Want to play a game that will stamp all over your heart, leave you regretting every decision you've ever made and have you questioning why you even bothered in the first place—but in a good way? If your answer to all the above is yes, then might I suggest Life is Strange: Before the Storm. Then, when you've finished all three episodes, come back and read the rest of this article because it contains hella spoilers.
Before the Storm captures the zeitgeist just like its predecessor, Life is Strange. Both games nod to the cult iconography of the Pacific Northwest, and both play out like an indie movie fresh from Sundance. Before the Storm had the extra challenge of weaving themes of love, loss, and recovery into an established and beloved story though. Before the tornado, before the dark room, before time travel, there was Chloe Price (voiced by Rhianna DeVries) and Rachel Amber (voiced by Kylie Brown)—two teenagers drawn together by their own personal pain. That's the story Before the Storm sets out to tell.
In the original, Rachel's absence was the driving force of the narrative, and everything we knew about her was reconstructed through photographs, letters, and Chloe's memories. In Before the Storm Rachel is no longer a plot device, but a fully fleshed out and complex character, making the later events of Life is Strange even more tragic. Before the Storm goes to great lengths to establish Rachel as Chloe's savior and vice versa, injecting hope into a devastating chain of events. It's hard not to fall in love with Rachel just like Chloe does, which is why Episode 3 was met with such a mixed response.
At the start of Before the Storm, Chloe is isolated. Her diary and texts are filled with messages to Max, who is now in Seattle, leaving her alone to deal with the death of her father and the jarring presence of her mom's commando boyfriend. Rachel quickly fills that gap left by Max in Episode 1, then their relationship deepens and Rachel's influence seeps into every aspect of Chloe's life.
In dream sequences Chloe's father tells her "sometimes people need you, even when they don't admit it," and refers to their first fight as a "lovers quarrel." Steph, the openly gay student at Blackwell Academy, also asks Chloe the exact nature of their friendship. You learn that Chloe's overuse of the word 'hella' is thanks to Rachel, and you're given the option to adorably flirt with her to pass the time. None of these moments change depending on the decisions you make as the game goes on. It's quite clear from the 73% of people who told Rachel you were more than just friends at the end of Episode 1 that the romantic path is a popular one, which I am all for.
While a romantic relationship between Chloe and Rachel was expected, one this explicit was not. Life is Strange struck a chord with LGBT gamers thanks to Chloe and Max's ambiguous friendship during the first game, and there are several moments where Max can cross that boundary. Before the Storm is different. Rather than a bonus kiss which you only get by making certain choices, Episode 2 leaves no room for uncertainty.
If Before the Storm were a rollercoaster, Episode 2 would be the moment you reach the top and enjoy the view. The most romantic and meaningful moments happen toward the end, including one of the best interpretations of Shakespeare's play The Tempest I've ever seen. When you get the opportunity to kiss Rachel to prove your devotion, it's the validation that Life is Strange flirted with but wouldn't commit to. When they express their feelings for each other, who could help but root for them to escape Oregon?
Episode 2 is also where the other plot points begin to take shape—in particular the relationship between Chloe's drug dealer Frank, his partner Damon, and Rachel's heroin-addicted mom Sera.
Episode 3 shifts focus onto this storyline dramatically. Gone are the moments of tenderness between Chloe and Rachel, replaced by a balls-to-the-wall finale with a stabbing, a main character who turns homicidal, and the reveal of the real villain of the story. At the start of the episode Chloe creates a lightshow of stars on Rachel’s ceiling, but this is the last moment of genuine intimacy between the two, and given that we know Rachel dies two years later it doesn’t feel like enough.
While it was not the finale I expected, Deck Nine had a lot of loose ends to tie up and a short amount of time to do it in. Ideally Before the Storm would have been five episodes long like its predecessor—there is so much more of this story that could have been told.
The series ends with a decision to lie to Rachel about her father's dirty dealings or tell her the truth. Compared to the ultimatum at the end of Life is Strange, this decision is pretty low stakes but important given how themes of honesty play throughout the game. We're then presented with a montage of Chloe and Rachel's next two years together—Chloe dying her hair, rolling around Arcadia Bay in Chloe's truck, getting their tattoos, etc. This is where it should have ended. It's bittersweet given what we know will happen in the future, but heartwarming to see Chloe and Rachel enjoy some time together.
Yet, for some reason, a post-credits scene was added showing Chloe desperately trying to contact Rachel while the sounds of a camera go off in the background, reminding us of Rachel's fate in the dark room. This kind of emotional manipulation is something that a lot of players, myself included, found unnecessary. It was a twist of the knife that seemed too obvious.
