Life is Strange

Played through episodes two and three over the last few days. It's still walking a line between nuance character based storytelling and sci-fi melodrama that doesn't always work, but it's definitely emerged as one of the fascinating experiments I've come across in a while.

I think it gets a lot of what I've felt other episodic, story-driven games have missed. The pacing is dead on, the episodes just the right length and not full of busywork. The dialogue too, while a bit wooden from time to time, also flows well, so conversations feel natural (and even convincingly awkward - appropriate for teenagers) rather than characters reciting exposition at each other. The spaces are always interesting to explore, full of detail and little things can impact on both character-building and potentially the wider narrative too. While the game is clearly authored with plenty of cutscenes, there's more than enough interaction - some quite meaningful - to keep the player involved as opposed to just watching.

Many of the characters are painted in pretty broad, sometimes stereotypical strokes (a few villainous characters in particular, although wouldn't be at all surprised if there were a few surprises there later). And as said, while I for the most part like the 'rewind' mechanic (much more convincingly implemented than it was in Remember Me), the sci-fi aspects do threaten to get in the way when the game excels in quieter, more nuanced moments. Fascinated to see where they go after .

More than anything it has a confidence of direction that is rather atypical for video games. The music cues are the best example of that: I've come across only a handful of moments in games that use existing music to powerful dramatic effect (something like crossing into Mexico in Red Dead is one of the few I can think of off the top of my head). Here there are several per episode: musical moments that really enhance the mood of a particular scene. Add to that smart art design, camera angles and character art, and you have a game that just goes to show how many games put very little thought into all aspects of their total aesthetic identity.