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Dolash posted:I found this in my Steam library the other day and thought I'd hit up the thread for some motivation to play it. I like the modern, dialogue and choice driven adventure game setup, particularly the Telltale stuff (although that's somewhat hit or miss) and people have been saying this is the game to try for people who enjoyed those games. It might reflect poorly on me but the whole twee teenager thing is sort of offputting, so knowing little else about the game outside of a few glimpses it's been hard to work up the urge to try it out on my own. Not that I think it's a bad genre or anything, just not my usual cup of tea. I went into it rolling my eyes at how twee/hipster/whatever the setting and characters, but I ended up being won over by the game's charm--it scratches a lot of the same itches as Deadly Premonition for me.
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Aug 14, 2015 00:07
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Dolash posted:I found this in my Steam library the other day and thought I'd hit up the thread for some motivation to play it. I like the modern, dialogue and choice driven adventure game setup, particularly the Telltale stuff (although that's somewhat hit or miss) and people have been saying this is the game to try for people who enjoyed those games. It might reflect poorly on me but the whole twee teenager thing is sort of offputting, so knowing little else about the game outside of a few glimpses it's been hard to work up the urge to try it out on my own. Not that I think it's a bad genre or anything, just not my usual cup of tea. Two of the most harrowing entertainment experiences I've had this year are courtesy of this game. (For those who have played: Preventing Kate's suicide and choosing to euthanize alt-Chloe.) I realize how extreme that sounds, and it's certainly got some quirks that might keep you from connecting with the game the way I did. For my part, I don't think I reacted as negatively as you did to the early tone of the game, but it definitely felt false and off-putting at first. I found myself telling my friends "Yeah, the writing is kind of rough, the twee poo poo might bother you, but the story they're telling is interesting and different, and everything else about the presentation demands your attention." (The cinematic direction in particular is tremendous; I bought the first episode because the demo intrigued me. I was ready to buy episode 2 midway through, and then the montage that ended episode 1 put me over the edge on the season pass.) That's what I'd recommend -- play through what you got. If you're not curious as to where this is going by the end of episode 1 (or the demo, if that's all you have), it's probably not your bag, and that's absolutely fair. But if you give it a chance, you might fall head-over-hella-heels for it (sorry) in ways you never thought you could.
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Aug 14, 2015 00:49
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Now that I have the time travel power I should be good, because for some reason actually getting to control the time travel with the right mouse button and make people walk backward/repeat sentences is dumb fun. Also because realizing you can time travel and immediately using it to steal answers and good conversation bits is delightfully petty. Oh, and I guess stopping that one shooting or something. There's certainly enough depth here to pique my interest so thanks for the encouragement to get over the initial distaste. Please tell me there's a route split at some point where one way you keep playing Ellen Page in Groundhog Day and the other Max realizes she could be a supervillain, then dumps photography for world conquest.
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Aug 14, 2015 01:09
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Dolash posted:I found this in my Steam library the other day and thought I'd hit up the thread for some motivation to play it. I like the modern, dialogue and choice driven adventure game setup, particularly the Telltale stuff (although that's somewhat hit or miss) and people have been saying this is the game to try for people who enjoyed those games. It might reflect poorly on me but the whole twee teenager thing is sort of offputting, so knowing little else about the game outside of a few glimpses it's been hard to work up the urge to try it out on my own. Not that I think it's a bad genre or anything, just not my usual cup of tea. How is this not your genre? It's got kids and fun, weird time poo poo, and
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Aug 14, 2015 01:25
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Dolash posted:Now that I have the time travel power I should be good, because for some reason actually getting to control the time travel with the right mouse button and make people walk backward/repeat sentences is dumb fun. Also because realizing you can time travel and immediately using it to steal answers and good conversation bits is delightfully petty. Oh, and I guess stopping that one shooting or something. There's certainly enough depth here to pique my interest so thanks for the encouragement to get over the initial distaste. I had the same thoughts and wants but when I realized everyone in this game is a self-involved emotional retard who operates on the cusp of narcissism and speaks from the same kool kidz dialogue pool I began to enjoy this game for what it is.
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Aug 14, 2015 02:17
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Dolash posted:Now that I have the time travel power I should be good, because for some reason actually getting to control the time travel with the right mouse button and make people walk backward/repeat sentences is dumb fun. Also because realizing you can time travel and immediately using it to steal answers and good conversation bits is delightfully petty. Oh, and I guess stopping that one shooting or something. There's certainly enough depth here to pique my interest so thanks for the encouragement to get over the initial distaste. I find this game to do some very surprising things that I genuinely did not expect, in a good way. I know what you mean about the feel of it. Episode 1 is definitely the worst offender of that, and it only gets better from there.
