Life is Strange: Double Exposure
Developer: Deck Nine
Publisher: Square Enix
Platforms: PlayStation 5, Switch, Xbox Series X/S (Reviewed), PC
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $49.99 USD – Available Here $84.95 AUD – Available Here
Overview
It’s hard to believe that it has been nearly a decade since the original Life is Strange was released by Square Enix. Perhaps it’s due to the series continuing with different characters and releases throughout these years but sometimes returning back to its roots might just be what the franchise needed. That happens to be the case this time around as Square Enix has handed the previously held reins of Max Caulfield’s story from Dontnod to Deck Nine to tell a brand new tale following everyone’s favorite quirky girl with super powers that had to deal with impossible choices in dire circumstances. So now with Max now in a brand new place in life and once again finding herself having to investigate a mystery with supernatural powers, is Life is Strange: Double Exposure a worthwhile continuation to a story once thought finished?
Story
It’s worth noting before we begin that Life is Strange: Double Exposure takes place following the events of the original game, meaning that those who have somehow yet to play the first game will find direct spoilers mentioned here. That being said, while numerous references are made about the past and events of the first game, the story told here is mostly self-contained, meaning that players can choose to jump in here should they wish, they’ll just be missing out on numerous references and the meaning behind certain items and a key choice early in the game.
With that warning out of the way, a decade has passed for Max Caulfield, who is now a full grown adult and an award-winning photographer that has landed herself a position as Photographer-in-Residency at the prestigious art school Caledon University. This means that not only as Max found herself a stable income working as a lecturer and teacher in photography for aspiring students, but perhaps the first place she can feel at home in nearly a decade. Regardless of whether players chose to either sacrifice Chloe or sacrifice Arcadia Bay (the game’s very first major decision) players can still immediately see that she is haunted by the actions and result that transpired, whether it means the sacrifice of her closest friend and potential love interest or sacrificing a town full of people she knew. This can be seen through numerous past messages on her phone, memories scattered around her home, the fact that she swore to stop using her time rewinding capabilities and causing them to have all but vanished, and even how secretive she is with her past even to her new best friend Safi.
One night as Max, Safi, and their shared friend Moses were relaxing and taking in the stars, tragedy strikes when Safi leaves early. Max finds that Safi has been killed by a gunshot and, with no perpetrator in sight or even any clues to go off of, it is up to her to try and figure things out, that is after she spends a couple of days locked away to try and compose herself after the loss of her new best friend. With her rewinding time powers near unusable, Max finds herself stuck in a world where her friend is dead. Or is she? Max soon realizes that she has a brand new type of power, one that allows her to shift between two timelines; her current one where Safi is dead and a brand one where Safi is alive and well. With these new supernatural powers in hand, Max vows to discover the true culprit behind Safi’s murder all while trying to make sure the living Safi doesn’t meet the same fate.
Life if Strange: Double Exposure tells an interesting and strong starting story that does its best to try and hook players early with a mystery that simply cannot be explained and only gets more confusing and twist filled the further Max investigates what is happening. Tie this together with the fact that her timeline shifting powers allow her to swap between the Living and Dead worlds and experiencing vastly different interactions with characters in each timeline and it makes for an intriguing opening few chapters. It is worth noting that while not episodic like the original game, the story is still separated into five chapters, usually with a major twist or reveal happening at the end of each one, where, at the end of every chapter, players can compare their choice and action percentage with others, including revealing some actions players may never have even noticed.
The interesting story developments are helped by the fact that many of the other main characters and even side characters that Max will interact with are handled quite well and being able to see how these characters interact with her in one timeline compared to another is always interesting, especially should players make an enemy of someone in one and end up being a close ally in another. Many of these characters are given their own motives that Max needs to work around and with to get what she wants while others will eagerly help her, creating some unique dynamics in an already colorful cast. That being said, there are some side characters that feel like they barely get the time to feel relevant and others that downright feel off, especially with how Max interacts with them. While one early introduced love interest is handled well, including the fact that it can come into play in both timelines, the other feels incredibly off-base both in tone and situation. It almost feels as if the writers were simply checking off a box with the only option available given the few fully fleshed out characters they had to work with.
Another aspect that feels a bit off is how the game handles the original events of Life is Strange. Players will be able to choose what happened back in Arcadia Bay with one choice that will continuously come up over the course of the game through various references and even major callbacks in the late game. The problem here is, the writers had to make due with the fact that one choice means that Chloe is dead and the other means she is alive while the rest of the town was destroyed. Having Chloe live and the following way that the writers handle her near non-existence in the story will likely divide and even anger some of the original fans, while letting her die ends up feeling far more impactful story wise given how things play out throughout this game’s story.
Unfortunately, while the storyline does feature some rather surprising twists and turns as well as some major revelations, it also doesn’t feel like it ever goes quite as deep as one would expect following Max’s original adventure and lacks a lot of the same emotional impact. Yes, there are dark themes that are explored but it feels like the team was afraid to step too far into how vile things can be on a college campus or how dastardly things can become, even at an art school. Instead a lot of the drama is instead placed around the supernatural powers themselves and while this works fairly well, especially given how the last couple of chapters develop, it does lessen the dramatic impact of the game’s story. It also is worth noting that a few major plot points feel like they are simply dropped for no reason whatsoever. A major event takes place shortly into the third chapter that is barely talked about over text message and then never explored further or even mentioned again and a few other events are given the same treatment and this was with full exploration of each chapter, including the “Ultimate” edition’s cat DLC which is cute but feels underutilized even if it is simply there as a bonus.
