As a follow up to the previous two articles that examined the gameplay and tone of Life is Strange episodes 1-3, it's necessary to summarize the plot to be able to critique the game, and offer theories as to the final two episodes. If plan to play Life is Strange, I would recommend not reading this article.
Protagonist Max(-ine), on a casual day
in school discovers she has the ability to rewind time when she
prevents Nathan Prescott, a wealthy bully whose dad is talked about
as if he owns half of Arcadia Bay in Oregon, from shooting a student
in the women's bathroom. During the day she also has a vision in
which she follows a doe up the hill on the outskirts of Arcadia Bay
to a lighthouse. In a drenching storm she witnesses a massive
tornado already in the bay and the doomed town cowering before it.
Max wakes, feeling anxious and ill because of the vision, which is
why she visits the bathroom in the first place.
A little more about Max. She is an
senior at Blackwell Academy, a prestigious private school. Yet, she
is not able to focus her energy on school, eschewing it for a more
creative and introspective existence. Photography is the only
subject she enjoys, and she always carries her old Polaroid camera
with her. She admires the only one teacher, Mr. Jefferson, a world
renowned photographer and the reason she applied to Blackwell.
The purpose of episode one was to
introduce the characters.
The girl you saved in the bathroom is
Chloe, Max's best friend before she moved to Seattle at the age of
thirteen. Unfortunately, right before Max moved, Chloe's dad died in
a car accident. For some reason, Max and Chloe didn't keep in touch,
and in the bathroom Max fails to recognize her old friend. Chloe
changed when her dad died, becoming a punk and a rebel, emphasized by
her dyed hair and torn clothing (it's very cliché). Chloe becomes
the first and only person to know of Max's power.
Chloe's mom remarried a man named
David. As I mentioned in the other article, the game wants him to be
a tough guy trying to do right by his family, but this fails.
Instead he seems like an paranoid idiot who stalks students, sets up
security cameras in his house, and believes everyone is guilty of a
serious crime. He never offers any detailed defense for his
behavior, only saying that he is trying to protect everyone.
All around town are hundreds of missing
person pamphlets for Rachel Amber. Max discovers Chloe has been
putting them up. Rachel became Chloe's substitute for Max after she
moved away. Rachel has been missing for two months and no one can
find her. Though the school is populated by the ever present cliched
cliques, everyone to liked her: the preps of the Vortex Club (the
campus society club), jocks, punks, geeks, and other misfits who
comprise the social scene of Blackwell.
One of the members of the Vortex Club
is Victoria, ruler of the mean girls. Her and Max are engaged in
eternal conflict since Max returned to Arcadia a few weeks ago.
Victoria torments everyone she believes beneath her (which is
everyone). Yet the writer tries to offer a subtler, softer side when
Max has the opportunity to sympathize with a minor incident that
befalls Victoria. Victoria is an excellent photographer and is
trying to seduce Mr. Jefferson for reasons unknown, but probably to
win a photography contest.
During the first episode Nathan
confronts Max about the incident in the bathroom. He threatens to
kill her, and she is rescued by the help of Warren, a science geek
who definitely likes Max, and Chloe. Together Max and Chloe drive
off and renew their friendship. At the very end of the episode Max
has a repeat vision of the tornado and she tells Chloe about
everything that occurred during the day.
The second episode begins the following
day.
Max, expecting an unusual day,
considering the circumstances, begins it with a fight in the
bathroom. Kate, a devout Christian is being publicly humiliated by
Victoria with the posting of a video. In the video, Kate makes out
with a number of guys at a Vortex Club party. Embarrassed, she
confesses to Max that she can't remember any of it, and Max assumes
she was drugged. Max promises to investigate, suspecting Nathan.
But first she has to see Chloe.
Chloe, astonished by Max's admission
the previous day, proceeds to test Max's powers. They spend the day
hanging out until they are confronted by Frank, the local drug
dealer. He demands Chloe repay him, but she argues with him when she
sees he is wearing Rachel's bracelet.
Eventually Max returns to school where
Kate has managed to unlock the door to the roof a building, and
throws herself off. Max is able to rewind and then freeze time in
place, allowing her to reach the top of the building and talk Kate
down. In a conference with the Principal, Mr. Jefferson, Nathan, and
David, Max is proclaimed a hero and allowed to accuse any one of them
of failing to protect, or trying to harm, Kate.