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Aug 14, 2015 02:32
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Are you guys cereal? You didn't like the "kool kidz speak?" I found it hella endearing, myself. 
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Aug 14, 2015 04:14
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Torgo2727 posted:Are you guys cereal? You didn't like the "kool kidz speak?" I found it hella endearing, myself. Yeah, same here. Like it makes me roll my eyes sometimes but it's not really in an annoyed way.
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Aug 14, 2015 04:44
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it was good
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Aug 14, 2015 05:06
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Regy Rusty posted:How is this not your genre? It's got kids and fun, weird time poo poo, and It's subtle, but there's something more self-serious about this kind of game and this whole indie-teen genre that makes the juxtaposition between their powers and how they use them more jarring. In a comedic or absurd series, for example, it's easier to excuse why the heroes wouldn't be off using their time travel powers to save the world. I get that it's really just a narrative hook meant to give an interesting mechanic to the player, in service to the themes of the story rather than dominating them, it just bugs me. And to be honest if it was just teenagers being teenagers I don't think I could've gotten through at all, so good job time travel I guess. I desperately wanted to tell someone, anyone about time travel the whole episode - it felt far more important than anything else Max spent time thinking about, and she embraced being able to bend reality to take petty revenge on bullies too easily. It shouldn't be as hard to convince people as it was with Chloe - ask them to give you an item, travel back in time and show you have the item. Or ask them to think of a number between 1 and 1000, tell it to you, then go back in time and tell them the number they're thinking of. Or do the time-travel teleport thing I like using so Max can cross the map in about two real-time seconds. At least giving you direct control over the time travel lets you make small decisions in keeping with how you might actually want to use such an ability. Pull something off a high shelf and it breaks? Time travel to fix it. Want to read someone's mail but not have them know? Time travel after reading. My favorite example was being in Chloe's room, finding the CD, and with it the photo - after the conversation I traveled back to before I found the photo, but kept the CD, meaning we didn't have the conversation but I could still advance the plot. I found it a little weird afterward that she seemed to think I knew her and the missing girl were friends, but I can forgive them glossing that over. I imagine that means I could've done the same with the USB key earlier so that I could undo breaking into Victoria's room and revealing her "prank", but gently caress not revealing that. Finished the first episode, generally satisfied with my choices although there were a few tough calls (I'm annoyed I apparently missed the files). I think Junkfist is right that if you take the game for what it is then so far it's been pretty good, and it's definitely a nice change from Telltale since I don't have a firm enough grasp on the writers yet to predict how choices will play out. It's kind of funny how time travel works like an internalized version of the save-scumming games like these are known for, where you're encouraged to go back and try out the other options. They should take it a step further and at the ending have Max be able to say "hm, this was okay, bet I could do better" and start the whole game over from day one, except Max says all her lines bored and sarcastically. Final observations. Warren is into Max and Max doesn't seem to notice, it took Max wayyyy too long to figure out Chloe's stepdad was the security guy (she looked at his name on a bill AND a family photo with him in it and still didn't put it together!), that janitor is creepy as hell, I am not looking forward to having to use time travel to prevent that poor religious girl from killing herself and Max should just use her time travel powers to murder Nathan's raping, murderous rear end because it would be the perfect crime. Also don't know what they're supposed to do about a tornado, I assume FEMA'll be on top of that one. Dolash fucked around with this message at 06:26 on Aug 14, 2015 |
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Aug 14, 2015 06:23
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Dolash posted:It shouldn't be as hard to convince people as it was with Chloe - ask them to give you an item, travel back in time and show you have the item. Or ask them to think of a number between 1 and 1000, tell it to you, then go back in time and tell them the number they're thinking of. Or do the time-travel teleport thing I like using so Max can cross the map in about two real-time seconds. Is some one gonna tell him? I wanna tell him.
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Aug 14, 2015 08:18
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Ok I'll tell him. Nobody does anything about the tornado.
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Aug 14, 2015 08:21
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KiloVictorDongs posted:I went into it rolling my eyes at how twee/hipster/whatever the setting and characters, but I ended up being won over by the game's charm--it scratches a lot of the same itches as Deadly Premonition for me. They're both heavily influenced by Twin Peaks.