Given the way Chloe and Rachel’s relationship is presented throughout Before the Storm, there's a touch of unusual malice in the decision to include the post-credit scene. It's entirely out of place given the subtlety and thoughtfulness of the previous episodes. The ending also played into a lot of damaging tropes that queer people have been battling against within media—the Bury Your Gays trope for one, the time-worn narrative that homosexuality ultimately ends in tragedy. Queer women in TV, film, and now games seem to have a nasty habit of dying, and after a while it begins to wear you down. While I don’t think Deck Nine, Dontnod or Square Enix considered this when they created their game, I wish they had.
Having said all this, I was not expecting a happy ending. Rachel is dead when Max returns to Arcadia Bay and Deck Nine had a responsibility to the canon that Dontnod created. However, I find it hard to get behind the decision to keep Rachel dead in every outcome of the game, especially when the mechanic revolves around player choice and, well, time travel. But perhaps that is the point, sometimes people have to die and there’s nothing you can do about it—it’s just a shame it has to be yet another beloved queer character.
It’s going to take a good while before I can sit through a replay Life is Strange now that we know exactly what it was that Chloe lost when Rachel died, but maybe this time I’ll choose to save Arcadia Bay—at least that way they can finally be together.
Square Enix has announced that Life is Strange: Before the Storm's special bonus episode, titled Farewell, will release on PC, Xbox One, and PS4, on March 6th.
Farewell is an entirely standalone episode (only available to owners of the digital Deluxe Edition of Before the Storm) and marks the return of first series protagonist Max Caulfield. It's the only time that Max is the lead playable character in prequel Before the Storm, with previous episodes having centred around her Season One best friend Chloe Price.
Equally notable is the fact that Farewell sees actor Ashly Burch resume the role of Chloe Price for the first time since the original series. Rhianna DeVries voiced the character in Before the Storm's three main episodes, as Burch was unable to participate due to the now-resolved SAG-AFTRA strike. Hannah Telle, who played Max in the original series, also returns.
Life Is Strange: Before the Storm‘s third and final chapter arrived in December, bringing the teen trauma prequel full circle, but that isn’t quite the end. Still to come is a “bonus” episode set even earlier than Before the Storm, visiting teensy Chloe and teensy Max before they were pulled apart. Square Enix today announced that the bonus ep, named Farewell, will launch on March 6th. It will only be available in the game’s various deluxe editions, which is a bummer. New deluxe editions are coming, mind, including one with the soundtrack on vinyl for those who enjoy forcing squished dinosaurs to do karaoke. (more…)
We’ve already seen which games sold best on Steam last year, but a perhaps more meaningful insight into movin’ and a-shakin’ in PC-land is the games that people feel warmest and snuggliest about. To that end, Valve have announced the winners of the 2017 Steam Awards, a fully community-voted affair which names the most-loved games across categories including best post-launch support, most player agency, exceeding pre-release expectations and most head-messing-with. Vintage cartoon-themed reflex-tester Cuphead leads the charge with two gongs, but ol’ Plunkbat and The Witcher series also do rather well – as do a host of other games from 2017’s great and good.
Full winners and runners-up below, with links to our previous coverage of each game if you’re so-minded. Plus: I reveal which game I’d have gone for in each category. (more…)
Welcome back, gentle human bean, to another year of PC gaming thrills, spills and ambient anxiety about the correct deployment of the term ‘roguelite’ here on Rock, Paper, Shotgun. As our beleaguered forms struggle to cope with the sudden shift away from Chocolate Oranges for breakfast, now is the time for our time-lost minds to reflect upon how we occupied ourselves over the past ten days.
To wit: what videogames did we play, when time, relatives, bloating and demanding pets allowed?
The truth can be hard to look at, is it really something you're ready for? Maybe the lies we tell each other are less horrible than the truths we keep hidden? In addition to these being the main questions Life is Strange: Before the Storm asks of its players, they were also, in a way, the questions those players asked of publisher Square Enix when Before the Storm was first announced. Why spoil the mysteries of the original Life is Strange by laying them bare for all to see? Why not let fans leave the words unsaid and the people never met to their imaginations? Why entrust these beloved secrets to a new development studio? But, despite those legitimate concerns from the Life is Strange community, since the first episode launched in August this year it's been apparent that Before the Storm is not only a worthy follow-up to the original Life is Strange, in some ways it surpasses the groundwork that has already been laid.
Before the Storm paints a more intimate picture of Chloe Price, hellraiser best friend of the original's protagonist Max Caulfield, three years before the events of Life is Strange, in the time Max moved away to Seattle and the two lost contact. Playing as Chloe is a markedly different experience to playing as Max, and given how much you know about Chloe's future at this point, it's remarkable how much freedom it feels like Before the Storm gives you in shaping her outlook and attitude.
Crucially, of course, Chloe does not have Max's mysterious ability to rewind time. This could have been regarded as a step backwards in the complexity of the game, but Before the Storm wisely plays to Chloe's strengths of perception and social manipulation, meaning there are plenty of opportunities to carefully explore your surroundings and approach altercations as a puzzle to be solved. And there's a very marked permanence to the responses you give and the reactions you have to the world around you, raising the stakes in a very real way.