Life is Strange is a 3D, single player, choice-based game video game where you play as an 18 year old girl named Max Caufield who discovers she has time traveling powers and uses them to save her childhood friend/love interest, Chloe Price from dying. The game follows the butterfly effect concept, in which it consists of the player making decisions that will affect the turnout of the story. There are parts of the game where certain decisions are life or death decisions, affecting the characters and tone of the game. The game is played out in an episodic way where you play five episodes (as opposed to ‘levels’). There are many themes displayed throughout the game such as melancholia, queerness, bullying, family and loss. The game was developed by a French studio called DontNod Entertainment and was produced by Square Enix. DontNod Ent. was founded in 2008 and published their first title in 2013 with Remember Me, however, this project brought upon bankruptcy and had to resolve their financial conflict by crowdfunding what would eventually be Life is Strange which created an incline of success for the studio. As someone who plays video games, I tend to hear about different games within the community. I discovered Life is Strange through a Youtube playthrough from a gaming channel I used to watch. I’ve been captivated since the start of the game, however, I had some personal criticism against some of the dialogue as some of it seemed a bit outdated. Nonetheless, I was intrigued by the story and the characters I was presented with. Life is Strange uses fictional properties such as time travel in order to convey to the audience that despite what we want in life and who we want to save, we must move on and accept the consequences that are bound to come our way, and that we must go through the pain of loss and melancholia instead of grasping for something to fill our ego. 

        To give further background info on the game itself, the game is set in a fictional town called Arcadia Bay, Oregon, where our protagonist, Max, is a senior at a prestigious high school, Blackwell Academy. Max is a timid, introverted character with a love for photography. She often takes photos of objects in her environment, which is significant because these photos are used later in the game to time travel to that one place in time. Max discovers she has powers when she accidentally reverses time when an old friend, Chloe, gets shot in the chest by the troublesome and violent, Nathan Prescott in the girls bathroom and sends her back to the first scene in the classroom. Chloe Price is a rebellious and assertive teen and was Max’s childhood best friend. Within the game, there’s additional information revealing that Max actually moved away from her town for 5 years and came back after getting accepted to Blackwell. While Max was away, she started to drift apart from Chloe, which caused some conflict in their relationship when they began spending time with each other again. As they spend more time with one another, Chloe tends to be the one who is caught in fatal situations where she is put in danger and Max has to use her powers to help keep her alive. This raises a significant issue as Max has continuous dreams about a massive tornado headed towards her town and learns that the more she uses her powers, the stronger the threat of the tornado is. This creates the conflict where Max wants to save Chloe’s life, yet, also doesn’t want her family and friends in her town to die from the storm. 

        Chloe suffers significantly from loss and melancholia of her late father and her missing best friend/girlfriend, Rachel Amber and ultimately becomes a symbol of loss. Chloe lost her father in a car accident at a young age and she still suffers from the loss and struggles to get over it. What exacerbates this is the fact that her mother remarries to another man, who Chloe doesn’t get along with at all. Chloe feels hurt that her mother can move find a way to move on from the death in the family, yet, Chloe still suffers and can’t find a way to move on. She finds ways to cope in more destructive ways such as smoking and getting herself into harmful situations, yet she doesn’t benefit from these “mechanisms” as she’s still unhappy with her situation throughout the game through her behavior and her dialogue with Max. 

        Chloe suffers from the loss of two important people in her life which ultimately makes her a symbol of loss and death. She is fated to die which is represented by the amount of times she is able to die throughout the game. In episode one, she gets shot in the chest by Nathan, in episode 2, she accidentally shoots herself while shooting bottles in the junkyard and nearly dies when she gets her foot stuck in train tracks. In episode 4, Max travels back in time through one of her photographs in an attempts to stop Chloe’s father from dying which ends up backfiring when Chloe is terribly injured from a car accident and suffers while her parents drown in debt from medical bills. Chloe asks Max to euthanize her and no matter what you choose, you must give her the overdose. In the final episode, Chloe dies again from a gunshot and for the final decision of the game, you must choose whether to sacrifice Chloe for the sake of Arcadia Bay, or sacrifice the Bay for the sake of Chloe. For every death, Max has to avoid suffering from her loss by bending time continuously, knowing it’ll destroy her environment. She can’t help but think of living a life where she doesn’t have Chloe by her side. 

        Max believes that she uses her powers for the greater good by constantly saving Chloe’s life when really, she’s destroying her environment, and her ability to ‘let go.’ As mentioned before, Max must make the decision of whether to sacrifice Arcadia Bay or Chloe to the looming threat of the storm. Throughout the game they both developed a significant and romantic relationship with one another, it would be painful for Max to have to let go of Chloe, especially after being away for a long period of time. The player also develops a liking to them and feels emotionally impacted by their relationship as they have been through so much together. However, due to these events, it’s clear to us that Chloe is fated to die and if Max tries to cheat death again it will ultimately have treacherous consequences and Chloe may never stop getting herself into these fatal situations. In my playthrough of the game, I chose to sacrifice Chloe because I knew that she was always meant to die since the very beginning and trying to hang on to something that isn’t meant to be is meaningless and harmful in the long run. Max must face her fears and give into the inevitable and bare the loss of someone she loves dearly, no matter how painful it may be. 

        Personally, this game impacted me emotionally as I was so invested in these two characters and their journey through this otherworldly, somewhat spiritual path which would ultimately lead them to certain doom. I have never really experienced loss but I do experience the fear of having to lose someone important to me. I too wish I had some kind of power to change things to the way I want them to be but I know that this isn’t as perfect as it seems. As a queer individual, I felt impacted through Max and Chloe’s connection and how they would both go through lengths to save each other. They’re not perfect characters and have flaws just like regular people, but they are still able to love and cherish one another without a care for what people may think of them. 

        Life is Strange teaches the audience that it’s okay to let go and deal with loss because it is a part of life whether we like it or not. What matters the most is the time shared with people we love and care for before their time is up. This is why this game is so relevant to those suffering from loss and/or melancholia. As for queerness, it shows a meaningful connection between two female characters who aren’t sexualized or bastardized in any way which is refreshing. The medium as a video game makes this piece engaging and compelling and an experience all should take part in.