked like he was lifting things using wind, but now he just looks like your standard Jedi.

And for those of you sick of hearing me talk about Life is Strange (hi, Chris!), this will be my last entry for a little while, since episode 3 doesn’t have a release date yet.

My Choices:

Aladdin and other LARDs

Sooo... that Genie… I don’t know. 

On the one hand, I think the makeup/special effect is top notch.  I don’t see how they could have made it look any better than it does.  It’s an amazing melding of the animated movie and Will Smith.  But just because he's made up and/or rendered well doesn’t make it pleasing to look at.  I still feel like I’m looking at A Thing That Should Not Be.  I think they should have just redesigned the genie from the ground up, rather than turning Will Smith into the bright blue 1992 genie.  It’s a beautiful execution of a flawed concept.

I do think Will Smith will do a decent job.  I’m sure it’s going to be an entertaining movie.  But yeesh, Disney, you’re going to flood the market.  According to Wikipedia, Disney has four live action remakes coming out this year: Dumbo in March, Aladdin in May, Lion King in July, and Lady & the Tramp in October.  Not to mention Mulan in March next year.   This is the same company that cancelled several Star Wars spin-off movies for fear of people having “Star Wars Fatigue”. 

Their previous Live Action Remade Disney movies (just for fun, let’s call them LARDs) have been of varying quality.  101 Dalmatians was fun but forgettable.  I thought the live action Cinderella was just plain boring.  The Jungle Book was pretty good, at least it had its moments.  Beauty and the Beast was… good and bad.  Gaston was amazing, but the Beast was stiff and unconvincing.  Given how good the CGI was in the Jungle Book, I was surprised the Beast didn’t look better.  I didn’t like the character designs for some of the living furniture, and the new songs were utterly forgettable.  But overall, it was enjoyable.

I’m typically of the opinion that if you don’t like the look of a LARD, just don’t see it.  Don’t complain that the movie shouldn’t be made, don’t childishly tweet that Disney is "raping your childhood" or whatever.  Other people are trying to enjoy these movies, and don’t need negativity from whiny bloggers who aren’t even part of the target audience.  I’m just trying to figure out Disney’s game plan here.  It seems like they’re in such a rush to get as many LARDs through the door as possible.  It’s like they’re trying to make up for lost time somehow.  I worry that they might be sacrificing quality for speed. 

Arguably, the longer you wait on a CGI-heavy LARD, the better.  Some of these movies require a huge amount of CGI, and those visual effects (usually) get better every year.  Once you put a LARD out there, it means the movie goes to the bottom of the list for being remade again.  It will probably be 50 years before they make another live action of Beauty and the Beast, which means the next couple of generations are going to grow up with the shoddy Beast in today’s version.  But if they had just waited another 5 years or so, they might have been able to tweak the CGI to perfection.  I don’t know, maybe they could release a “Star Wars”-style special edition with updated special effects.  But that would just make people whine more.

I certainly don’t want to say it’s a bad idea that Disney is remaking these films, and I’m actually looking forward to some of them.  I’m just worried that some of the movies won’t be well received, and after the first bomb Disney will throw another tantrum – sorry, I mean “rethink their market strategy” – like they did after Solo, and stop making LARDs altogether.

For the record, I'm not sure I believe in “Star Wars Fatigue”.  I believe that Solo paid for the sins of The Last Jedi.  Like it or not (and I didn’t hate it), TLJ wasn’t one of the more popular movies in the Star Wars series.  But it still made a ton of money, because it’s one of the main films in the series.  What are you going to do, skip it?  It’s a series, you can’t just skip episodes.  But Solo came out less than six months later, and people said, “Well, these movies aren’t very good lately, and that one looks skippable, so let’s wait for Netflix.”  But that doesn't mean they're sick of Star Wars movies, it just means they want better ones.

I didn't think Solo was great, but it was a decent popcorn muncher.  The numbered Star Wars movies should feel epic (which may have been another issue with TLJ), but the spin-offs should have their own feel.  I don't mind some of them being mindless fun with no real point.  In fact, I encourage it.  If they would just put a little more time between releases, I think they'd make some pretty good money on Star Wars spin-offs.

