Season 2 Powers

[Brewski]

So, lets assume for the sake of this topic that, as the devs stated prior to beginning development of Season 2 that it will not be a continuation of Max's story. (Leaving the reasons vauge to avoid spoilers, so please don't post any here without tags.)

That leads me to an interesting second question, which is, if they are changing the case, do they change the premise as well?

Max is defined in this game byher time travel powers, which evolve and expand as the game progresses. By the end we have a pretty good understanding of how they work, but not why they work or where they came from. In the DLC documentatories the writers say they left it vauge on purpose, not wanting the mechanics of the powers to get in the way of the story.

But it still leaves the problem that we know how they work, so the joy of discovering Max's power as she does is gone if they use the same powers in a second game.

That said, time travel is just one type of power you could use. What if LiS becomes a series of coming of age stories surrounding young adults developing different super natural powers? You could keep the mood and the feel of the game the same while verying the machanics and story as widely as needed.

If they did that, what other powers would work?

My first thought is: Mind Reading

If someone suddenly developed the ability to read someones mind, you could have much the same type of game as season 1 but with new twists. Rather than backing up and retrying, you could get advanced knowledge and try to use it. It might stll backfire, but then so did Max's power on more than one occasion.

It would also leade to moral quandries much like the first season, and could lead to very dark places.

What do you all think? Any other powers you can think of that might work?

[talemore]

Carrie White

[MorningLightMountain]

The main thing to consider is how it would work and what would fit in the context of a game like Life Is Strange. Mind reading is something that could work well though. The more exotic superhero type powers really wouldn't fit in something like LIS.

[Mook]

Simple visions or premonitions would work.

[NinthElement]

It would probably have to be something time-based, but they could still make it different to Max's rewind. How about a protagonist who gets visions of a person's past or future by touching them? After all, the devs were clearly inspired by The Butterfly Effect for the first game, so it might be good to borrow from another cool movie - The Dead Zone - if they want a new power that will be equally compatible with a down-to-earth narrative.

[NinthElement]

Originally posted by ØniKanji:

Simple visions or premonitions would work.

Snap, I was working on my suggestion at the same time.

[Mook]

Originally posted by 9thElement:

Originally posted by ØniKanji:

Simple visions or premonitions would work.

Snap, I was working on my suggestion at the same time.

Ye, I like the idea of visions since the game really points to chaos theory and how there are multiple fractals in this universe. Time rewind and visions fit in that sense :D

[FrontlinerDelta]

I know some might not like it but I'd like to see time rewinding return even without Max if need be. I just really enjoyed how it was done in this game and it was very interesting to play such a choice based game and be able to experience multiple choices (even when there was no "right" choice which made it even better).

I wouldn't mind losing the "travel through photos" power since that's very thematically tied to Max being a photographer but I would like to see the basic rewind ability return.

[Mook]

Originally posted by FrontlinerDelta:

I know some might not like it but I'd like to see time rewinding return even without Max if need be. I just really enjoyed how it was done in this game and it was very interesting to play such a choice based game and be able to experience multiple choices (even when there was no "right" choice which made it even better).

I wouldn't mind losing the "travel through photos" power since that's very thematically tied to Max being a photographer but I would like to see the basic rewind ability return.

That's hella right

[Bardewi]

I think they should continue with the rewind powers, I think they should explore more.

Remember that Max could not only go back and enter photos, at some point she came to stop the time.

That is why I would like them to exploit this power more and see what happens.

The butterfly effect are not only negative consequences, they can be positive. The tornado was the consequence that had Max, but does not mean that other
protagonist will happen the same.

And not because it is the same power, it has to be the same final choice, they can create thousands of ways to end the game and play with our feelings.

[Brewski]

I can see them bringing back the rewind too, as it is kind of a game defining theme, but I agree that if they do they will have to ditch the Focus power. They could replace that piece with something else better themed to the new protagonist.

Still, I think if they are replacing the cast and the location too, I'd like to see the power be different enough to not be directly compared to the original. I think that would bock them in narratively a bit.

