Life is Strange first debuted in 2015, and since then, the series has carried a lot of things. Newly-made fans loved its attempts at a queer storyline; they hated its cringey, teen-clearly-written-by-out-of-touch-adult dialogue. But regardless, that first game set the tone for a series about (mostly) young people building connections with each other and trying to figure out a way into the future. Six years later, Life is Strange True Colors is more than just the next entry in this beloved series; it’s a testament to how much this franchise has grown and matured from the initial template.
The first instance of that maturity we see is the most obvious. True Colors’ protagonist, Alex Chen, is 21 during the events of the game, the oldest main character we’ve seen from these titles so far. Most of the other characters are around this age or older, and the focus is on the Town of Haven Springs as a whole, rather than events around the local high school, or the more nomadic route Life is Strange 2 takes. True Colors is very much about entering a community as an outsider, and contending with the nuances of that community, both good and bad, as you try to adjust.
The one doing that adjusting is Alex, as she leaves a group home to live with her brother Gabe in Haven Springs, on Colorado’s Western Slope. It’s implied that Alex has had a rough go of things up until now, and that she’s contending with some kind of emotional issue. We don’t fully understand what that is until Alex arrives in Haven, but it becomes clear that she doesn’t want her brother to know about it. This is a fresh start for her, and Alex is desperate to not screw it up.
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