Yeah, I wish audiences were more forgiving, but that's not gonna happen.  Regardless of my opinion, the onus is on Disney to create a release schedule that maximizes their profit.  The internet is full of people complaining about LARDs, so it might be a good time to slow it down a little.

The Sims – Virtual Life Addiction

My name is Matt, and I am a Sims-a-holic.  I first played SimCity on the SNES in the early 90s, but I didn’t really get into it.  I tried a few other worldbuilding games as well – SimEarth, SimAnt, Populous, etc, but it just wasn’t a genre for me.  The only city building game I really enjoyed was ActRaiser, which is sort of like alternating between SimCity and Castlevania.  I still kept giving these games a try though.  My wife was really into games like Theme Hospital and Rollercoaster Tycoon, so these games were already in my house, no point in not trying them.

When “The Sims” came out in 2000, I was skeptical at first.  It seemed weird managing a single family instead of a whole world.  It reminded me of an old game I had on my Commodore 64, Activision’s “Little Computer People.”  I used to love that program, though it was more like a fish tank than a game.  You just watch a guy living his day-to-day life.  You could make requests that he might or might not follow, like "Please play the piano", but you didn't directly control him.  It was a concept that was ahead of its time.

But money was tight and "The Sims" didn't have a demo.  I didn't want to shell out $40 for something we might only play once.  But then someone gave me a cracked copy.  We both loved it so much, we went out and bought the full game.  And later, every expansion pack.  And later still, The Sims 2, 3, and 4, along with most of their expansion packs.  Not to mention a few spinoffs like “The Sims Medieval” and “The Sims Online”.   We bought some of them twice, because we have separate Origin accounts and sometimes want to play at the same time. 

That one pirated copy led to us spending hundreds of dollars on the series.  I’m not trying to make a pro-piracy argument here, if anything it’s pro-demo.  I wonder how many other people would  have jumped into the series earlier if they’d been able to try it first.

It is honestly one of the greatest series of computer games of all time.  That said, I’ve rarely played any Sims game the way it’s meant to be played.  The first thing I do on any lot is use the cheat code to make them millionaires.  I play these games for wish fulfillment, to live vicariously through my avatars.  I don’t think I’d even like the Sims games if they didn’t have cheat codes.

Here are some random thoughts and memories about each game.

The Sims (released in 2000)

We played the heck out of this game.  We only owned one computer at the time, so sometimes we fought over it.  One of my fondest memories is that of my wife playing the Sims while I read a book nearby, looking up now and then to see what she'd built.

I loved how easy it was to mod the game.  I constantly downloaded user-made objects to improve (or sometimes crash) the game.  I found tons of great skins online, and learned how to make them myself.  I ended up making an entire neighborhood full of comic book and sci-fi characters.  I made a Resident Evil themed castle, in which lived Jill Valentine and Claire Redfield. 

Eventually I skinned myself.  I had a favorite shirt at the time, a souvenir shirt from the Dueling Dragons at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure.  It showed the face of a dragon surrounded by flames.  I wore that shirt for years, until it was too ratty to wear in public.  I scanned a photo of the shirt and made it into a Sims skin, and played as myself.  Then my wife made a sim of herself, and we watched ourselves go on a virtual date.  Another one of my fondest gaming memories.

I spent way more time making female households than male.  I was still an egg at the time, and I thought I was just being voyeuristic.  My favorite Sim was sort of an idealized version of myself: Female, denim jacket, tie-dye shirt, wild red hair.  I must have made and remade that character a dozen times.

The Sims Online (2002)

We bought it and tried it, but it was a total flop for us.  It did teach us a lesson about reading the fine print, though.  The game promised that the first month was free, but it still required a credit card number to sign up.  We only played it for the first couple of weeks, and stopped logging on.  A few months later I looked at the credit card statement, and noticed we were being charged a monthly fee, despite never having agreed to anything but the free month.  Whoever I called got an earful, believe me, but they still refused to reverse the charges.

The Sims 2 (2004)

I didn’t play much of the Sims 2.  All I remember doing in it was making a college dorm, filled with the cast of Daria.  I don’t know if it was my computer at the time or a glitch in the software, but it had a texture loading problem.  Some objects just showed up completely white.  I don’t think that’s the only thing that kept me from playing, though; I think I was just more into other games at the time.

