This is what a sequel looks like when done by outsiders who don’t like or respect the original. The hot take that the original game broke Max regardless of choice, and that PriceField is a toxic, doomed, relationship, didn’t go over very well with many decade old fans. This is probably the most disappointed I’ve ever been in a product or developer.
True. I didn't even mind how they were doing the Pricefield relationship at first just to set things up for the way they were telling the story at first...and obviously it is something you can't ignore. But the way they actually handled it was atrocious and just straight up weird.
The addition of Detective Alderman was perfect. He came along as an antagonist, who wasn’t necessarily bad but posed a threat to ruin Max’s own detective work through the parallel universes and have Mose as the main suspect. The game then has you go through a peak LIS tense sequence where Max finally use her powers in an interesting way to avoid Alderman and find Safi’s camera (evidence that could convict Mose), while also discovering that the powers have a side effect where you can swap things between universes without Max having to travel herself. Then Max is faced with a choice that seems pretty impactful: To chose between supporting Mose (moral choice) or agree with Alderman because he could help Max uncover clues later on (logical choice). This entire amazing sequence ends up being entirely useless by the end of the game. Alderman ends up accusing and threatening Max at her home in the next chapter (even if she chose to agree with him), the evidence on the camera ends up not meaning a damn thing by the 5th chapter, and (worst of all) Alderman runs into his alternate reality self (which doesn’t even make any sense because he wouldn’t be investigating the murder in the other reality) and then ceases to exist with no further explanation asides from a small text exchange. You also never really use the object swapping power again. Max uses it in a cutscene. Just unfathomably poor writing and execution, and that’s just one part.
This this this! It's all so incredibly bad. It literally just...doesn't make sense! Alderman was such a cool foil to Max and the story in general. We never really had like...an outside presence looking in and investigating. It made your decisions have more stakes...at least it would've if it were done correctly. It's like the game tries to show off all these good ideas and flaunts them in your face, but they are all a facade. It doesn't even seem like it was purposeful either; like it's supposed to be a twist. It feels like poor decision making on their part. I don't think it was his alternate timeline self, I think it was himself in the past. Like the day before. The entire summit was badly explained. Like I get that it was "ground zero" so weird stuff was happening there, but even then, don't just chalk it up to "oh that's where stuff started so it's just weird". A lot of stuff could easily be explained, but it just isn't. I feel like I should make a video just talking about everything bad about the game now and going into spoilers. 😅
@@naysgameopinions I personally think they had a full-fledged story written out and planned, but had to scrap a lot of it because they were on a time crunch, and threw together 2-3 final chapters that worked good enough to release. Similar to Destiny and Activision in 2014, except Destiny had a open world multiplayer experience to fall back on, whereas LIS relies solely on the story to carry the gameplay experience, so they cant get away with it. Whether or not i'm right or not, it definitely feels like chapters 1 and 2 were an entirely different game than chapters 4 and 5, besides the gameplay mechanics itself. Maybe they had a different conclusion to the story, but maybe we'll never know.
@xxCrazyEights88xx That sounds about right. Seems like it was all sloppily put together. For sure. It definitely feels like there's a cut off point where the creativeness in the story plummets and it's all down hill from there. It'll be great to get mome insight from an inside perspective, but yeah, who knows if we ever will. Makes me wonder even more how they will continue the series.
i think it wasnt alderman from the alternate reality that he found, it was the alderman from two days earlier. which, i also dont get a lot😅those arent maxs or safis power, but maybe a third person, like diamond
@virtuousthing9070 It wasn't anyone else's power. It's just that the overlook was "ground zero" so it was the center of the storm for all the weird stuff. The flowers growing where Safi died, the mugs stuck in the tree, the random phone, etc etc. Reggie went up there and saw himself too with the Abraxas box. But yeah, nothing ever gets explained properly so we really can't say what is what because they can come out with the next game and say it's something completely different to fit their narrative.
Amazing review. I love your pitch of having us actually lecture and be able to answer questions to students, that would have been AMAZING, and would let new players get a feel for who Max is. The journal is SOOO bad and disappointing
Thanks! I definitely feel like SOMETHING was missing with Max. Feel like we should've gotten more with her and her personal life. The journal didn't help at all. It was soooo weird. The writing, the drawings in it, the design of it in general...
THANK YOU! I mean this would have been the perfect time narratively for Max to also reflect on her time in Jefferson’s class. The student now becoming the master. How he impacted her life compared to that weird nightmare sequence sequel that we got in Double Exposure.