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Aug 14, 2015 09:13
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I kinda like that the apocalyptic typhoon is still a background mystery, it fits with the whole thing of when you're a kid and all your personal issues and problems are The Most Important poo poo Ever while actual looming perils and threats are just pushed aside and largely ignored until they're right in your face.
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Aug 14, 2015 10:52
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I would have assumed that the apocalypse typhoon was 100% metaphorical if it weren't for all the dead whales and double moons. I'm still convinced that it's going to turn out that Max is causing that by loving with the timeline though.
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Aug 14, 2015 11:27
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Getting through episode 2 and I'm dying for Max to start abusing her time travel to vent a little. Kick Nathan in the balls then time travel back out of it, just for fun. Try crazy conversations, like wildly accusing people to see if they let anything slip or make up ridiculous confessions to get reactions then time travel and use those details against them (time travel would be the greatest tool for an interrogator imaginable, ref: save-scumming LA Noire). I know, I know, not in keeping with the spirit. At least all the small things you can do are still fun - that one girl is going to figure it out if I keep moving her out of the way of projectiles.
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Aug 14, 2015 15:11
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Dolash posted:Getting through episode 2 and I'm dying for Max to start abusing her time travel to vent a little. Kick Nathan in the balls then time travel back out of it, just for fun. Try crazy conversations, like wildly accusing people to see if they let anything slip or make up ridiculous confessions to get reactions then time travel and use those details against them (time travel would be the greatest tool for an interrogator imaginable, ref: save-scumming LA Noire). Don't worry, Max will do her share of horrible poo poo to people during your adventures.
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Aug 14, 2015 15:13
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Max is a self-proclaimed pacifist. Which is as good a reason as any for why she can't stab some bitches. But I swear she did have a line in ep 4 where she thought about kicking someone over and over and over.
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Aug 14, 2015 17:25
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As I said, she's a technical pacifist because she just has her two minions, Chloe and Warren, do all the work for her.
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Aug 14, 2015 17:26
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I liked Max's line about being a pacifist in between scenes of her casually smashing a lock with a fire extinguisher and using a crowbar like a career criminal.
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Aug 14, 2015 19:18
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As long as it's not another person it's fine.
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Aug 14, 2015 19:20
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Max is a pacifist, but gently caress doors, shelves, lockers, and safes.
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Aug 14, 2015 20:27
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You can use her rewind power to just be a dick to Frank in the diner in episode 3. Chuck his beans on the floor or pour his beer over his head.
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Aug 14, 2015 23:37
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I WAS EATING THOSE BEANS
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Aug 14, 2015 23:40
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Dolash posted:It's subtle, but there's something more self-serious about this kind of game and this whole indie-teen genre that makes the juxtaposition between their powers and how they use them more jarring. In a comedic or absurd series, for example, it's easier to excuse why the heroes wouldn't be off using their time travel powers to save the world. I get that it's really just a narrative hook meant to give an interesting mechanic to the player, in service to the themes of the story rather than dominating them, it just bugs me. And to be honest if it was just teenagers being teenagers I don't think I could've gotten through at all, so good job time travel I guess. I want to expand on your post. If you aren't up to date on all 4 episodes yet, don't read because i'm not spoiler tagging this poo poo. While a story about a girl that has time travel powers then convincing and showing the world is an interesting story, it was not the interesting story DONTNOD wanted to tell. It certainly would not contain the same story beats, nor would it have the same themes DONTNOD wanted to portray. Dolash posted:
Are these points against the strength of the story? Or in favor? After all, Motherfucking Shakespeare posted:For anything so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature, to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure. In other words, an effective fictional drama imitates life. It holds up a mirror and we see ourselves and our lives in the reflection. Perhaps you knew someone in high school that was had a crush on someone, but never got the hint? Or someone that was severally socially and emotionally handicapped and could "only" get work as a janitor in a school? Have you known someone that tried to kill themselves? Are these imperfections in the story that can be fixed, or is it actually just human life? Humanity is weird and life is strange. (nailed that one) So what is the theme of this game? People on the other sites, some even on this forum, think the main theme is about "Chaos theory," the cycle of life, death, and rebirth. They assert that by saving Chloe at the start of the game, a chain reaction occurs and Max will be forced to choose between saving the town or her best friend. They may be right. However, I remain hopeful that this game, at its core, is about the bonds of friendship. Whatever gave Max this power, gave it to Max for a reason - to save Chloe. It is unsurprising that some of the most important story beats focuses on the relationships between Max and Chloe, Max and Kate, and Chloe and Rachel. Both mine and the chaos theory interpretations are valid for the same reason that makes Life is Strange so successful in terms of storytelling. It has "applicability." I am optimistic that DONTNOD will not employ a dark Storm of Swords style ending of "you know how you really like this character? Well, they're dead now, don't you feel silly for liking them?"At this point in pop-culture history, this style of story is getting a little played out. There is nothing wrong with this style, and it has its place, to be sure. However, catharsis is no vice. Happy endings do not have to be cliche.