Various Console Versions

I’ve played The Sims on several different consoles and tablets, but honestly it’s a game that’s at its best on a computer.  In my experience, the console versions are either harder to control, or they sacrifice some of your freedom in favor of more mission based play.  I haven’t tried the more recent ones, however.

The Sims 3 (2009)

I loved the Sims 3.  By this point, I was fully aware of my gender issues, and my neighborhoods were full of lesbians.  I still enjoyed making Sims based on comic book characters, but this time I mostly used their secret identities instead of having them walk around the neighborhood in full costume.  The graphics in Sims 3 are about as good as I would ever need them to be, and I really thought I’d never want to upgrade to Sims 4.  Except… well, the load times were excessive, and it got worse the more expansion packs you installed.  It took about 8 minutes just to load up the game each time.  Creating a Sim took forever, because each time I clicked a new clothing group, it took several minutes for the clothes to appear.  This may have been partly because my computer was getting old, and partly because of the mods I used, but it’s still pretty slow on other computers and without mods. 

The Sims Medieval (2011)

This was a fun departure.  Like the console versions, it was more limited than the main series.  You can place furniture, but you can’t build houses.  You can’t even scroll completely around a building, they’re more like dioramas.  Every kingdom eventually looks the same, once you’ve placed all the buildings.  And it was more mission based than the regular Sims games.  Despite this loss of freedom, it was a blast to play.  The “quests” made it feel like “The Sims: D&D Edition”.  Unfortunately, these so-called quests mostly involved gathering seeds or writing plays, and it always felt like the most exciting stuff was happening off screen.  But it was enough to keep me entertained for a few months.  I still reinstall it now and then.

I will say, though, that Sims Medieval is one of the few games where the expansion pack actually makes the game worse.  Some of the new content was nice, but with it came new daily tasks that were just torture.  Literally – one of the new objects in the expansion was an interrogation chair, with which you would tickle captives into giving you answers.  It was incredibly irritating to use, and once the expansion was installed, it added the object’s use to the daily tasks of one of your Sims.  So you couldn’t just ignore the object’s existence, lest your Sim lose mood points or whatever.

The Sims 4 (2014)

I have to admit I did a double-take when I was looking up the dates for this blog.  I honestly thought Sims 4 was only about a year old.  Going by their usual release schedule, they’re probably already working on Sims 5 by now.  Anyway, I just recently started playing Sims 4.  Sims 3 had been running slowly lately, and I assumed Sims 4 would take even more horsepower.  But then I got a new laptop and Sims 4 went on sale for $5, so I had to give it a try.  It’s fantastic.  First off, it takes about 30 seconds to load.  (Note, I’ve tried Sims 3 on the new laptop, and still takes 8 minutes just to start playing.)  There’s no more lag when picking outfits for your Sim, either. 

One thing I always find interesting is seeing what each Sims game keeps in its memory.  The first Sims game only kept the current house in memory, and you would see a loading screen if you go anywhere else.   In Sims 3, you could travel anywhere in your city with no loading, but the downtown buildings didn’t have actual interiors.  Sims 4 decides to pace itself.  Each city is divided up into neighborhoods of about 3 to 5 lots each.  You can walk all the way up and down your current street, but you’ll get a loading screen if you actually want to enter a neighbor’s house, or visit a different neighborhood.  This is probably the smartest thing they could have done, and it really helps the game run faster. 

I love all the little tweaks you get from playing a game that has been remade four+ times.  The designers have been paying attention and listening to feedback all these years, and now character creation is a joy.  It’s so easy to find the clothing and accessories I’m looking for.  You can plan multiple outfits for each category.  You can uncheck the category boxes so that all clothing items can be worn in any category, and all clothing is unisex.  There’s some (somewhat hidden) gender tweaks, for those who want to play someone less traditional in that area. 

I'm back to my old tricks now.  Neighborhoods full of mostly female comic book heroes and sci-fi characters. My favorite trick?  You can run your basement adjacent to your swimming pool, and then put windows on the walls so you can see the pool from the basement.  You can create beautiful underwater houses this way. 

