After playing the first episode of Batman the telltale series, I was wary for something similar such as Life is Strange. This game is much more superior, the game-play is significantly more endearing and the characters are more compelling. This type of game play, is still inferior compared to the traditional games which is why the rating is only three starts and the graphics are really outdated as the voice does not match up with the characters mouth but the first Episode creates a positive image for the rest of the episodes. Moreover, I am glad purchasing each individual episode buying model is over

Chrysalis is a solid introductory episode to developer DONTNOD's take on the Telltale formula. It's less concerned with setting up the overall plot right out of the gate, and is instead focused more on introducing players to the gameplay mechanics, world, and characters that inhabit it. Much like other modern episodic adventure games, player choice in the main driving force behind the experience. Your actions have consequences, not all of which are obvious. Where Life Is Strange stands out from its contemporaries is in its time manipulation mechanics. Don't like the immediate consequences of a certain decision? The game gives you the opportunity to go back and change that while still leaving the long-term effects a mystery. You can even go back and alter seemingly minor dialog choices or random events. It's a novel and exciting mechanic that allows for more freedom than, say, a Telltale game.

There's ultimately not too much going on in this first episode. The bigger story at play here is only revealed right at the very end of this chapter's story, and it's not quite clear how everything else is going to tie in together, if at all. We still get to meet some cool characters, watch our lead go through a sort of coming of age tale complete with time-traveling powers, and it's all brought to life with a kind of hipsterish indie-drama vibe. It's compelling and I can already see this going to be an emotional ride.

It might not be the most action-packed start, but the time travel mechanics provide a nice new spin on the concept and I'm curious to see how my choices will affect the story going forward. The amount of decisions to make here already give this episode a high-amount of replay value by itself. I can only imagine the number of possibilities when all of the content is together in the full game. Some very minor glitches are present and while the stylish graphics do help cover up a lot, it's easy to see flaws in things like lip syncing and character animations. I also think the lead actress doesn't always show the appropriate level of emotion in certain scenes. I get she's a hipster, but come on. Most of the issues go away in the face of some truly great decision making and the novel mechanics though. So overall Chrysalis is good and worth trying out to see if the story is for you. It's free so won't even have to put money down on it until you decide to branch out to the rest of the content or not.

7.8/10

Played on PS5
Playtime: 3 Hours
Play Status: Completed
Completion Date: January 31st 2023
No Spoilers

A Strong Start
As a fan of interactive movie games, of course Life is Strange is a game that looked very interesting to me. That's why I already finished it but because PS Plus made it free this month I wanted to replay it. And here are my thoughts on Episode 1...

In the Life is Strange, we play as Max Caulfield. She is a photography student at Blackwell Academy and one day while she is in bathroom, she sees a girl getting murdered. Right after that, she goes back in time. She is able to rewind time.

This is basically how the episode starts out. I don't want to give any more details because the episode took me 3 hours and I basically tried to explore everywhere. Overall though I can say that I liked the story of Episode 1. It sets up the main plot and some of the subplots very well.

This is also thanks to the characters and the voice actors. Our main character Max Caulfield voiced by Hannah Telle is a relatable teenage girl and Telle did a great job. The other main but non playable character Chloe Price voiced by Ashly Burch is like the opposite of Max.

And I loved her as well. We don't know much about these characters yet but the game gives off pretty good signals about the future episodes. We will most likely go deeper with the upcoming episodes.

Some of the other standouts for me were Nik Shriner's Nathan, Dani Knights' Victoria, Carlos Luna's Warren and Don McManus' David Mansen. I think all 4 did great jobs and I am very curious to learn more about their characters.

The gameplay of Life is Strange consists of 3 main mechanics. Exploring, making choices and puzzle solving. Episode 1 offers multiple great locations to explore with nice side elements. You get more from this world if you explore everything and talk with everyone.

Choices are a bit hard to judge just by this episode but what I can say is that I already saw some things happening because of my choices. And that is a good sign. Interesting thing with time rewinding though, you can change your choices.

If you leave an area your choices are of course can't be changed anymore but still for almost all of your choices you can go back in time, see what the other outcome might be and select using that knowledge. It's an interesting mechanic for sure but I don't think it adds much other than it being cool thematically.

Finally, puzzle solving where the time rewind mechanic really comes in. Sometimes your progression will be blocked by a number of things. Like let's say a person stands in front of you and wants a certain information. You can trick the person into saying the information you want, rewind time and tell to that person so you may continue.

It's hard to give much examples without spoiling some good moments so I won't try too hard and I will just say that I loved the puzzle elements. Rewinding time is used well and it is fun to experiment with.

The game looks good graphically but of course it started to show it's age. On PS5 I encountered no bugs, glitches or frame drops so that was very nice.

Life is Strange starts out with a great first episode. The story is interesting, characters and performances are very well done and while the gameplay is not the most exciting in the world, clever puzzles that forces you to use your time rewind ability does make things interesting and exciting. I think this episode was a blast to play, can't wait to see the others!