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Aug 15, 2015 01:08
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Nah it's just a power fantasy for girls; Instead of blowing things up and killing dudes by being really strong and violent your superpower is to redo conversations with people until you're popular or you get what you want.
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Aug 15, 2015 03:56
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Still can't wait for when ep 5 becomes an FPS and it's a Singularity reboot ARG all along or something. Max rewinds the past few minutes all the time to land the most perfect sicknasty headshots
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Aug 15, 2015 04:28
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Life is Strange is actually Timesplitters 4.
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Aug 15, 2015 04:34
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Max lines up the polaroids, takes the shot and kills Hitler.
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Aug 15, 2015 04:39
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Regy Rusty posted:I WAS EATING THOSE BEANS
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Aug 15, 2015 05:50
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Regy Rusty posted:I WAS EATING THOSE BEANS I wish Max had the ability to stop time more than just once so I could've put the beans in the air over his head and then let them drop on him
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Aug 15, 2015 05:54
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Resumed episode 2 and I am really starting to feel the difference between this game and Telltale's offerings. I'm so glad I got over my initial disinterest. Getting Kate to step down off the roof actually felt like an accomplishment, and when Nathan got suspended I immediately cheered - he's Joffrey levels of awful, and even though I'm sure it'll come back to bite me very soon in the moment it feels like a victory (are there people who don't report and confront him at every opportunity? Crazy!). Also claiming a personal victory that Chloe did the "guess my items" thing to prove Max was a time traveler, I really hope Max gets a chance to tell Warren too. For some reason I found it a little creepier rewinding Chloe once she knew Max was doing it, sort of a "well, time to rewind your memory of the last minute or two, see you in a bit!" Hopefully you guys don't mind me dropping these thoughts here over episodes you've probably finished picking over months ago. As an additional aside I'm also enjoying imagining how the other students would be handling the plot if they were the one with the time travel power. If Kate couldn't go back far enough to undo the party she'd probably be primed to go all Carrie on them, while Chloe would probably take her cues from Bill Murray. God help them all if it was Nathan, he'd be capping people in the head then rewinding like nothing happened just to do it some more. Edit: It bugs me that each choice screen so far has shown me some choice I didn't realize I'd missed. Apparently there was an RV to draw on and getting Warren's test tube to explode didn't count as "helping" him, even if he thought it was funny. I just know I'm going to have to craft a super 100% run at the end of this, which is surely in keeping with the rewinding theme of the game. Dolash fucked around with this message at 06:06 on Aug 15, 2015 |
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Aug 15, 2015 05:56
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Dolash posted:Edit: It bugs me that each choice screen so far has shown me some choice I didn't realize I'd missed. Apparently there was an RV to draw on and getting Warren's test tube to explode didn't count as "helping" him, even if he thought it was funny. I just know I'm going to have to craft a super 100% run at the end of this, which is surely in keeping with the rewinding theme of the game. This has been one of the more amateurish game designy things that's kind of bugged me about LiS. Overall, it's been great, don't get me wrong, but I don't like how missable a lot of details are. And I know, a lot of this is on the player to catch these things, but there's a way of crafting the scenes that would encourage messing around with everything, and the game usually doesn't do that. In almost every scene where you're free to poke around, the game gives you something that feels time-sensitive that you should be doing instead. Someone is always waiting on you to do something (sometimes even sending you text messages about it), or someone is about to come in and catch you, and that encourages immediately going to do that main goal thing instead of stopping to smell the metaphorical roses, which is easily a good 50% of the game. If you always do the goal in each scene that the game is rushing you towards, you'll miss so much. Also I don't think it tutorializes the 'you've learned something so you can rewind and redo this conversation differently' mechanic well enough. I missed what the little "<< (speech bubble)" icon was trying to tell me the first time it popped up, and I probably played half the game through before figuring it out. Somehow I confused it with the similarly opaque 'flappy butterflies' icon and didn't recall what either of them were indicating. Not that I wasn't sometimes rewinding and redoing conversations anyway, but I just wasn't making the connection to why that icon kept showing up. They probably should have tossed up actual directions, like 'this icon means you can go back blah blah' in a few conversations until the player had done it a few times, just to make sure it's hammered in. Or just forego the cute icons and use the TTG method of just telling you in text every time. "Chloe will remember this (but not if you rewind)"
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Aug 15, 2015 06:41
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Dolash posted:
I had the opposite reaction to that. I was like, oh poo poo there was stuff I missed. I guess I will have to go back and play it again! 