The game has its downsides, though admittedly what I consider downsides are upsides for some people.  I don't like how your Sims gain weight if you eat poorly and don’t exercise.  Realism is nice and all, but I play video games to escape real life.  Okay, it's actually a cool feature; my complaint is that there’s no way to turn it off the options menu (like I always do for aging).  Luckily, I found a mod to nix it.  Some of the aspiration paths have “become an adult” as one of the requirements to proceed.  I prefer to make Young Adults and keep them that age, so I avoid choosing those aspirations.

Sims 4 isn't perfect, but with the right mods, it's one of my favorite escapes.    

Life is Strange 2 - Episode 1

Disclaimer:  This blog contains major spoilers for the “Life is Strange” series of video games.

The first thing "Life is Strange 2" asks you is whether you chose "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay" or "Sacrifice Chloe" at the end if LiS1 (similar to the beginning of KotOR2).  Oddly enough, I had to think about that for a minute.  Here's the thing... well, let me ramble a little first.

If I’m going to write a blog I like to do it as soon as possible, while the details are still fresh in my head.  But sometimes it takes a while for my opinions to really settle, and my initial opinions don’t match my long-term view of the game/movie/book/etc.  I know I’m beating a dead horse, but before I really get into LiS2, I want to lay out a couple of after-afterthoughts for LiS1 and BtS.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that the perfect order to play them in is chronological (in-universe).  Play the BtS bonus episode first, then BtS Episodes 1-3, then the original Life is Strange.  Rather than be introduced to Chloe when she’s a world-hating rebel, introduce her as a fun-loving kid who gets hit by tragedy.  Jump forward a couple of years to see how it affected her, and witness her character arc as a new friendship starts to make her a better person.  Then another time skip, Rachel disappears, Chloe regresses, and we get another character arc.  Unfortunately with this much buildup, it makes the “Sacrifice Chloe” ending of LiS1 a “Shoot The Shaggy Dog” story. 

…but I’ve come around on that, too.  While I chose to sacrifice Chloe when I played, I’m starting to consider “Sacrifice Arcadia Bay” the true ending.  Not only does it leave more room for sequels (like the comic book series), but I’m also starting to come around on the morality of it.  No, I’m not saying Chloe’s life is worth more than all the other people in town.  I just mean that Max didn’t even know for sure it would work – they were just working on a theory, that the tornado was caused by Max’s time travelling.  For all they knew, going back and letting Chloe die wouldn’t affect the tornado at all.  Or worse, trying to fix time travel with more time travel might have made the tornado even bigger.

So while the town ended up being better off if you sacrifice Chloe, I think the actual decision to let her die was the riskier choice, given the information the characters had to work with at the time they had to make the decision.  Besides, the “Sacrifice Chloe” ending makes the whole game kind of pointless.  Why would the Powers That Be suddenly grant Max this power, only to show her that it was better to have never used it?  Plus, frankly, I refuse to be held responsible for the weather.  Going forward, I am going to accept “Sacrifice Arcadia Bay” as my personal canon.

So anyway, that's my long-winded way of explaining why, when LiS2 asked me what I chose at the end of LiS1, I lied and picked the "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay" option.  I don't typically lie to my electronics, though the toaster's been asking me a lot of inappropriate questions lately.

So far, the only thing it affects is a scene where you see Arcadia Bay from a roadside overlook.  Its condition is determined by which LiS1 ending you picked.    This… bothers me, for reasons that are hard to put into words.  Part of me would rather they had picked a canon ending and stuck to it.  I was kind of hoping they might revisit Max and Chloe in a future game, going off the “Sacrifice Arcadia Bay” ending.  But this sets a precedent.  Any future LiS game that decides to reference any earlier LiS game, will probably ask you for your final choices of said previous game(s).  This means that there will never be official canon, which also means it will be harder to revisit old characters in future games. 

I mean, okay, if you tell a LiS sequel that you chose “Sacrifice Arcadia Bay” in LiS1, then sure, you might run into Max and Chloe themselves as cameos at some point.  But they can’t be too integral to the plot, because the more screen time they’re given, the more screen time they also have to program for the “Sacrifice Chloe” version of that sequel’s universe.  In other words, we’ll never see another game where M&C are the protagonists.  Not that I expected one, but I hate the door being closed forever.  But maybe I’m reading too much into it.  The whole series feels experimental, so they’re not necessarily bound by these rules. 