In the closing montage, the player
witnesses the principal and Mr. J in a heated argument, Victoria
crying while Nathan comforts her, and an unknown person making scrap
books about Kate and Rachel, along with some other scenes.
The third episode begins that night.
Max, unable to sleep, receives a text from Chloe, asking her to meet
on the main campus. This requires breaking curfew but Max agrees.
Chloe has stolen her step-dad's keys and they enter the school and
break into the principal's office. They read the files about a
number of students, including one by a psychiatrist that claims
Nathan is psychotic. They then go for a swim in the school pool, and
are nearly caught by the security guards.
They flee and stay the night at Chloe's
house. In the morning Max speaks with Chloe's mom, Joyce, and they
discuss the death of Chloe's dad, and how Chloe changed because of
it. Chloe distracts her mother so Max can investigate her step-dad's
surveillance for the second time, where David has pictures and files
on Kate, Rachel, Chloe, and Max. She discovers a picture of Frank
and Rachel and decides to break into Frank's RV.
Max and Chloe learn Rachel was in a
relationship with Frank, and Chloe feels betrayed for not knowing.
Returning home, a final revelation
occurs. While sitting on her bed, Max looks at the Polaroid Chloe's
dad took of them when they were thirteen, the day he died. Then she
falls into it and relives the fifteen minutes before he left the
house. Knowing that if he drives he dies, thirteen year old Max (but
with eighteen year old Max's experience) hides the keys and convinces
him to take the bus.
But when she wakes up she is back in
her dorm room, only everything has been changed.
Going to leave it there, and do a bit
of analysis.
First, some of these events might be
different from other players as choices may alter events and
outcomes.
One of the reoccurring connections to
Max's vision of a tornado, is a series of plagues that effect
Arcadia. On day one, a snowstorm strikes in September, day two a
solar eclipse without any explanation, and on day three a number of
birds fall dead from the sky. The Apocalypse is coming. And what
caused it? My guess, is that either: there is a predetermined future
and any deviation from this will bring about the end of the world, or
there is no predetermined future, but any rewinding will cause the
apocalypse.
Why does Max have this power, how does
it work, and will it last are questions the story hasn't tried to
answer, but it should, to create a satisfactory conclusion.
Who is the person that is keeping scrap
books about Kate and Rachel? My guess is pretty weird, and uses
convoluted logic. I think it is Mr. Jefferson. Why? Because
everyone else is too obvious. And not just obvious, but
psychologically impaired, idiotic, and malicious. By everyone I
mean: Frank, Nathan, David, and Victoria. These are the antagonists
and they are inexpertly constructed. The writer occasionally bestows
them with difficulties and emotions, but it contrasts so sharply with
their normal behavior it is unconvincing. But if the writer is
trying to create a mystery they won't want the culprit to be the
obvious person. And there is one strange hint that may point to Mr.
Jefferson. Aside from the fact that he tutored Kate, a strange note
by Nathan repeatedly says. “Rachel in the dark room.” Mr.
Jefferson is a famous photographer and maybe that is where he brings
the girls. Nathan could know because he helps Mr. Jefferson get
them.
Though Kate was clearly bothered at the
video, I suspect she was already suicidal based on events not yet
seen. It's possible she was sexually assaulted by someone prior to
the Vortex party and is too ashamed to tell anyone. This would be
the connection between her and Rachel. Both were female students,
abused, and yet where is Rachel?
Ok, here is my other theory, which
competes with and can't fit into the prior one. It's incredibly
implausible, but based on Max's new ability and my lack of trust in
the writers, what if Max is also Rachel. They were never in Arcadia
at the same time, Max fits into Rachel's clothes, they were both
friends with Chloe... That's all I have. And yet I suspect the
author's have a sort of mind bending ending, and I'm trying to
predict it in advance.
I suppose the final question is, what
is going to happen now that Max can, and has, changed the past and
thereby the present? Will she return to her original time, live in
this new one, or continue to move around trying to achieve some sort
of goal?
See you next time for the review of
episodes 4 and 5.
Life Is Strange
Series:
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