#rachloe

[evast]

theyre in love and nobody can tell me anything different insp

[muffins-are-ok-i-guess]

I wonder if Chloe and Max had a baby girl if they would name it Rachel

[subwaypigeon]

LIFE IS STRANGE: BEFORE THE STORM EP 1 THOUGHTS

*!!!SPOILERS!!! for Life Is Strange and LIS: Before The Storm, duh* If you actually take the time to read this "review" of sorts, this is probably gonna be long. Haul up, take a seat. *Spoilers, duh* This game, I had extremely high expectations due to how bloody much I loved the first game. Not to hard to know that with how much I screech about it. But this game, even though the first episode is the only one released of the three (four, if you got the deluxe) ((kill me emo heart I'm gonna die playing one last time as a young max rip me)), is honestly beautiful prequel. Originally, I was quite disappointed it wasn't being created by DONTNOD, but instead created this time by Deck Nine Games, but after looking into how much they admired the source material and wanted to do it justice, I gave it hope. And they pulled through, 10 times more than what I'd expected. Now I'm gonna get into my pros and cons with this. (Obviously more pros than cons but ya know) So obviously, the voice actors are different. Nothing could be helped there unfortunately. Yes, majority of the voice actors are so far off it hurts, but so far the once you hear most is Chloes new VA. And to be honest, she isn't half bad. Sometimes she sounds like she trying to hard, but other times it sounds much like OG Chloe. I wanna quickly note Dana's and Justin's VA's. I know there's a strike going on but whAT. They couldn't have tried to find anyone who's pitch is even remotely close to Dana's and Justin's OG VA??? Like cmon. I know they're only side NPC's in this game and we will *probably* hardly see them since this prequel focuses on Rachel and Chloe, but come onNNNN man. Now what I love about this game (which is a lot more than what I dislike) The animation on these characters is something I love so much. It's such a subtle different in the facial expressions, the eye movements and slight smirks and smiles that are made by characters that just wasn't there in the OG Life is Strange, and honestly it just makes the immersion that much better. It gives the characters so much more character and emotion. It makes them feel much more human and more alive. Also wanna quickly point out the cool as heck feature of getting to choose the outfit Chloe wears??? Like heck yes thank you I am DOWN for this. The diary function for Chloe (the same kind as max had in the OG) gives you so much more insight into how Chloe is feeling and it adds so much more to her already interesting character. It shows how she is dealing with the death of her father, her mum and Madsen, and her feelings of abandonment by her best friend Max when she left with her family to Seattle. In the OG game, you see people kinda viewing Chloe as being a bit selfish and bitchy for thinking everything's about her, and that her finding anger in the fact that Max didn't speak to her after she left Arcadia bay as an irrational feeling. It makes you view Max as someone who is basically incapable or hurting anyone, which while she wouldn't purposely want to, she is humans and humans can and will hurt people whether they mean to or not. Chloe's feelings of anger and abandonment toward Max are so extremely valid, but this is something you don't really see or feel while you're playing the OG as Max. You only see Chloe's actions as something fuelled by unnecessary anger and selfishness, when that's not the case. She's feeling hurt from her father dying and her mother moving on with some guy who does NOT respect her at all, and dealing with her best friend since childhood just leaving her behind. Anyone would be hurt and distressed by that. All the diary entries and her own opinions of the different characters, add to the character development of Chloe. Along with that, her inner monologue also lets you into her thoughts a lot, yet again adding more to her personality and just allowing you to really feel what it was like for her in the events leading up to the first Life is Strange. Okay next, Rachel. My sweet bean. My lil princess rebel bbbbbbbbby. Quick thing why do her and Chloe's VA have to sound LITERALLY. EXACTLY. THE SAME. Way to confuse a girl. But hat fact aside, Rachel is beautiful. Such a beautiful character. I have seen some people worrying about Rachel's character ACTUALLY being realised and put into reality, since her whole appeal in the OG was the fact that she was so appealing BECAUSE of the mystery behind this missing girl that everyone absolutely adored. And they're not wrong, that was the whole appeal. There's this girl that we have never met that everyone adored so much and was loved by everyone, of course you'd be worried that it would be ruined once she's actually put into game as a real life person and character. Thing is, I don't think it ruins it. It only cements the fact that Rachel IS that character that everyone spoke of her as. The perfect and popular girl that was friends with everyone. I don't know what else I can really say about Rachel except hat I LOVE HER and the ending scene with her breaks my DAMN heart. Now I wanna talk about the junkyard scene with Chloe and Rachel. I need to because DAMN BOI MY EMOTIONS. Quick run down: Rachel is acting quite weird with Chloe, Chloe calls her out on it and Rachel isn't having it. Chloe tries to get her to not leave the junkyards and confesses her feelings for her, and even though Rachel feels the same thing due to whatever has happened she can't be there right now so she leaves. Chloe is hurt as heck by that. She does her Chloe thing and smashes everything in her sights and that scene alone with Chloe crying, her anger, and the DAMN background music is already emotional enough. But then they show Chloe finding her dads wrecked car in the junkyard, the car he died in. And oH BOY the feelings. They way they showed Chloe's emotions when seeing that car, but also mixed with her anger and her then smashing the car due to that mix of emotions, honestly worked so well in creating an immersing and emotion filled experience for the player. The final scene, they show Chloe reuniting with Rachel and Rachel apologising for the way she acted and you find out what is upsetting her (spoiler: her dads having an affair and she's angry af) She then burns a photo of her and her dad in a trash can, kicks over the van and it lights a tree on fire. Then, obviously being filled with rage and sadness, she screams out in pain toward the tree and oh boy oh man oh mAN, I don't think I've ever had a SCREAM feel so painful. I felt the pain in each scream. I don't know how they did it and made me actually cry with a simple scream, but damn. Bloody 10/10. A few smaller things I want to mention: they NAILED it with the soundtrack. That was one thing I was worried about but I think they smashed it. I'm curious to see how much we see of Nathan in this game as well since seeing him briefly in this first episode. Is he gonna be as prevalent as the first? Or just a side character? Also, the dialogue in this game is actually so good. Obviously a lot is cheesy monologue because it's coming from a bunch of 16 year old teenagers, but for what it is it's really accurate and portrays a lot of emotions so raw and genuinely. I went into this game obviously being so hyped because I love this game, but also cautious BECAUSE it is being created by a different studio and I didn't want this game to be ruined for me, but I can honestly say with 100% confidence that this game did NOT disappoint and they did it so much justice. It may only be the first episode of three but damn, I really cannot fault it all too much, if any at all. There's probably so much that I missed talking about but I guess these are the main things that stood out. If you actually read all this you deserve some kind of a medal so thank you