Life is Strange: Double Exposure

If you love Max Caulfield, it’s absolutely worth playing. Just don't expect it to have the same emotional impact as the first game did. It’s a solid supernatural mystery. 🦋

Spoiler free part: I was going into this game with high hopes, as I ADORED Life is Strange 1. But, LiS: Double Exposure had a very rushed, unfinished feeling to its ending. Many things were left unanswered. (maybe it’s to set up the next game, but it felt more confusing than purposeful cliffhangers). This game made plot beats that were rip offs/heavily inspired by plot beats within LiS 1, that didn’t need to be there. Additionally, Safi’s character was underdeveloped/underexplained and I have trouble empathizing with her behaviour at the end. Overall, the writing lost me, left me confused and I wasn’t connected to the characters as a result. SPOILERS AHEAD!!!! For the first 3 chapters, Max’s story is set up. Max discovers her new parallel universe time jumping power, she uses this to investigate, and we start learning about the people in Safi’s life, and why they could potentially be her murderer. The story itself gets confusing after we learn that Safi has shape-shifting powers. We are no longer trying to solve Safi’s murder. Safi starts losing control of her powers due to overwhelming anger, as she finds out who cancelled her book deal; her mother, Yasmin. Safi terrorizes all of the people at Caledon, Max comes along behind her cleaning up her mess. And in the end, Safi proposes to Max that they should join together and look for other people with powers. To do what exactly? Safi doesn’t say, but based on her violent behaviour towards the people within Caledon, probably not something good. Then we are just left with so many loose threads!! We don’t get a definite answer as to who killed Safi. Was it actually Max? Was it suicide? What happened to Alderman--literally ceasing to exist because he touched another reality's version of himself--is never brought up again. There were collectable polaroid pictures for you to find, and the reason why they were there/who left them was never explained. I know it was theorized by Max that it is her from another 3rd timeline. But, nothing was confirmed. As I said before, maybe this is all build up for LiS: Reunion?? All the loose threads aside, there was the ripping off of plot beats/elements from LiS 1. Which felt like the story was just grasping at straws to make us care... The biggest one was the nightmare sequence Max went through, which felt similar to the nightmare in LiS 1, Chap 5. Mixed with other things, this nightmare was retraumatizing Max about Chloe getting shot in the Blackwell bathroom and her time in the Darkroom with Jefferson. I guess you could argue it was to challenge Max, and make her have to fight through it for some sort of character growth (?) but, it seemed unnecessary. In LiS 1, the point of the nightmare scene is to help influence Max’s final choice. But here, it was soooo random. It literally has nothing to do with Safi’s proposal, which is the final choice in this game. It would have been much more impactful for the nightmare to include Safi’s perspective… more about how her mother made her feel inadequate, and how that has fueled her anger. More about her feeling of being abandoned by everyone. More of anything to make us empathize with Safi. Also, that damn storm. It even LOOKED like the storm in LiS 1 (lowkey was it just there for nostalgia-bait lol?). I believe it is a physical manifestation of Safi losing control over her powers. So, it makes some sense in that regard. But, that storm wasn’t there when Safi was shot at the beginning of the game. If Max supposedly shot Safi to stop the storm, but there was no storm that first night, then it brings us back to “who the hell shot Safi in the first place?” There were a few things I liked, so I'll end on those... I thought that the lore involving Maya was interesting. A student’s work plagiarized by a teacher and then sold off as his own, which caused a ripple effect of problems, was unexpected but clever. I wish they had explained more about Safi and Maya’s friendship, and again, more on how that impacted Safi negatively. I was glad that this game had a lot of queer representation, and that it gave Max a female and a male romantic option. Finally letting Max be her queer self, overtly, was very cool! Especially because LiS 1 was full of queer subtext for the most part. I missed Chloe (of course), but I honestly think they did a good job with Amanda’s character.

