Following in the footsteps of Telltale's point-and-click adventure games, Life is Strange is all about choices. Assuming the role as teenager Max Caufield, the decisions that players make throughout her journey as an unsuspecting time traveler aren't easy ones.
And with the Life is Strange: Remastered Collection due out later this year, players can return to Arcadia Bay for Max and Chloe's gut-wrenching story. But fans probably aren't ready to re-confront some of the story arcs and decisions that have made Life is Strange as successful as is it. This post contains spoilers for Life is Strange and Life is Strange: Before the Storm. Additionally, some readers may find some content in this article unsettling.
Pull the Plug or Do Nothing
As those familiar with Max's tale already know, so many decisions in Life is Strange revolve around Chloe and whether or not she lives or dies, foreshadowing another major choice at the end of the game. In a tragic twist when Max rewinds the clock farther than usual, she enters a parallel universe where, instead of Chloe's dad dying in a car accident, Chloe herself is permanently injured instead. Now, she spends her life bedridden, barely able to move, with her parents taking care of her day and night and plagued with hospital bills.
To Chloe Price, the clear choice is to end her own life, and she asks Max to be the one to do it. She says it would ease her parent's troubles and save her from living a bedridden life. But to the player and Max, this is much more of a moral dilemma. Whether or not the player believes in something as morally gray as euthanasia is on the line, but if Max chooses not to do anything, her best friend with ridicule and blame her. This is easily one of the toughest decisions in the Life is Strange series.
Saving Kate Marsh
This isn't necessarily the hardest "choice," per se, but navigating this conversation can be somewhat difficult. As a religious teen, Kate is very ashamed to have been a part of promiscuous filming—even if she hadn't been involved willingly. After rumors of her cease to spread, in Episode 2 of Life is Strange, Max must talk her down from stepping over the edge of the roof of the dorms. While Max would normally have the ability of her rewind powers to make the save somewhat easy, they're unavailable during this portion of the game.
Getting Kate to step away from the edge calls back to important decisions from earlier on in Life is Strange, specifically whether or not Max intervened when David was interrogating her or took a picture, whether or not Max answered Kate's call, and whether or not Max encouraged Kate to go to the police about being drugged. How Max went about these problems will determine how the conversation with Kate goes, but either way, she'll need to navigate it properly to save Kate Marsh.
Bae or Bay Ending
Life is Strange will allude to Chloe's death in a number of ways, whether it's being hit by a train, being shot in the school bathroom, or the moral dilemma listed above. But at the end of the game comes an unexpected decision: Max must choose to save either Arcadia Bay or Chloe, not both, in what's known as the "Bae or Bay" dilemma in the fandom.
Shortly after Life is Strange's release, the split was overwhelming—over approximately 95% chose in favor of Arcadia Bay. However, for those wondering what happens after the "Bae" ending, the official Life is Strange comic series follows just that.
Life is Strange: Remastered Collection launches for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S on September 30, 2021.