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Aug 15, 2015 06:45
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Surely the more glaring design choice was at the start of episode 3, where Chloe jumps out to shout boo at you and you can't immediately rewind to turn the tables on her. I was waiting for a chance to rewind through that whole next conversation! Also the missable things don't bug me toooo much, but missing photo opportunities gets my hackles up. It's going to turn out you need to get them all for the 100% ending or something, isn't it?
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Aug 15, 2015 07:04
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There's a "Collectables Mode" where you just replay the area in your save file so you can get them with no decisions or actions carrying over so probably not.
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Aug 15, 2015 07:36
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Junkfist posted:There's a "Collectables Mode" where you just replay the area in your save file so you can get them with no decisions or actions carrying over so probably not. Oh thank God, gotta snap 'em all. Also c'mon Max, use your head - if you don't want Chloe to take the money, just rewind to before she finds the money and point her somewhere else instead! That's what friends do, right? Divert each other around issues instead of facing them head-on? Edit - Why even run from the pool-time intruder? Walk up to him, figure out who he is, rewind to a minute earlier and tell Chloe you have to split early 'cause somebody's about to come in. Do I have to do all the thinking around here? Edit Edit - Okay, spilling that beer on Frank just to see what would happen, Max's finally getting into the swing of things. Dolash fucked around with this message at 09:56 on Aug 15, 2015 |
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Aug 15, 2015 07:43
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Junkfist posted:There's a "Collectables Mode" where you just replay the area in your save file so you can get them with no decisions or actions carrying over so probably not. what What WHAT I've been sitting on my save file since March because I've been committed to having a clean run with absolutely no metagaming, seething in frustration at not having the opportunity to go find the photos I missed, and this mode has existed all along? Well poo poo, looks like sleep's canceled tonight.
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Aug 15, 2015 08:21
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Finished Episode 3 and whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?  Credit where it's due, the plot is a lot more daring and willing to make big plays and changes than I expected, but I can already tell this alternate timeline won't last. A lot of the little choices from the previous episodes would be completely invalidated and I feel like they're pretty invested in the Rachel mystery which might not even be a thing in the new timeline, not to mention punk Chloe's arc. My guess is either other people will have died, like Kate Marsh because you weren't there for her (because apparently Max is a Vortex Club snob now?), or you can't save the town without Chloe for some reason and she's in no state to help you (and for some reason you can't also fix that with time travel), but there'll be some reason why Max figures she has to undo her actions. I'm open to the possibility that it'll be some kind of ending choice between the two timelines which you might even move between, or that William or one of the Chloes will ask you to create the other timeline. Actually that brings up the big obvious question (and then all the little questions attached to it) - does this mean that once she stole William's keys, pastMax reasserted herself and went on to live a somewhat different life than our Max, becoming a different person and making different choices over her first month and a half at Blackwell? I'd assumed Max and the school wouldn't be much changed since they'd hardly interacted with Chloe over the last five years, so saving her dad would've been easy to integrate without changing much about the events of the last few episodes (that didn't directly concern Chloe). At least she didn't accidentally undo her own time travel powers. The craziest thing is Max has established she can travel far back using her photos, and she's got piles of those. Nominally speaking, if she's patient and keeps her cool she should be able to completely shape the timeline. Heck she could evade Chloe's severe injuries using the same photo, just go back to the Price household, prove she's a time traveler then relay everything they need to know to keep the family out of harm's way. I know it isn't going to play out this way, but my god it should and they got my hope up by actually having Max use her power to make big changes or be clever, so it'll be disappointing when she doesn't take it all the way. Any ending where Max doesn't end up transcending her school bullshit problems to become an all-powerful Time Lord (Lady?) might be a bit disappointing at this point.
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Aug 15, 2015 19:30
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Dolash posted:Finished Episode 3 and whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat? In the opening to the next episode, I'd advise checking your diary and your phone messages.
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Aug 15, 2015 19:33
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