I avoided this game for quite a while as I love the original, Before the Storm and True Colours. The only game I REALLY didn't like was 2, and hearing the negative reviews for this one I wasn't really interested. Finally got it in Humble Choice and played it through, and I'm pretty surprised by all the negative reviews. It's honestly pretty good and I enjoyed my time with it. It looks beautiful, the facial animations are the best so far, and the new mechanic was fairly fun. Better than Alex's power in True Colours, and certainly better than Chloe's power of gamified sass in Before the Storm! Also heard that the final chapter was where it all fell apart, but I disagree and thought it was handled pretty well. Better than it was in the original in a vaguely comparable scenario. The main issue I had was that the game is incredibly poorly optimised and runs really badly. I can run True Colours at maximum everything 1440p and get 60fps on my seven year old gaming laptop. This game I had to mess with the settings just to get it running at 30fps, and even then it had some stutters, texture lag, and occasionaly dips to low 20fps. And honestly, this game really doesn't look substantially better than True Colours, it's just badly optimised. Or at least the graphical upgrades they've baked in are not worth the performance hit. But honestly, that didn't hamper my enjoyment of the game and many people have better hardware than me anyway so probably won't have those issues to the same extent. Still a shame that so many newer Unreal Engine games have such terrible performance whilst older ones look almost as good and run like a dream. Technical issues aside, if you're holding off because of the negative reviews I'd say don't. I love the other games, and this entry in the series doesn't suffer from any more cringey dialogue or logic plot holes than any of the others. People seem to mainly be annoyed at how it handles Chloe, but in my game Chloe was dead and that fact was treated with respect and still felt like a weight Max was carrying. If she's alive in your game, apparently it's a bit more dismissive. Looking forward to getting Reunion now.

Olha... é um LIS ok, para mim fica parelho com o True Colors. Senti que o final foi meio arrastado mas tudo bem, do começo até o meio do jogo a trama segue bacana, depois vai do jogador do quê achar, mas já saiba que não tem o mesmo impacto emocional de LIS 1/BTS e 2, porém não achei uma tremenda bosta igual uns disseram aí, na questão de outros terem poderes, ué rapaziada, isso já foi mostrado antes, a diferença é que querem expandir isso agora ficando aquele gostinho de x-men kk. AGORA DE MÚSICA PQP, TODAS JÁ ESTÃO NO MEU SPOTIFY

As a big Life is Strange fan I was hesitant to return to the original protaganist Max Caulfield, but I thought the game was better than I expected and I enjoyed my time with it. I would easily recommend this to fans of the series, or even just the first game.

Not entirely sure why this title only has 'Mixed'ratings - I've played and adored all of the Life Is Strange games thus far, and this one was no exception. I see some review complaining about the story, but I found the narrative and thematic elements of Max's continuing journey to be profound, compelling and abeautiful new thread in her story. From writing to direction to the new motion capture and the truly remarkable voice acting, this is an easy game to fall in love with. Please don't let the negative reviews sway you; if you have enjoyed previous titles, this one is sublime, and any more time spent with Max is an honour. Thank you Deck Nine Games for continuing a series that is so special, and special to me. <3

[h1]Life is Fanfic[/h1] Sendo bem sincera, isso aqui só se chama "Life is Strange" porque a Square Enix ficou com a IP, pois a essência da saga foi embora junto com a Dontnod. É muito bizarro ver que trouxeram a Max de volta só por dinheiro, mas o problema é que parece que só o nome veio com ela. A personalidade, o jeito de emergir, escrever e comunicar as coisas simplesmente sumiram. [h2]Roteiro porco[/h2] Não é muito difícil entender que, se você está criando um jogo de escolhas, o foco tem que ser justamente o roteiro. Foi assim que o primeiro Life is Strange nasceu, investiram massivamente no roteiro e economizaram nos gráficos para entregar uma narrativa envolvente e fascinante. [i]Double Exposure[/i], por outro lado, faz o inverso. Ele te entrega gráficos "mais bonitinhos" a preço de uma história retirada diretamente do Wattpad. Na verdade, isso é até ofensivo com as histórias de lá, pois muito conteúdo bom já saiu do Wattpad e chegou em outras mídias, mas o que quero dizer é que o game peca no único ponto em que nesse gênero é inegável de se pecar. Muito da história aqui é descaradamente tirado do plot do primeiro jogo. Não parece de forma alguma uma história original, mas sim uma releitura barata de algo que já era excelente, tinha começo, meio e fim, e que simplesmente não precisava ser mexido. [h2]Selo Deck Nine de não me importo com a sua escolha[/h2] Como já é de se esperar e virou padrão dessa desenvolvedora, as escolhas são pífias, patéticas, sem peso nem impacto nenhum. Até aqueles filmes interativos da Netflix tinham mais consequências e davam mais valor às decisões do jogador. É meio cômico como eles estão com essa franquia há tanto tempo e sequer conseguem entender o que fez a saga ser o fenômeno que foi. A maior prova disso é que, se a protagonista de Double Exposure fosse uma personagem original da Deck Nine, o jogo não teria apelo algum. A história é horrível. Tem um ou dois pontos altos, mas no geral é muito ruim, a ponto de não ter motivo, razão ou circunstância para ser jogada de novo. Nada tem peso, nada impacta, nada cativa, nada muda. Enquanto os dois primeiros jogos sempre foram sobre lidar com o peso das decisões da vida cotidiana usando superpoderes que te apontavam o real impacto do dia a dia, aqui temos um jogo cruzinho sobre como um superpoder pode mudar e moldar a sua vida. Perdeu-se totalmente a noção do que fez essa franquia ter a relevância que tem hoje. [h2]Diálogos podres[/h2] Além do roteiro mal escrito e da descaracterização completa da Max, o elenco secundário deste jogo é simplesmente insuportável e sem carisma nenhum. Tirando a Safi(que também é uma insuportável, mas pelo menos sustenta o que é), parece que nenhum deles realmente tem uma personalidade própria. O jogo se escora totalmente em estereótipos batidos e preguiçosos para tentar criar profundidade, o homem negro sendo perseguido pela polícia, a personagem trans sofrendo transfobia e sendo colocada para fora... Tudo isso de uma forma tão rasa quanto um post da Quebrando o Tabu. São NPCs horrorosos com histórias que parecem ter saído do Twitter de 2015, diretamente da era "close errado" e "geração tombamento". São falas totalmente nada naturais e forçadas que, além de não agregarem absolutamente nada para a trama, dão uma vergonha alheia absurda de ler e ouvir. [h1]Veredito[/h1] E pelo amor de deus, que final horroroso foi esse. Tudo bem que a Deck Nine não é conhecida por fazer jogos brilhantes e finais excelentes, mas aqui eles se superaram. Se tivessem se baseado em algum post do Reddit, teria saído algo melhor. A impressão que fica é que eles querem forçar um universo cinematográfico estilo MCU, mas usando um roteiro que parece saído de um chat da IA do WhatsApp. Eu honestamente fico abismada de ver que teve pessoas que jogaram o original e acharam isso aqui bom, para mim, esse povo deve ter jogado de olhos fechados. Eu jamais indicaria esse game nem para quem eu odeio. De graça ainda estaria muito caro. [b]Me roubaram 13 horas da minha vida que eu nunca mais vou ter de volta.

