Intro
“Life Is Strange” (2015) is available on console and PC. It was created by Dontnod Entertainment and published by Square Enix. This game is targetted towards young adults and late teens because of its coming of age theme. Life Is Strange uses its time rewind mechanic and not allowing us to skip dialogue in order to weave its narrative into the game. Although the story follow a linear path, we as Max are able to go back and forth in order to solve puzzles and progress. Our objective is to use our rewinding time ability to save others.
Gameplay
This game felt like I was inside a movie the whole time. It had a great hook at the beginning with the opening scene being a tornado on a cliff. We then wake up as Max at Blackwell academy. This sequence of narratives leaves us as the player curious as to how we got there and what was going on. Immediately, the types of fun we are experiencing are Narrative and Discovery.
(After we wake up at school, we get the title screen, signaling the start of the game)
An inciting incident we experience is in the restroom where we experience a girl getting shot and us discovering our ability to rewind time. The game then introduces the rewind mechanic and teaches us how to use the mechanic in order to make progress in the game. This rewind ability lets us re-experience moments, make different choices, and see how alternative decisions affect the narrative.
(The game tells us to hold right mouse to rewind)
The game shows us how to rewind time. We later use this mechanic to solve challenges. For instance, when we wake up in the storm again, a tree falls in our path. We are able to rewind time and walk beyond the tree and have the tree fall behind us. If you weren’t able to figure this out within a certain amount of time, the game will give you a hint stating you can effectively teleport by rewinding time.
(Tree falls in our path, preventing us from advancing)
Another mechanic that supports the narrative of this game is the inability to skip dialogue and important narrative scenes.
(Being unable to skip this scene of the narrative)
Some games allow players to skip the dialogue and just continue to play the game. However, to Life is Strange the dialogue and narrative scenes are essential to understanding the game and getting the full experience. It is purposely done to immerse the player into the narrative. For instance, in this scene we are told by our friend that we must go into the garage to get the tools we need to fix our camera. Skipping this dialogue would require the game to implement some other mechanic to let the user know what their next object is.
(Max being prompted to search in the garage for tools).
Loop
In this game, the loop we see is the mechanic of being able to rewind time. When we rewind time and make a decision, we receive immediate feedback of a little butterfly in the top left corner saying that this action we took will have consequences. We also judge our actions by how it has affected those we interact with. For instance, when you choose to report Nathan who had a gun in the restroom to the principal, you see that your report was not taken seriously and it might backfire on you. Instead, you have the ability to rewind time and change that decision.
(Talking to principal with the option to report or hide the truth)
Conclusion
I really enjoyed the game because I felt immersed in the narrative of the game, with its visuals, sound effects, and interactions. I think a potential flaw of this game is that it is very long. This first episode took about 2 hours to complete which is pretty long and at times I felt like I was just waiting for the game to end. Additionally, another flaw might be that there are so many items to interact with which does add to the story but sometimes feels overwhelming. However, I feel like the decision to only have the ability to rewind time is very clever because if they allowed us to freely manipulate time, what is stopping us from just skipping forward in the whole game? Additionally, we can only rewind time within a current zone, so we cannot rewind all the way to the beginning of the game. This allows for our actions to truly have consequences. “Life is Strange” is similar to other narrative-driven adventure games, like “The Walking Dead”, but it differentiates itself by introducing a unique rewind mechanic. Overall, I really enjoyed this game.
