Life is Strange: Double Exposure won’t be fully released for another two weeks, but those with the Ultimate Edition of the game can get started with the story right now. Anyone looking to get through this ‘Advanced Access’ content – which covers two of the full game’s five chapters – will likely finish playing and possibly streaming it, and all its narrative spoilers, tonight before going to bed go.
Look, fans have already had their say about how splitting this story-focused game’s launch – and thus its player base – is a terrible idea. And many fans will have decided by this point whether they want to spend £75 to start playing today, or wait until October 29 and pay £50.
But now that I’ve played the first two chapters myself, seen how they end, and now that I know that the full length of the game is only slightly more than that amount again, I’m even more confused as to why anyone thought this was a was a good idea. These are thick, story-heavy sections, and I imagine discussion forums and Twitch streams will be awash with spoilers by the time you read this.
There’s the obvious worry here that plot details will be spread by those playing today, a full two weeks earlier than others, and the sad fact that some fans have said they now feel forced to spend an extra £25 , simply to prevent this. For all players, though, it’s a shame to see what should be a huge moment of excitement and discussion for the series – and there’s plenty to chew on here! – fragmented and limited to just a few.
I’m not at all sure how Square Enix feels about this, other than it’s a way to make more money from its most die-hard fans. Maybe the publisher has sales figures, business plans and marketing charts to prove me wrong – or financial requirements that require this to happen anyway. Anyway, if you ask a smaller, albeit more passionate group to justify spending half the price of the game, you’re still risking them turning the whole thing off, right? And surely limiting the discussion, at least for now, dampens the excitement of launching to the widest possible audience at the same time?
Life is Strange has always been a series that provokes discussion, thanks to its branching story, ambition to tackle difficult topics and great character-based storytelling. And before Deck Nine’s Life is Strange: True Colors, the familiar episodic nature meant players had natural moments between chapter launches to regroup, debrief, and theorize about what might come next. There is absolutely nothing wrong with releasing a story in segments. But when was the last time you paid extra to read the opening of a book first?
There are arguments for and against episodic releases, of course, and Life is Strange’s original developer, Don’t Nod, has admitted to ditching the schedule for LIS2, which simply took too long for a variety of reasons. But it’s notable that Don’t Nod is now returning to a split launch for its own Life is Strange spiritual successor Lost Records: Bloom & Rage (the first half of which arrives in February 2025, before the final portion drops a month later) to promote fan discussion between episode releases – and without charging extra for the privilege.
In a different world, perhaps one where Square Enix made a different choice when it saw how two options for selling this game hung ominously in the air, I would have started this piece with some things about Double Exposure that I really want to talk about to talk, such as the skillful handling of both the original series protagonist, Max, and the absent but forever fan favorite Chloe. I also have positive thoughts about the game’s setting and the mechanics of Double Exposure’s new parallel world superpower, which is a real upgrade from True Colors.
Not everything is good. There are some truly strange tonal blunders – as Max gleefully notes about her surroundings, oblivious to the recent tragedy that hangs around the entire game. Additionally, as with all multiverse stories, there are some points of logic that don’t really make sense. (But why wouldn’t Are you just going to talk to that character and explain everything?) For more on all of this, though, come back in a few weeks for our Life is Strange: Double Exposure review. I think there’s a solid game underneath this Advanced Access nonsense, but like many other players I’m waiting for the game’s full launch to talk about it.