It’s weird to me that the writers gave Daniel wind powers.  Wind was such a strong theme in LiS1, so it looks like wind is an overall theme for the series.  Except BtS had a fire theme.  This makes me wonder if they’re going to do seasons based on water and earth.  But if so, why two wind games before we get to the other elements?  I’m probably reading too far into it.  They probably don’t even have any ideas for future sequels yet.  Plus, I'm not 100% sure yet if Daniel's powers are actually meant to be "wind", or just generic levitation powers.

I guess I’m hoping this is all building to some future game where the characters from LiS1, LiS2, and a few more sequels all meet and save the world.  The “Emo Avengers” or whatever.  I won’t hold my breath, but ya never know.

There is a strong racism theme in LiS2.  The first two games had a lot of gay subtext, but it was so subdued that sometimes I thought I was imagining it.  But LiS2 isn’t afraid to show off its social awareness.  Between mentions of Trump’s wall, a prejudiced cop, and a bigoted shopkeeper, this game is probably going to be hated by a certain subset of gamers for being too "SJW-ish" or whatever.  Well, screw ‘em.  Not enough games have the courage to deliver this kind of social message.

But I also feel... I don't know, cheated?  I love that LiS1 and BtS featured GLBT representation.  I also like that it treated it as no big deal, just another minor aspect of some complex characters.  But after seeing how well LiS2 calls attention to bigotry, I almost feel cheated out of a good “GLBT person overcomes oppression” story.  Maybe LiS3 could star a transgender character.  With water powers.  I’d play that.

I like that you’re not directly controlling the character with the power this time.  As much as I loved LiS1, the time travel aspect was my least favorite part of it.  The writers did such a good job with the themes, moods, music, and characterization, that they didn’t need to include the more traditional video game elements.  I preferred BtS (even if the story wasn’t as interesting), because it felt less gamey and more like interactive fiction.  I think LiS2 is the best of both worlds, because it holds onto the supernatural elements while not requiring you to control them directly.  I just wish I liked the characters as much as Max and Chloe.

The way you influence Daniel is revolutionary.  I don’t know if it’s the first game to do it this well, but it’s certainly new to me.  Decisions you make influence your little brother’s developing personality.  Just like raising a child in real life, your actions teach him far more than any verbal lessons you could give him.  The best way to insure he becomes a good person is to be a good person yourself.  But what is “good” in a world where authority figures judge you by your skin tone?  The LiS series is excellent at placing you in situations where there is no right answer, and the decisions are doubly difficult when you’re bringing up a kid with such deadly powers.   Be a bad influence, and you could find you’ve created a super villain. 

In a way, this game is the world's longest escort mission.  But that's okay, since it's not an action game.  It's not like Elder Scrolls where your companion are constantly getting themselves killed.  I love the way the conversations work in this one, they feel very dynamic.  Sometimes you can perform other actions while talking, and the conversation will change to reflect what you're doing.  On the downside, sometimes two characters talk at once and you'll miss something.

The new inventory system is like something out of an RPG.  For the first time in a LiS game, you actually collect a large number of items and store them, rather than just carry a few quest items until you solve a puzzle.  And you actually have to keep track of money now.  It's really difficult to decide what overpriced food to buy at a Mini Mart to get the most out of your limited funds.

In LiS1, Max takes pictures that give you achievements.  In BtS, Chloe draws graffiti.  LiS2 appears to have two achievement methods - collecting souvenirs for your backpack, and sketching landscapes.  The sketching mechanic is interesting, but takes a lot longer than Chloe's graffiti or Max's snapshots.  I hope there's not a lot of them, they could get annoying.

This episode has a lot of walking.  It sets the mood - wandering through the woods puts you in the same mindset as the characters, so you feel their aimlessness.  These are characters who have no idea where they're going, with no definite goal except escape, and they're just looking for something to find.  Unfortunately, it got old after a while.

