Back in March, Square Enix held an online showcase where the publisher offered fans an in-depth look at the future of its popular adventure series, Life is Strange. Life is Strange: True Colors, a brand new mainline game in the series from Life is Strange: Before the Storm developer Deck Nine, due to release this September and the first to drop the episodic release schedule. On top of that, Deck Nine is also developing Life is Strange: Remastered Collection, which includes remastered versions of the original Life is Strange, as well as its predecessor Before the Storm.
With Dontnod Entertainment, the creator of the Life is Strange series, moving on to something new, Deck Nine is taking over the reins. Life is Strange: True Colors is being set up as the third mainline game, and will introduce a new cast of characters, a surprise returning character, and of course, a unique new power to play around with. Being the fifth game in the series means that, while True Colors is being developed as a standalone game, there's a lot to catch up on for newcomers. In the lead up to Life is Strange: True Colors, here's the complete story of Life is Strange so far.
Spoilers ahead for the events of Life is Strange, Life is Strange: Before the Storm, The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, and Life is Strange 2.
Life is Strange
Life is Strange was developed by French studio Dontnod Entertainment, and featured five episodes that were released individually between January and October 2015, for PC, PS4, PS3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, iOS, and Android. Set in the fictional town of Arcadia Bay, Oregon, Life is Strange is described as a graphic adventure game, and tells the story of a teenage girl named Max in her final year of school at Blackwell Academy. Early in the first episode, Max experiences a mysterious vision of a tornado ripping apart the local lighthouse, something quickly set up as a vision of the future and one of the overarching plots of the game's story.
After her first vision of the tornado, Max rushes to the school bathrooms and is soon forced to hide when two students storm in fighting, resulting in the death of the girl. In her desperation to save the girl — revealed to be her childhood best friend, Chloe Price — Max discovers she has the ability to rewind time and uses her abilities to save Chloe.
While Max uses her power to do a variety of things, the main story involves the disappearance of Chloe's new best friend, Rachel Amber. The two girls discover that Rachel was murdered by one of her teachers, Mr Jefferson, and Max is forced to uses her powers to go back in time and report the teacher before he's able to hurt multiple students including Chloe to protect his secret.
Despite decisions made throughout, Max is unable to prevent the storm from coming to Arcadia Bay. At the end of the game, the player is forced to choose between rewinding time and letting Chloe die to prevent the storm from ever arriving, or saving Chloe's life at the expense of the town. Although Dontnod Entertainment has its own canonical ending in mind, the story of Max and Chloe ends here, so for now players can make whichever decision they feel best suits their version of Max in their version of Life is Strange.
Life is Strange: Before the Storm
After the success of Life is Strange and other graphic adventure games at the time including Telltale's The Walking Dead, Square Enix hired developer Deck Nine to develop a three-episode prequel that explored the relationship between Chloe Price and Rachel Amber before her disappearance. Appropriately titled Life is Strange: Before the Storm, the prequel released in 2017 for PC, PS4, Xbox One, iOS, and Android, featured an original score written and performed by the British indie-folk group Daughter, and had to recast the role of Chloe Price due to Ashly Burch's involvement in the SAG-AFTRA strike.
In Life is Strange: Before the Storm, Chloe meets Rachel for the first time at a concert at the old mill and instantly hit it off after a confrontation with two strange men inside. The pair meet up the next day and decide to ditch school and hang out in a scrapyard, before making their way to a lookout where Rachel witnesses her father kissing another woman. Upset by what she's seen, Rachel throws a family photo into a trash can fire and kicks it over in frustration, accidentally creating a wildfire in the hills of Arcadia Bay.
It's revealed that the mysterious woman is Rachel's biological mother Sera, so Chloe and Rachel contact a local drug dealer Frank to get help find where she is. Upon meeting Frank at the scrapyard, Frank's boss Damon shows up to settle a debt and stabs Rachel after learning her father is the district attorney. While Rachel is in the hospital, Chloe learns that her father contacted Damon to have Sera killed, and Damon is now holding Sera for ransom. With help from Frank, Chloe is able to rescue Sera and heads to the hospital to visit Rachel. The player is given a choice to tell Rachel the truth about her fathers deal with Damon, or keep it a secret to protect her.
The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit
Released for free on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC in June 2018, The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit served as both an introduction and promotional teaser for Life is Strange 2, not unlike what P.T. was meant to be for the now-cancelled Silent Hills. The game takes place over the course of a Saturday morning and follows Chris Eriksen, a 9-year-old boy using his imagination to go on exciting adventures as a superhero, aptly named Captain Spirit.
Set in Beaver Creek, Oregon, Chris is forced to entertain himself around the house and yard for a few hours while his Dad watches a basketball game, promising they'll go and get a Christmas tree later in the day. Toward the end of the two-hour experience, Chris is yelled at by his intoxicated father who blames him for the death of his mother in a hit-and-run accident two years earlier.
Upset from the argument, Chris runs outside and begins climbing up to his treehouse, when one of the boards comes loose and he falls. In true Life is Strange fashion, Chris needs to have some sort of supernatural power, and he stops mid-air before hitting the ground, landing safely in the snow. When Chris gets up, he sees two boys playing in the yard next door — Sean and Daniel Diaz, the two protagonists from Life is Strange 2.
Life is Strange 2
The first episode of Life is Strange 2 released on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC in September 2018, three months after the release of The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, and finished in December the following year. Developed once again by series creator Dontnod Entertainment, the sequel follows a new cast of characters, brothers Sean and Daniel Diaz, on a road trip across the USA while on the run from the police; featuring upgraded animations, physics, and shaders due to the power of Unreal Engine 4 (the original game was developed on Unreal Engine 3).
At the beginning of the game, the older brother Sean intervenes when Daniel is being harassed by their neighbor. As the situation escalates, the boy's father Estaban is shot and killed by a police officer that arrives on the scene, which leads to Daniel letting out a scream that creates a shockwave, inadvertently killing the officer. Forced to flee, the boys are now on the run from the police and decide to make their way to their father's hometown in Puerto Lobos, Mexico.
On the way, the brothers go to their grandparents in Beaver Creek where they meet Chris, the protagonist in the Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, and Daniel uses his powers to save him from falling. Police soon arrive on the scene after the brothers are spotted in public and Chris helps them escape.
After a brief stint on a drug farm to earn money, and a confrontation that lands Sean in hospital, he awakens two months later and finds Daniel has been taken in by a religious cult in Nevada. After rescuing Daniel and their mother Karen, the trio makes their way to Arizona and befriend former security officer David Madsen, the stepfather of Chloe Price. Karen allows herself to be caught by police to give the brothers enough time to make it past the Mexico-United States barrier, but are ambushed by the FBI. Based on decisions made throughout the game, Sean will decide to either surrender or escape and even that decision can end in different ways.
If Sean chooses to surrender, the game can end with Daniel being sent to live with his grandparents and reuniting with Sean after fifteen years in prison, or Sean being killed and Daniel becoming a criminal in Mexico. If Sean chooses to escape to Mexico, it can end with Daniel surrendering and living with his grandparents while Sean remains in Mexico alone, or both of them escaping, opening up their own garage, and using Daniels powers for criminal activities.
Life is Strange: True Colors will release September 10 for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.