Theory: (or rather me rewriting this shit) Alderman and Safi were written as perfect contrasts to each other one alive on one side that is talked about everywhere and then ultimately ends up alive again but becomes someone who is everywhere at once and no longer knows herself And Alderman who is alive on both sides and the only to actually see himself and ultimately disappear from both sides. Safi herself can become anyone she wants at will I think Alderman will return and will be able to turn anyone into nothing sort of an anti God with no sense of self
That definitely sounds good, but we'll have to see how it pans out. At this point they can see the pushback the community is doing and rewrite everything to fit a narrative that works out for them and said that was the plan all along, but maybe I'm being too cynical and harsh. Ha. I can definitely see Alderman coming back, especially since the timelines combined, but this direction is exactly what I don't want the series to veer into...or not in this way right now. Like how people are making fun of the Marvel-esque ending. It's getting too supernatural and "epic". It would've been cool if Alderman stuck around and turned out he was apart of some sort of task force trying to rally up people with powers for some reason. It's not even that I don't like what they did to him...it's just how they did it in combination with everything else. I think Alderman coming back with powers or something is too villainy. He was a great representative of people without super powers can still have powers. I thought the Other Max was going to actually be the real Max. The Max that we played as in the first game and then the Max we are playing as now is an alternate timeline Max based on what she did in the first game. So the twist would be we weren't the original Max the entire time and the bad guy is actually a good guy situation. Her killing Safi is something that actually needed to be done. But even if she's the original Max, that doesn't make the Max that we are playing any less real so it would be sort of a push and pull situation. Theres a lot of ways this game could've gone and even more ways it can go, but the way they did Double Exposure is just embarassing and feels like a smack in the face for people actually invested in the series.
The love interests (or lack thereof) in this game was bizarre. Firstly, Chloe is now out of the question. Honestly, them breaking up isn’t necessarily a bad thing narratively, but the execution of it in this game, the explanation they gave, is absolutely atrocious. And then Amanda is sort of thrown at us right from the start. We have 2 lines of dialogue with her before we’re forced to decide if we wanna date her or not, only for her to reject you anyways should you say yes. She just feels like a Rachel/Steph 2.0
Perfectly said! It's soooo weird and forced. Nothing natural about it. It's like they are forcing us to like Amanda from the jump. And then Vinh is nonstop hitting on Max that it just becomes creepy. And then the choices make it seems like Max is leading him on or just straight up likes him which doesn't make sense at all.
The only good point of the gameplay is when you are finding Safi’s camera in M’s office. That was a puzzle similar to what you’d seen in the original. The rest of the “game” is not a game at all. You just watched things happen.
Yes! One of the best parts. I was going to go into detail about that part, but I didn't. After that, I was so excited for the rest of the game because I thought we were going to get more situations like that where we play with our power...but nope. 😭
"hurriedly follows Safi's footsteps" is in reality a jog. I don't think DeckNine has ever seen anyone run before because the run animations in this game is awful but that's the least worst with this game
Double exposure is a game I actually hate tbh it's such a drag to play and I couldn't even push myself to play a strange game in second time by the end of the game I felt like I wasted not just my time playing it but almost ten years waiting for it.
The game was very mid and why was it so mid it's because of Deck Nine Game's terrible practices. This game could have been good if they didn't treat their people terribly for years.
From what I heard, it seemed as if the people that were actually making the game actually knew what they were doing, but the higher ups made executive decisions that no one on the team agreed with. Hopefully they can get all that straightened out.
do you think this game is worse then the second one with the 2 boys ? because i thought that was was horribly bad but now you are saying this game is maybe even worse then the second :/
Well I didn't like the 2nd one the first time I played it, but after I replayed the game recently in preparation for Double Exposure, I realized it's an excellent evolution of the first game. It may not be completely on par with the first game overall, but I think it excels past the first game in a lot of other aspects like gameplay mechanics. I talked about it a bit in my last video, "My History With Life Is Strange". Unfortunately, Double Exposure is clearly the worst one so far. Without a doubt. I don't see how anyone could even argue otherwise. It's a very strange direction and I'm curious on how they will continue the series with how awkward this game ended.
True. Even though I really liked the music, it didn't really fit like how the music did in the past games. It feels like they were trying too hard when finding music for this one.
This is terrible hope they do better and they could do before the storm and after the storm but in the middle of before the storm and Life is strange one.
I'll honestly take anything but this. I mean I like seeing Max later on...we have to move the franchise past the first game. But hanging on to it so desperately like Double Exposure does feels sort of pitiful. You can't move on and try to hang on to the past games at the same time.
This is what a sequel looks like when done by outsiders who don’t like or respect the original. The hot take that the original game broke Max regardless of choice, and that PriceField is a toxic, doomed, relationship, didn’t go over very well with many decade old fans. This is probably the most disappointed I’ve ever been in a product or developer.
True. I didn't even mind how they were doing the Pricefield relationship at first just to set things up for the way they were telling the story at first...and obviously it is something you can't ignore. But the way they actually handled it was atrocious and just straight up weird.