The plot feels part Thelma and Louise, part The Fugitive.  The kids witness the death of their father by a trigger-happy cop, so they go on the run without really knowing for sure if they're actually in trouble.  Now they're just making their way across the country, feeling like it's just them against the world.

While I enjoyed it for what it was, I do hope the plot of Episode 2 feels more focused, less aimless.  If each episode is just them finding the next safe place until they finally find a forever home, it will feel repetitive. 

My choices:

The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit

"The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit" is a free game set in the "Life is Strange" universe.  It stars Chris Eriksen, an imaginative boy who envisions himself as a super hero.  He lives with his father in Beaver Creek, Oregon.

Chris sees everything as it relates to his super hero character.  The water heater is an evil monster, the family truck is a spaceship, and so on.  Most of the time you see the tricks Chris uses to emulate his pretend powers, like holding a remote in one hand while pretending to turn the TV with his mind.  Other times, the game full on shows you the made-up worlds he's imagining.  It's great fun, reminiscent of "Spaceman Spiff" in Calvin & Hobbes. 

But of course, being LiS, there is an undercurrent of sadness.  His fanciful adventures help him cope with the loss of his mother, and the stress of living with his alcoholic father.  Of course the father is grieving too, but he has a tendency to take his anger out on his son.  It's up to you whether you walk on eggshells around him, or really get on his nerves.  Either way, you'll still see evidence of his dark side eventually.

I thought it was interesting that the late mother went to Blackwell Academy, despite this being set in a different town than Life is Strange.  I wonder if this was just a nod to the previous games, or if there's a deeper connection.  She was hit by a car, which the police are calling a homicide, but they've given up trying to solve the case.  There's also a hint that she might have taken Mark Jefferson's photography class.  Could she have been another victim of the first game's Dark Room, and later killed to tie up loose ends?  Will her murder be given another look in a future game?

It also features several references to Hawt Dawg Man, who is rapidly becoming the official mascot of the LiS universe.

It's a short game.  It took me about 2 hours, and I made sure to inspect and interact with everything.  It's well worth your time, even if you haven't played the other games in the series.  I don't believe it spoils anything from the previous games. 

Some screenshots:

Life is Strange: Before the Storm

Disclaimer:  This blog contains major spoilers for both “Life is Strange” (LiS) and “Life is Strange: Before the Storm” (BtS).

So let's start with my usual unrelated rambling...

I've been waiting for a series like LiS for a long time.  I've never really cared about my actual skills as a gamer, but as I get older I'm favoring story over gameplay even more.  There are so many games out there with an interesting story, but where the actual "game" gets in the way.  One of the reasons I like Skyrim so much is because it's relatively easy, so I can get immersed in the world without worrying too much about my reflexes.

Not long ago I bought "The Last of Us Remastered" because it was on sale.  The opening was fantastic.  Honestly it was better than most actual theatrical zombie apocalypse movies.  There was a real sense of urgency as you looked out the car windows and watched the chaos developing around you.  When you have to get out and run on foot, there's a sequence where you can see the shadows of the infected people chasing you at the bottom of the screen, showing you just how close they are, and the effect is terrifying.

But once the intro was over, things went downhill. I found the game itself to be dull.  The combat wasn't fun, and the stealth parts were just tedious.  I know the game has received fantastic reviews, so I know it's just me.  And that's okay, y'all enjoy your games, and I'll enjoy mine.  I would love to watch someone else play "The Last of Us", because the story was pretty cool, but I have no interest in slogging through it myself.  Maybe I'll look it up on YouTube sometime.

So the LiS series is good for me.  I can appreciate a good story, without having to worry about my gamer skillz.  In fact, I've gone ahead and added to my list of all time favorite games.  I've also checked out the fan-made "Love is Strange" visual novel, and I've been reading the comic book series.  And finally, I've finished the prequel, "Life is Strange: Before the Storm".  When I get into something, I really go all out.

The visual novel is kind of odd.  First off, a visual novel seems like a step backwards anyway, since LiS is one of the reasons I feel like VNs should be obsolete.  But I suppose it's the easiest medium for dating simulators, especially low budget ones.  "Love is Strange" is not a sequel or a prequel, but a "what if" interactive fan fiction.  "If all the characters from Life is Strange had survived and managed to attend Blackwell at the same time, who would date who?"  I don't have the patience to finish it, but the strangest thing I've come across so far is that their teacher is Hawt Dawg Man.  The artwork is nice, and I can tell it was made by true fans.

