Life is Strange has always been known for deep character development and stories. The series’ latest entry, Life is Strange: Double Exposure, is another example of that strength. In a 60-minute PAX West demo, protagonist Max Caufield’s latest adventure hooked me in with the high stakes and tension in between testing her new universe-hopping abilities.
Double Exposure is a direct sequel to the original Life is Strange, where Max also stars as a teenage protagonist. Now, Max is a college-aged photography student at Caledon University. What originally seems like an average college experience turns into something sinister when she finds her close friend, Safi, dead in the snow. While the premise is a hook in and of itself, Max’s new Shift power, puzzle solving, and branching scenarios with difficult choices also sell Double Exposure as an emotional, interactive story.
Double Exposure makes sure to not solidify any of the endings in the original Life is Strange as canon, but the part where Max swears off using her Rewind power is the same. When she tries to use them again to solve Safi’s murder, she finds that they’ve evolved into a new “Shift” power that can transport her between two parallel universes, including one where Safi is still alive. The demo opens when Moses, Max and Safi’s mutual friend, is being questioned by detectives because he took Safi’s camera from the crime scene on an impulse. To save him from suspicion, Max decides to use her shift power to retrieve Safi’s camera.
That’s when I first started playing with her shifting power. In Double Exposure, a few specks of light highlight potential rips in time that Max could use to jump between timelines. I questioned the other Moses about potential hiding places before jumping back to shuffle through his office supplies. During my playthrough, I also admittedly used the feature to hide from prying detectives when they eventually entered Moses’ office. This game of cat and mouse added to the tension of the situation and taught me more about Max’s relationship with her friends, in addition to her friends themselves.
Like other Life is Strange titles, Double Exposure also supports branching narratives. At the end of the demo, Max needs to make a decision on what to tell the detective investigating her friend Safi’s case. A monochrome filter and heart-pumping music took over the screen as I pored over the two choices. After I made my choice, the color flowed back into the scene with an ominous message that I’d just made an impact on the narrative.
Double Exposure seems like a thrilling sequel that faithfully ages Max up from her younger years. It feels right at home in the Life is Strange series as a coming-of-age story with a supernatural twist and hints at a gut-wrenching story to come. I didn’t get to see Safi this time around, but I bet she’ll also be a big contributing factor to the potential drama.
Life is Strange: Double Exposure will be released for PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S on October 29.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.