Game profile
Life is Strange
A photography student discovers she can rewind time and uses this power to investigate a classmate's disappearance. Episodic chapters combine teenage themes with an emotionally charged story about friendship and guilt.
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What kind of game this is
At its core this is Adventure, set in the present day. Visually it is deliberately stylised rather than photorealistic, and the overall tone stays somewhere between light and heavy. The structure is guided rather than open, so you are moved along instead of dropped into a map. Sessions of an hour or two sit at the sweet spot here.
Difficulty stays forgiving, so progress rarely depends on your reflexes. The narrative carries the whole thing, and the mechanics serve it. It is a single player experience from start to finish. It is available broadly, on 5 platforms. It sits in the mid price bracket.
What stands out
- Rewind time core mechanic
- Emotional teenage story
- Episodic narrative structure
This fits you if
- you want to live through a story, not just play a system
- the writing matters more to you than the mechanics
- you want zero frustration and no difficulty wall
- you play alone and want a complete experience without other people
Look elsewhere if
- you need real difficulty to stay interested
- you skip cutscenes and want to get to the gameplay
- you specifically want an open world to roam
- you want to play it side by side with someone
How long is Life is Strange?
About 15 hours in total. At three evenings a week and two hours each, you will be busy for roughly 3 weeks, or 8 sessions.
How the rating ranks
Critics settled on 79 out of 100, which puts it above 25 percent of the 1276 games here and at rank 919 overall. That is the lower end of this database, critics were more reserved here than with most titles. The number does not tell you whether a game is exactly right for the right evening, though.
For comparison, Adventure averages 83 points across the database, so this one sits 4 points below its own genre. The figure rests on 1904 collected ratings.
Released in 2015, which makes it 11 years old. A genuine classic, and worth checking how the version you buy holds up today.
The facts
- Release year
- 2015
- Genres
- Adventure
- Playtime
- approx. 15 hrs.
- Difficulty
- Relaxed, forgiving
- Story weight
- Carries the whole game
- Play with
- Solo
- Setting
- Present day
- Visual style
- Stylised
- Price bracket
- Mid price
- Platforms
- PC, PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, Mobile
- Critic rating
- 79 / 100
Direct comparison
| Genres | Release year | Playtime | Critic rating | Price bracket |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Life is Strange | 2015 | approx. 15 hrs. | 79 | Mid price |
| Kentucky Route Zero | 2013 | approx. 10 hrs. | 88 | Mid price |
| Night in the Woods | 2017 | approx. 10 hrs. | 88 | Budget |
| Rue Valley | 2025 | approx. 15 hrs. | n/a | Mid price |
If you liked this, try these
- 88/100 Kentucky Route Zero Shared: Adventure, Present day, shorter, rated higher
- 88/100 Night in the Woods Shared: Adventure, Present day, shorter, rated higher
- n/a Rue Valley Shared: Adventure, Present day
- 83/100 Road 96 Shared: Adventure, Present day, shorter, rated higher
- 79/100 Beacon Pines Shared: Adventure, Present day, shorter
- n/a Deer & Boy Shared: Adventure, Present day, shorter