The addition of Detective Alderman was perfect. He came along as an antagonist, who wasn’t necessarily bad but posed a threat to ruin Max’s own detective work through the parallel universes and have Mose as the main suspect.
The game then has you go through a peak LIS tense sequence where Max finally use her powers in an interesting way to avoid Alderman and find Safi’s camera (evidence that could convict Mose), while also discovering that the powers have a side effect where you can swap things between universes without Max having to travel herself. Then Max is faced with a choice that seems pretty impactful: To chose between supporting Mose (moral choice) or agree with Alderman because he could help Max uncover clues later on (logical choice).
This entire amazing sequence ends up being entirely useless by the end of the game. Alderman ends up accusing and threatening Max at her home in the next chapter (even if she chose to agree with him), the evidence on the camera ends up not meaning a damn thing by the 5th chapter, and (worst of all) Alderman runs into his alternate reality self (which doesn’t even make any sense because he wouldn’t be investigating the murder in the other reality) and then ceases to exist with no further explanation asides from a small text exchange. You also never really use
the object swapping power again. Max uses it in a cutscene.
Just unfathomably poor writing and execution, and that’s just one part.
This this this! It's all so incredibly bad. It literally just...doesn't make sense! Alderman was such a cool foil to Max and the story in general. We never really had like...an outside presence looking in and investigating. It made your decisions have more stakes...at least it would've if it were done correctly.
It's like the game tries to show off all these good ideas and flaunts them in your face, but they are all a facade. It doesn't even seem like it was purposeful either; like it's supposed to be a twist. It feels like poor decision making on their part.
I don't think it was his alternate timeline self, I think it was himself in the past. Like the day before. The entire summit was badly explained. Like I get that it was "ground zero" so weird stuff was happening there, but even then, don't just chalk it up to "oh that's where stuff started so it's just weird". A lot of stuff could easily be explained, but it just isn't. I feel like I should make a video just talking about everything bad about the game now and going into spoilers. 😅
@@naysgameopinions I personally think they had a full-fledged story written out and planned, but had to scrap a lot of it because they were on a time crunch, and threw together 2-3 final chapters that worked good enough to release. Similar to Destiny and Activision in 2014, except Destiny had a open world multiplayer experience to fall back on, whereas LIS relies solely on the story to carry the gameplay experience, so they cant get away with it.
Whether or not i'm right or not, it definitely feels like chapters 1 and 2 were an entirely different game than chapters 4 and 5, besides the gameplay mechanics itself. Maybe they had a different conclusion to the story, but maybe we'll never know.
@xxCrazyEights88xx That sounds about right. Seems like it was all sloppily put together.
For sure. It definitely feels like there's a cut off point where the creativeness in the story plummets and it's all down hill from there. It'll be great to get mome insight from an inside perspective, but yeah, who knows if we ever will. Makes me wonder even more how they will continue the series.
i think it wasnt alderman from the alternate reality that he found, it was the alderman from two days earlier. which, i also dont get a lot😅those arent maxs or safis power, but maybe a third person, like diamond
@virtuousthing9070 It wasn't anyone else's power. It's just that the overlook was "ground zero" so it was the center of the storm for all the weird stuff. The flowers growing where Safi died, the mugs stuck in the tree, the random phone, etc etc. Reggie went up there and saw himself too with the Abraxas box.
But yeah, nothing ever gets explained properly so we really can't say what is what because they can come out with the next game and say it's something completely different to fit their narrative.
I don’t like what they did to Chloe Price in Double Exposure.
It was very odd. It seemed as if they got confused.
Amazing review.
I love your pitch of having us actually lecture and be able to answer questions to students, that would have been AMAZING, and would let new players get a feel for who Max is.
The journal is SOOO bad and disappointing
Thanks! I definitely feel like SOMETHING was missing with Max. Feel like we should've gotten more with her and her personal life.
The journal didn't help at all. It was soooo weird. The writing, the drawings in it, the design of it in general...
THANK YOU! I mean this would have been the perfect time narratively for Max to also reflect on her time in Jefferson’s class. The student now becoming the master. How he impacted her life compared to that weird nightmare sequence sequel that we got in Double Exposure.
Theory: (or rather me rewriting this shit) Alderman and Safi were written as perfect contrasts to each other one alive on one side that is talked about everywhere and then ultimately ends up alive again but becomes someone who is everywhere at once and no longer knows herself
And Alderman who is alive on both sides and the only to actually see himself and ultimately disappear from both sides.
Safi herself can become anyone she wants at will
I think Alderman will return and will be able to turn anyone into nothing sort of an anti God with no sense of self
That definitely sounds good, but we'll have to see how it pans out. At this point they can see the pushback the community is doing and rewrite everything to fit a narrative that works out for them and said that was the plan all along, but maybe I'm being too cynical and harsh. Ha.