The comic book series is interesting.  It takes place one year after the "Sacrifice Arcadia Bay" ending.  Max starts to experience odd shifts in the present timeline, like Worf's dimensional shifts in the ST:TNG episode "Parallels".  Chloe and Max decide to return to Arcadia Bay to find out what's going on.  I'm only two issues into the four-issue limited series, but I'm enjoying it so far.

Now, back to "Life is Strange: Before the Storm."

Episode 1:

It opens with 16 year old Chloe breaking curfew, defacing people’s property, throwing unprovoked insults at almost everyone she meets, drinking alcohol, trying to score some pot, damaging somebody’s car so she can steal a T-shirt (and/or some cash), and getting into a bar fight.  Granted, a few of those are optional.  Still, why are we supposed to like her again?  I mean, I grew to like her over the course of LiS, but anyone who starts with BtS might be a bit put off. 

One of the minor criticisms of the first game was the outdated slang.  There's even a YouTube clip that compiles all the uses of "hella".  Personally I never thought it was supposed to represent current slang, but rather intentional personality quirks.  Chloe and Max hadn't seen each other for five years, so they reverted to the way they used to talk to each other.  And besides, small towns often have their own common slang that's behind the rest of the world.

So I was amused when BtS addresses this by having Chloe remark, "Hella?  Who says that?" after hearing it from California-born Rachel.  The LiS series seems to do this a lot - listen to fan reactions then respond to them in later episodes.  It's a good retcon.

And yay, Rachel started a forest fire.  Rachel's connection to fire is an interesting theme.  Later in Episode 3, the fire goes out at the same time Rachel is stabbed, giving the impression that there could be a supernatural connection.  LiS centers around a tornado, and LiS2 has a kid who possibly makes tornadoes, so the writers really love their elements.  I wonder if some future sequel will tie it all together.

Episode 2:
Chloe's family dynamic is all too real for me.  After my parents divorced, my mom started dating a total asshole (also ex-military).  Of course, that was nearly 30 years ago and they're still together, so I've learned to put up with him.  But unlike Chloe, I never had to live with him.  I was never rebellious like Chloe, but I might have turned out very differently if I'd gone to live with them instead of my dad.

I usually don't even notice the game's Hammerspace inventory system.  When Max carried five bottles around in LiS, it didn't even occur to me to wonder where she'd stashed them.  But in this chapter, when Chloe picks up a car battery then makes a movement like she's stuffing it in her back pocket... well, I just had to laugh.  I liked the bit of customization within the car.  For the record, I used the blue light bulb from the robot, the welcome mat on the floorboard, the pirate flag for a seat cover, I did put the bobble head on the dash, and I wrote "You are about to die" on the back wall.

The toughest choice this chapter was whether to stay with Mikey when Damon attacks Drew.  For me, it was actually harder than the game's final choice.  I stayed with Mikey to keep him out of harm's way, but it was really tough to listen to Drew getting his ass kicked outside.  Even if Drew is a jerk.

Performing Shakespeare made me nostalgic for one of my favorite scenes in an RPG, the "Aria di Mezzo Carattere" opera in Final Fantasy VI.  Afterward, watching Chloe and Rachel celebrating in the streets was touching.  They really captured that energizing euphoria actors often experience after a good show.

When I reached the end of the chapter and saw the big reveal, I almost had to laugh.  The stakes are so much lower in this game than in the first one.   I’m so used to seeing Chloe get shot or made paraplegic that “OMG Rachel’s mom isn’t her mom” barely gets a reaction out of me.  But being a prequel, there really was only so much they could do.  These characters are confined to their destinies, and the writers only had so much wiggle room for extra drama.  Maybe I should have played through the prequel first, just to see how things escalate.

Episode 3:

Chloe's reaction to finding her mom's sex drawer was priceless.

I enjoyed working on the car, even though I hate cars.  Chloe's names for engine parts (like "Fuckamajig") match my own, but she clearly knows more about engines than I do.  

