Time Is On Your Side:Life Is Strange: Episode One Reviewed

So many stories begin with a murder, look at Twin Peaks for example; based around the murder of a seemingly perfect high school girl in a sleepy isolated town. It's an effective point for getting a narrative engine whirring. Life Is Strange, a new game from French developers Dontnod, gets it's plot going by having you stop a murder but with a twist as you've already seen it happen.



Max Caulfield has just returned to the small town that see grew up in from Seattle for a photography course at a prestigious school, and reconnecting with people she'd long lost contact with. It's left her a stranger in a familiar place. On top of that she begins to have vivid dreams about a massive tornado looming over the town and with them, the realisation that she can rewind time.

Max's teenage life is already seeming far more complex than my own but Life Is Strange manages to stay grounded and personal. You get glimpses into a lot of character different ideas and agendas within the short chapter and it won't take long till you're picking out favourites and picking sides. The teenage slang comes thick and fast and mostly works though, and i'm in the later half of my twenties so maybe I'm losing my grip on how kids today talk, I don't know if people say things like "sad face" but for the most part it works.

I bring up Twin Peaks because there is more that a passing resemblance to the setting, the small pacific coastal town of Arcadia (and there is at least one obvious reference to David Lynch's show in the game). The game clearly owes a lot to the storytelling of Telltale Games too, you make dialogue choices and actions that split the plot and the game makes these reasonably clear that they will have some future repercussions. What is different is that once you've made your choice you can change your mind, though once the story moves on, usually set by leaving an area, there is no going back.

It also allows you to change some small things too. Here are some of the least spoilery examples: When you talk to some kid with a skateboard he calls you out on not knowing any of the tricks. Rewind time and you can drop words like 'nose slide' into conversation and impress him. Walking past a girl sat at a bench, you see her get struck by a football, rewind time and you can warn her. These moments may not have an impact on the central story but these tools can come into play in similar ways in the games more decisive moments.

The game uses some familiar metaphors, this isn't the first time a camera has been used to represent a sense of detachment to the world around you, but it still works. Likewise, the game name checks a dozen authors, films, photographers over the chapter but these are people figuring themselves out, finding people and media to latch onto to find who they are.  

Whilst you always have something to do the game doesn't rush you. You have time to explore the environment, talk or observe people around you, take pictures or poke around dorm rooms and houses. These environments are littered with little details about the people, rarely essential but filling out the characters and world. Teenagers are not easy to write. Their lives are filled with little struggles and there is a politics to how these play out. Life Is Strange may go a little too far out of it's way to remind you that this is a contemporary story, with sexting and mentions of Kickstarter, it is best at capturing the moments that never change for teenagers, the cliques, the bullies and the personal drama.

Whilst I can't relate to everything that Max goes through I remember what it's like thinking whether I should stand up to a bully or not, or just laying on a bed smoking weed and listening to music. Life Is Strange nails the small moments so it'll be interesting to see if it can keep them at the forefront as the plot grows and we get to realise the full results of out choices.

Game Review – Gods Will Be Watching

(Deconsructeam/Devolver)

Gods Will Be Watching started out as an entry for the game jam Ludum Dare 26. It was made with the theme of Minimalism. The original game, which makes up a chapter of the full game, featured dishevelled band of individuals, amongst them a robot, doctor, engineer. Taking lead as Sgt. Burden you denote tasks to them, to find food, repair a radio and stave of madness to survive. It all took place in one screen a cold expanse of lonely woodland. It was a novel idea and more complete than most game jam results, capturing desperation and hopelessness.

It was picked up by Devolver Digital, of Hotline Miami and Shadow Warrior fame, to expand it into a full title with help from a crowd funding campaign. The game seemed a natural fit with the aesthetics of other Devolver games thanks to it's lo-fi pixel art and often grizzly violence. Now the full game has been released, Gods Will Be Watching is another game looking back on the point and click genre and like Kentucky Route Zero and, despite not having that much in common, doing something interesting with it.

Alright, maybe I'll talk.

The plot focuses around Sgt Burden, part of Everdusk, as he infiltrates a group deemed to be terrorists or freedom fighters depending on perspective. You along with a rotating team are placed in scenarios to complete from withstanding twenty days of torture to finding a base in the terror-stricken desert. While these scenarios are often interesting and inventive, they way they play out is often very similar, boiling down to managing resources and completing tasks within a time limit.

The game opens with a hostage situation. Sgt. Burden is tasked with taking care of the hostages ensuring they don't attempt an escape whilst holding of troops outside. All the while you have to assist in the hacking of a system to download a cure for a virus. Sound like a lot to manage? Well it is. Another scenario finds Burden stranded in a desert. Along with a squad of soldiers, you have to reach a military base within a time limit. Juggling these different objectives is where the challenge lies, scout ahead to ensure safety but burn through precious time. Soldier slowing you down? You can put him out of his misery. It's means more rations to go around at the expense of fire power to defend against enemies.

"Yes, the hostage situation is under control".

Often the solutions and answers to move forward only come apparent following failure, not a bad thing in itself, many games make death an important part of the game. Death has always been an interesting part of games, from Dark Souls to Devolver's own Hotline Miami, it can be an important part of figuring out how to progress but here it is just a frustration.

Deconstructeam is aware of this frustration with the conclusion of the plot getting a little to meta for it's own good, referring to the repeated failures and deaths of the legendary Sgt. Burden. In fact the end sequence seems like the biggest let down after an interesting negotiation scenario the fate of a planet is decided by a fight, turn-based where you have to figure out the opponents moves and respond offensive or defensively, whilst having a bit of a back 'n' forth discussion about morality and slavery. It all feels a bit silly, like James Bond monologuing his philosophical beliefs and chasing down Goldfinger, especially when the consequences of your failure have already been hammered home, slowing down the already turn-based combat.

Gods will be frustrated

Whilst the decisions you make can be simplified to either taking a survivalist or moral approach there is a weight an consequence to your decisions. Kill the straggling soldier slowing you down in the desert and you will be given a quiet moment of reflection as one of his comrades will pick up his dog tags. These actions and their consequences don't hold up as well over the same game, as a character you didn't make it through one chapter will return in the next. It holds the plot together but takes something away from the approach you spent the last half an hour wrestling with.

I did like that with the games lack of hints I took to writing down effective or ineffective strategies on paper which made me think back to older point and click/adventure games. With stunning music full of synth washes and sci-fi arpeggios that fit the games tone perfectly and detailed, gory pixel animations, there is still a lot to like about Gods Will Be Watching. It falls short of the original game jam's promise but still takes an interesting approach to moral decisions, shame about the execution.