I can definitely see Alderman coming back, especially since the timelines combined, but this direction is exactly what I don't want the series to veer into...or not in this way right now. Like how people are making fun of the Marvel-esque ending. It's getting too supernatural and "epic". It would've been cool if Alderman stuck around and turned out he was apart of some sort of task force trying to rally up people with powers for some reason. It's not even that I don't like what they did to him...it's just how they did it in combination with everything else. I think Alderman coming back with powers or something is too villainy. He was a great representative of people without super powers can still have powers.
I thought the Other Max was going to actually be the real Max. The Max that we played as in the first game and then the Max we are playing as now is an alternate timeline Max based on what she did in the first game. So the twist would be we weren't the original Max the entire time and the bad guy is actually a good guy situation. Her killing Safi is something that actually needed to be done. But even if she's the original Max, that doesn't make the Max that we are playing any less real so it would be sort of a push and pull situation.
Theres a lot of ways this game could've gone and even more ways it can go, but the way they did Double Exposure is just embarassing and feels like a smack in the face for people actually invested in the series.
The love interests (or lack thereof) in this game was bizarre. Firstly, Chloe is now out of the question. Honestly, them breaking up isn’t necessarily a bad thing narratively, but the execution of it in this game, the explanation they gave, is absolutely atrocious. And then Amanda is sort of thrown at us right from the start. We have 2 lines of dialogue with her before we’re forced to decide if we wanna date her or not, only for her to reject you anyways should you say yes. She just feels like a Rachel/Steph 2.0
Perfectly said! It's soooo weird and forced. Nothing natural about it. It's like they are forcing us to like Amanda from the jump. And then Vinh is nonstop hitting on Max that it just becomes creepy. And then the choices make it seems like Max is leading him on or just straight up likes him which doesn't make sense at all.
The only good point of the gameplay is when you are finding Safi’s camera in M’s office. That was a puzzle similar to what you’d seen in the original. The rest of the “game” is not a game at all. You just watched things happen.
Yes! One of the best parts. I was going to go into detail about that part, but I didn't. After that, I was so excited for the rest of the game because I thought we were going to get more situations like that where we play with our power...but nope. 😭
"hurriedly follows Safi's footsteps" is in reality a jog. I don't think DeckNine has ever seen anyone run before because the run animations in this game is awful but that's the least worst with this game
True true 😅
Safi should have been the main character instead
For sure. Solving your own death would be a cool premise for a Life Is Strange game.
I avoided this thing like the plage for SE/D9's treatment of Chloe.
It was definitely weird. I like the theories that the mischaracterization of her was done on purpose, but the game never went down that road.
Agree agree agree!
Double exposure is a game I actually hate tbh it's such a drag to play and I couldn't even push myself to play a strange game in second time by the end of the game I felt like I wasted not just my time playing it but almost ten years waiting for it.
I feel exactly the same. I was looking forward to it so much and was really disappointed the way it turned out. It feels like a bad fanfic.
The game was very mid and why was it so mid it's because of Deck Nine Game's terrible practices. This game could have been good if they didn't treat their people terribly for years.
From what I heard, it seemed as if the people that were actually making the game actually knew what they were doing, but the higher ups made executive decisions that no one on the team agreed with. Hopefully they can get all that straightened out.
Hopefully. And I hope the victims are ok
do you think this game is worse then the second one with the 2 boys ? because i thought that was was horribly bad but now you are saying this game is maybe even worse then the second :/
Well I didn't like the 2nd one the first time I played it, but after I replayed the game recently in preparation for Double Exposure, I realized it's an excellent evolution of the first game. It may not be completely on par with the first game overall, but I think it excels past the first game in a lot of other aspects like gameplay mechanics. I talked about it a bit in my last video, "My History With Life Is Strange".
Unfortunately, Double Exposure is clearly the worst one so far. Without a doubt. I don't see how anyone could even argue otherwise. It's a very strange direction and I'm curious on how they will continue the series with how awkward this game ended.
❤
I don't even know where to start with this game so I'll just say that the music has lost its edge and the lyrics are really simplistic now.
True. Even though I really liked the music, it didn't really fit like how the music did in the past games. It feels like they were trying too hard when finding music for this one.
Yeah it's too bad, it's so bad lol. Not sure if I have any faith in a future title at this point.
Exactly how I feel right now. True Colors already put me at a low point with the series and now Double Exposure took me under.
@naysgameopinions yep, same!
This is terrible hope they do better and they could do before the storm and after the storm but in the middle of before the storm and Life is strange one.
I'll honestly take anything but this. I mean I like seeing Max later on...we have to move the franchise past the first game. But hanging on to it so desperately like Double Exposure does feels sort of pitiful. You can't move on and try to hang on to the past games at the same time.
@@naysgameopinions Quite true it's true but we missed to much of it sadly.