What drama does come into play through the various clues and mysteries that players solve all end up tying into one thing whose resolution feels… unsatisfying at the least until things kick into overdrive for the culmination of the story. As for the game’s ending, we won’t spoil what happens here of course, but it feels rather surprising and a bit out of place in some regards, even if it does show that Max has grown from being a helpless feeling teenager into an adult capable of taking on anything she puts her mind to. That being said, there is one part of the ending that will certainly leave many wondering just what Deck Nine has planned next.
Gameplay
For the most part Life if Strange: Double Exposure plays similarly to previous entries in the series as Max will often have various locations she can explore with plenty of objects in the environment she can examine, spots she can take photos, and of course the people she can talk to or interact with. Max’s cell phone will keep track of her next “objective” indicating what character will advance the story and giving players free reign to interact with everyone and everything else without worry. Her cell phone also plays another role by providing a knock-off version of social media where characters will update and comment on Max’s photos and events happening at the time. Interestingly enough, these messages change depending on what timeline Max is in at the time, making sure to offer plenty of variety and also looks at how different some characters are between timelines. She can also view a journal containing her notes and feelings, which annoyingly needs to be flipped through from the start every time, and polaroid collectables scattered through each of the five chapters.
Obviously the biggest difference this time around is the fact that Max’s powers no longer rewind time but instead give her the ability to not only “peak” between the Safi Alive and Safi Dead timelines but swap between them entirely at certain locations. This is a rather unique feeling mechanic and works quite well, especially when some parts of the game vary wildly in appearance and tone depending on the timeline. Through this mechanic players will also find themselves interacting with two versions of each character, having to balance and remember who they may have wronged and who might like them depending on the timeline. For example, one character might be thankful and friendly to Max in the Safi is Alive timeline and completely despise her in the Safi is Dead timeline and the game does allow players to make a mistake if they aren’t careful.
Along these same lines players will find certain doors open that otherwise are closed in one timeline or items that may be missing and can be taken from one to another. Max can even “peek” into the other timeline from her current one to spy on what someone is doing or eavesdrop on a conversation that may reveal a secret she can leverage or the location of an item. It is interesting to note that while the whole “Your decision will have consequences” isn’t the most accurate here in many regards as the game often pulls up this notification after the simplest of choices, though more than a few of them never seemed to make an actual difference.. The only truly notable choices that seem to make differences are “Major choices” that players can turn warnings on for, being notified that this choice is a major one and if they are sure of their decision.
Her timeline swapping abilities are the crux of many of the game’s various puzzles on getting into locked rooms or digging up dirt on someone in one timeline and then using it in the other to figure something out or probing at them using what they should never have known in the first place. There are also a few puzzles that simply involve figuring things out on a puzzle box or putting together evidence but these are kept rather minimal surprisingly. Another thing that is kept shockingly barebones is a later evolution of Max’s timeline traveling powers, the ability to move an item from one to another. This power is used once throughout the entire game by the player and only one other time during a cutscene, making what seems to be an incredibly useful and interesting ability rather useless as it is only used twice and both happen only through story provocation. This is also unfortunate as there are a number of moments this power could come in handy, but they simply are unable to be used.
In many ways, that often feels like the case with Life if Strange: Double Exposure, plenty of interesting gameplay ideas that just aren’t given time to flesh out beyond the main timeline traveling powers. Even the photography and “double exposing” photographs only serve a purpose of obtaining optional dialogue until the latter becomes a key mechanic for a few moments near the end of the game. Otherwise things such as gathering and reviewing evidence only happens a couple of times and even the option of having timed conversations where other characters talk with Max as she explores only happens at the start of the game. Sure, players can listen in to other NPCs talking on the campus but she can’t reply to them. This keeps the general gameplay limited and far more so than one would expect given how unique the timeline swapping powers are at first, especially once puzzle solving takes a back seat in the last couple of chapters.
Audio & Visuals
Life if Strange: Double Exposure has a wonderful and slightly stylized looking art style with its character designs and the world itself. The character models are nicely detailed and Max (if players purchase the “Ultimate Edition”) can wear a variety of outfits as well that change from chapter to chapter. The Caledon Campus is also nicely handled but is a bit on the smaller side as far as exploration goes as players really only have free reign to explore at set points. One thing that is a very nice touch is how different the atmosphere and decorations of the campus is when comparing the two timelines. Since it is near the holidays, Living timeline is filled with holiday cheer and decorations while Dead timeline is somber and events are canceled, leading to a stark contrast. One thing that is noticeable however, even on the Xbox Series X, is that the game can stutter slightly when transitioning between timelines or have a bit of odd slowdown when peaking between them in busier locations.
The voice acting is quite fitting and Max’s voice actress has returned to reprise her role here. The other characters are similarly voiced quite well, though there are some audio balancing issues from time to time. This has been largely fixed from how it originally was, but occasionally characters will still talk far softer than another, making players have to rely on subtitles to catch what was actually said.The soundtrack features an impressive list of indie bands that all provide different pieces of background music that range from simple orchestral tracks to full on vocal tracks depending on the scenes and they are all used to great effect to try and make scenes have more impact, especially with the bigger twists and revelations they usually accompany.
Overall
Life is Strange: Double Exposure does a solid job reviving Max’s story with a brand new setting and moving her forward in life to the point that not only can we see how she’s had to deal with the chosen events of Arcadia Bay but also come into her own once things take a turn for the worst again. With a mostly well-written cast of supporting characters and some unique powers that make for some very interesting exploration, Double Exposure feels like it has a lot to offer at times while also not quite delivering enough of an emotional punch like one would expect from the franchise and also leaving far too many story threads on the table while limiting the use of some of Max’s most interesting abilities. This doesn’t mean that the title is a bad one, far from it, but it feels like it had the potential to be so much more.
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