Anlatsanıza ya ustalık eseri LIS lore'una nasıl bu kadar ruhsuz, merak uyandırmayan hikayeyle ve içi boş karakterlerle devam oyunu yapabildiniz? Nasıl kıyabildiniz Max'e?

choices matter, but not in the way you think they do. life is strange. [b]Max[/b] Maxine Caulfield is 28 now and she serves as the photographer-in-residence at Caledon University which explains her compulsive need of taking candid snapshots with *place your Polaroid ad here*. her eyes are really blue. ⚠️ [b]politics & agenda[/b]⚠️ yikes ( ˶°ㅁ°)!! so you might be wondering – [i]”why would you play this title if you’ve played the previous ones and you saw how heavily imbued with liberal rhetoric the LIS universe is?”[/i] he… heee… weeeeeell, call it a guilty pleasure I guess? and something-something sapphic romance and overall feel-good vibes and music? I wouldn’t have expected less from Square Enix but I was indeed surprised to see the accessibility settings which had toggle options for drug, transphobic, sex, violence, etc. content warnings. I mean, uhh, I’m curious what would happened if I checked everything, would it make the game disappear in the parallel timelines? anyways, the dialogues are preachy and progressive and expect to hear about the manosphere, white privilege, gender-neutral language and spaces, and a ton of other subjects which resonate with Cascadia and Canadian left-wing politics. no inherent hate or aversion; I believe it’s a work of art and portrays a relevant contemporary rhetoric on the political compass. this little town called Lakefield in upstate Vermont is a “blue” paradise. 🎵 [b]soundtrack[/b]🎵 the music is so touching. perfection incarnate. NewDad, Lights on Moscow, dodie, Matilda Mann, and many more obscure hazy-sounding, shoe-gazing, dreamy pop, indie rock jams. 🌳[b]environment[/b]❄️ there are plenty of zen moments throughout the five chapters which allow Max to reflect on her personal choices and take in the surroundings. this said, the environment and campus setting feel repetitive, claustrophobic, and will quickly wear you down. this is a massive downgrade from the previous titles, notably Life is Strange 2: Sean and Daniel where the variety of the scenery and key locations was varied and immersive. I got sick and tired of the campus; maybe this was done on purpose to highlight the inescapable dread students feel? my favorite place was [spoiler]the Snapping Turtle, and that might be because of Amanda :3 [/spoiler] [b]Chloe[/b] to unlock this character, please purchase Life is Strange: Reunion (a Deck Nine Apologetics Edition). 🐰 ❓

Double Exposure doesn't deserve most of the criticism it gets, but so long as the "exclusive cat content" exists as a paid dlc, this review will remain negative. The irony of such as blatant cash grab in a series that is often critical of corporate greed should not be lost on anyone.