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PART OF ME can't shake the feeling that Kate was supposed to jump off the roof.
About that roof. Kate, so despondent over the bullying and harassment she experiences after an embarrassing moment, is poised to jump from the roof of her private school unless our hero, a senior named Max, can talk her down. When I play this game with my wife, we get Max to do just that, and the episode ends with tears and quiet hope. I'm relieved, but it feels wrong. Like we broke something. Not because Kate's death would have been more dramatic, a bit of tragedy on the way to Max's self-actualization, but because it felt a little too neat. We acted with the best intentions, and experienced the best outcome. No surprises; no friction. What kind of growing up is that? Calling a Mulligan Life is Strange grants do-overs. Early on in your journey with Max Caulfield, a mild-mannered teen who has returned to Arcadia Bay, Oregon1, to study photography at the exclusive Blackwell Academy, you (and she) discover she has a gift. Max can rewind time, the world blurring as she moves back in time, memories intact and free to change whatever just happened. On Max's first day at Blackwell, a girl named Chloe is shot. Max rewinds time to save her. And then everything goes sideways. Moments like Kate. Kate Marsh is a sweet, quiet girl, zealously religious but with a wellspring of kindness that softens the harsh edge of her beliefs. By the time the player meets her, she's had enough. Someone drugged her at a party, and there's a video of her in a compromising position. She endures extreme harassment, and the second episode finds her on the roof, ready to jump. |
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