I didn't really like that Frank had to save Chloe at the end.  I was hoping Chloe would find her own way to stop Damon.  Frank could still kill Damon later off screen, but would it have been so hard to write a scenario where Chloe knocks Damon out?  Let the protagonist be the hero, dammit!  Chloe's life is hard, she needs a win.

The final sadistic choice was another “laughably low stakes” moment, at least when compared to LiS.  Do I tell Rachel everything, or protect her from the truth?  Bland as it was, I still spent some time considering it.  Rachel’s going to die next year anyway, why not let her die believing her dad's a nice guy?  But her future death is "out of character" knowledge.  In situations like this I tend to favor honesty, even if the truth hurts.  In my experience, the truth always comes out eventually, so lying just delays the inevitable.  Besides, Chloe wants to blow this town with Rachel anyway, so might as well let Rachel be angry at her dad. 

A lot of reviewers complained about the end of the first “Life is Strange”, because no matter what choices you make during the game, you’re always presented with the same two choices at the end:  Sacrifice Chloe or Sacrifice Arcadia Bay.  It renders all your previous choices pointless.  Why agonize over saving Kate when either (A) she’ll die anyway when the town is destroyed, or (B) she’ll be reset when I reset the week later?

But (as you can tell by my previous blogs), I agonized over them anyway.  I get into games more than most people.  Whether my choices really matter or not, I still want to roleplay a good person.  That's why I could never play a Dark Side character in KotOR. 

So yeah, even though BtS has another binary ending, I don't feel my previous choices were meaningless.  This is not a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book where any choice could lead to a "The End" page.  This is a story with two endings, and lots of possible middles.  I can live with that.

The final stinger, where it shows Rachel's phone while she's in the dark room, was heartbreaking.

Bonus Episode:
Not much to really say here.  It was touching and poignant.  I liked seeing their childhood, and I kind of wish I'd played it first.  

Final Thoughts:
I found myself wondering at times if this story really needed to be told.  It's sort of like the criticism aimed at "Solo: A Star Wars Story" - Was this movie necessary?  Did we need to be shown how Han met Chewie, found his blaster, got his last name, made the Kessel Run, etc?  Same with BtS; we didn't really need to see how Chloe found the junkyard, her truck, her beanie, when she decided on "stepdouche" as David's nickname, when she first dyed her hair, and so on. 

So again, the question.  Was this necessary?  And I have to give the same answer I gave the reviewers of Solo:  Of course it's not "necessary", it's entertainment.  Were any of the Star Wars films actually "necessary?"  How are we even defining necessary?  The first Star Wars movie was groundbreaking and may have changed (or at least accelerated) sci-fi forever, but it's not like it cured cancer or fixed the ozone layer.

Solo was fluffy and forgettable, but it was fun.  Life is Strange: Before the Storm was also fun.  I really liked learning more of Chloe's backstory, and seeing how close she was with Rachel.  Given their eventual fates, it adds a lot of emotional weight to the original Life is Strange.  Necessary?  No.  But damn enjoyable.

So, the big question:  If you haven’t played either one, which should you play first?  That’s a tough one.  I generally advocate consuming stories in release order.  With the Star Wars movies and the Forgotten Realms “Drizzt” novels, I think the original trilogies do a better job of making you care about the characters.  Once you care, you might be motivated to seek out the prequels so you can learn more about the universe.  In BtS, Chloe is so abrasive and raw that it’s hard to care about her until you find out everything life did to her to make her this way.  Some people who try BtS first might not stick with the game long enough to get attached to her.  

On the other hand, if one did stick with BtS and play all the way through it before starting LiS, I think it would make LiS all the more rewarding.  BtS is so much more low key than LiS, that playing them in story order means the dangers constantly get bigger.  The constant emotional gutpunches LiS throws at you would be all the more impactful now that you’ve seen what Chloe’s been through.  So yeah, if you’re going to stick with it, I would advocate playing BtS first, maybe even playing the bonus episode before the other three.  But if you try BtS and you just can’t empathize with the characters, try LiS and maybe come back to BtS later.  I honestly don’t think you can go wrong either way.  Both are excellent stories.

Coming up next: "The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit".

My Choices: