There are two characters that can be romanced in this episode, both of whom were fleshed out very well in “Wastelands,” making Sean’s attachment to them feel at least somewhat earned, even though they’re both pretty new to Sean’s life. One last thing I want to address is the options this episode gives for the player to have Sean get involved in a romance. There were definitely a few very important choices in this episode, some of which end with serious consequences. Ultimately, it’s a bit of a shame that the game doesn’t involve as much player interactivity as other games of the genre, but the story is still good enough that some players won’t mind that much (others, however, probably will). Additionally, we still don’t necessarily know to what extent all of the small choices will end up adding up and just how much they will influence Sean and Daniel’s relationship by the end of the game, so we’ll just have to wait for the last two episodes to see how all that ends up playing out. That said, the story that this episode tells is still entertaining, even if the player doesn’t have a ton of personal involvement in it, and the few choices that do make a difference feel like they REALLY make a difference. Most of the time, the player is just along for the ride, watching the story unfold, rather than actively participating in it. In Life is Strange 2, many of the choices the player is given (which aren’t that many to begin with) don’t feel like they’re letting the player influence the narrative at all. However, in the best narrative adventure games, the player may not determine the overall narrative of the game, but their choices will at least influence it. It’s also disappointing when you’re faced with an important-feeling choice that you take time to really think about, only for your choice to immediately get swept under the rug two seconds after making it.Īs a fan of choice-based narrative adventure games, I feel a bit obligated to explain that I realize most games of this sort have a set narrative path they set the player down and that choices the player makes may make changes to the narrative in terms of the player’s relationships to other characters, but very rarely cause huge diversions in the developer’s planned story. However, the fact remains that choices are pretty few and far between, with sometimes entire scenes going by in which the player doesn’t have any kind of say at all, and a lot of the time when there is an actual choice to make, it’s a choice that you can tell will have little-to-no effect on anything.
There were definitely a few very important choices in this episode, some of which end with serious consequences, and it will be very interesting to see how these results play into future episodes. Episode 3 suffers from this problem as well, though I have to say, not nearly as badly as the past two episodes have. In my review of Episode 2, I mentioned how Life is Strange 2 in general has had a tendency so far of hardly presenting choices to the player (whether they be big, narrative-altering choices or even just multiple dialogue options) and that most of the choices the game does offer feel meaningless or are immediately discarded by the game. Unfortunately, choices are again a department where this new episode feels like it falls a little bit short.
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