I do like the idea of premonitions/future vision. I think that would work as well. Good idea. I think it's different enough from the original to open up a whole range of possible related powers and themes, but similar enough to work with the mood of the original game.

Another one I think could work, maybe tied to the premonitions/visions idea above (or mind reading) would be some sort of dream sharing type power. I read a Fan Fiction called "All Wounds" where that idea was introduced, and I kind of like it for a continuation.

[Theo]

Ooo I think that it would be cool if this new character could see the future and past of not characters but objects instead, imagine having to piece together another mystery but instead of clues you have short visions to study. For example you could find a murderer by finding the murder weapon and then seeing a vision of who was holding it during the murder.

[Nick Fermi]

First i like to say that i love Life is Strange - the characters, the story, the setting, the music - perfect game for me, this game really hit an emotional spot.
I would keep the rewind game mechanic, because that feature removed that part which annoyed me most on choice based games like The Walking Dead, to either have to restore a save game and clicking thru lots of dialoge which can't be skipped, or live with a bad choice which i regret the rest of the game and sometimes spoiled the game for me. And i would love to see Max&Chloe in their next adventure, yes i chose to save chloe. To respect the choice the players made at the end they could publish two games with different stories, for each ending one.
For one story im thinking about Max vs. an evil timetraveller like in Quantum Leap. Or the time rewind ability transfering to Chloe but instead of focusing on pictures she is able to focus on songs to travel back in time to the point when she first heard that song.
I would buy both games anyway :)

[talemore]

Only that Max Caulfield's character is based on Carrie White. Both have their birthdays at the 21th September 1995 and it's mentioned Dotnod has taken inspiration from Stephen king novels. Either what dotnod decide it will be the reincarnation of Carrie white and it makes you wonder why them didn't let her die in life is strange. Many traits is used on Kate Marsh and them couldn't let kate survive without giving the hospital scene. Chloe price is another inpretation of carrie but it's an inpretation of the enraged Carrie while kate is the tortured Carrie. Max makes a reference to Carrie by the beginning of the game in the bathroom and the video taken on kate is another reference and you surely can find a couple more references if you look for them.


We're surrounded by Carrie's in life is strange and most of them never evolves any superpowers. What we know her superpowers are fatal enough to kill the host and can be triggered in defense and varies in strenght and abilities depending on what version of Carrie. It's likely the case there's only one carrie allowed to be active at the same time to keep the fabric of reality together.

[Farel]

I think the most logical decision would be somekind of power, that ties into the overall gameplay. LiS is a game about choices and social interactions. The time-traveling and rewinding was interesting, because it essentially allowed you to manipulate people, by knowing how they would react, before they do.

Mind Reading was one of the things, that cae to my mind as well. However, I would probably extend it to some kind of memory based super power. A set of powers, that allows you to view poeple's memories, interact with them or even change them.
I don't know, if anyone here ever played "Remember Me", but this game essentially had a few moments, where you would have to "remix" people's memories. This means you would watch a person's memory and then had the chance to rewind through it and change minor details in order to create a change reation, that alters the result and, as a consequence, made the person do what you want. It was probably the most interesting and moraly questionable part of the game, because this lead to situations, during which people blamed themselves for crimes, they didn't commit, became your freinds even though they were trying to kill you earlier or completely changed their attitude on life.
Sadly, "Remember Me" didn't explore this mechanic in depth and kinda forgot about moral questions after a while, so I think it might be fun to see something similar again done in more detail. And I think it might match a LiS game pretty well. It would technically even be a different version of the rewind power. The difference is, however, that you don't change the past, but only a person's subjective memory of the past.
This could lead to some interesting choices, because even if you use that power to do good, you have to wonder if it is ok to mess with people's memories like that and make them forget things, that might have been importantn to them.

[MrButBut]

Maybe some of you have said this already (too many long post to read carefully sorry!), but the point, for me, of the rewind power in a choice game is let the player experiment and do not be anxious in the same election process.
In Before Storm Chloe can "talk back" having a similar effect.

So I think in LiS 2 the same mechanic (at least in its esence) will be continued.