I will say that the animations are somewhat better in Life is Strange. There are parts where the lighting looks better, like in Chloe’s room, but those scenes are few and far between. It’s something about the lighting and texturing that makes it look less natural. I’m not bashing video game looking video games, but that’s the best way I can think to describe this. Before the Storm does fare a bit better in this regard since it was moving towards realism originally, but it still suffers from some uncanny visuals.Įnvironments too look less like places now and more like, well, video game levels. The more realistic texturing makes characters look almost creepy, with eyes that appear to be about to pop out of their heads. Up until True Colors, Life is Strange used a sort of watercolor approach to texturing, you could almost see the paint strokes in the environments. Textures and lighting look more realistic, but that’s not what the games were going for. On the surface, it is improved from a technical standpoint. Everything else done to “enhance” the games for these remasters, in my opinion, makes them look worse. The excellent, licensed soundtrack returns as well, consisting of some great tracks that make for very memorable moments, usually starting off and ending each episode. It even runs fairly well too, the only dip I noticed was in the geometrically complex junkyard when looking out from one end to the other, it’s pretty solid otherwise. Purely from a gameplay and features perspective, this is a great way to re-experience these incredibly emotional adventure games with heart-wrenching choices that actually matter. The choice statistics are still here too! With both global and friends list comparisons. Moving on to the game itself, it plays exactly the same as it did back in 2015, though no need to wait for episode releases anymore they’ll even auto-play after a few seconds when you finish one. Several scenes have bright backgrounds, so if the subtitles get lost in the colors I guess you’re just out of luck. It’s a bit pixelated on Switch, but it looks nice when you can read it. The subtitle text is white with a slight black outline and a hand-drawn look to it. There is also the option to add a Semi-Opaque background to subtitles, which would be fantastic if it worked outside of pre-rendered cutscenes. I’d like to highlight that you can change subtitle sizes from Normal, Large, to Hella Large, which is very cute and will no doubt help some players. You can use up to three save slots, adjust brightness and volumes, and change things about camera control like sensitivity and inversions. I wasn’t expecting PC-level configuration, so what’s on offer here is fairly standard for consoles. Choosing an episode to play will incur a long loading screen, so first let’s dive into the options. Starting up Life is Strange, you do have to sit through a solid minute of company logos and legal text to get to the title screen, so that’s not a great start. They do come as separate apps and downloads, however, so no launcher or anything to go through first. The Arcadia Bay Collection packages both remasters together for about $40, you cannot purchase them separately on Switch so it’s all or nothing. Both are fantastic games and some of my favorites in the genre, so let’s see how the remaster updates things. While Chloe doesn’t have time powers, she still solves environmental puzzles, makes choices, and argues with people to get what she wants. Before the Storm, meanwhile, is a prequel following the friendship of Chloe and Rachel. The plot revolves around her relationship with her old best friend, Chloe, as well as the mysterious disappearance of Rachel Amber and strange visions of an impending storm that will destroy the town. Life is Strange is an adventure game in which you explore and interact with characters and environments, make choices that impact the story, and solve puzzles and undo mistakes with Max’s newly discovered time powers. Now, it’s time I return to Arcadia Bay for the remasters of the original game and prequel Before the Storm on Nintendo Switch.īefore we arrive in Arcadia Bay, let me give you the rundown on Life is Strange. Regardless, the series has brought about some incredible opportunities for me, in particular interviews with the original and sequel creator Michel Koch as well as the comic writer Emma Vieceli and artist Claudia Leonardi. This all started with the 2015 original which starred Max Caufield, who is basically me in video game form – so much so that nowadays I cringe somewhat at who I was in High School. Each game focuses on something that happens to be very important to me, from the big sibling energy of 2 to the independence and little sibling energy of True Colors. I’ve mentioned several times that the Life is Strange series is very important to me.
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