By Robert Dolen
Riding strong on the aftermath of the intense first episode, the second act of “Before the Storm” continues that momentum despite the many story lulls in between.
In the interest of avoiding major spoilers from the first episode, episode two, entitled “Brave New World,” continues after the hard-hitting revelation learned at the end of “Awake.”
Rachel needs to sort through her emotions in the wake of episode one, while Chloe has to figure out what she’s going to do about her home life and her fast-growing relationship with Rachel.
“Brave New World” starts off very promising after the two are punished in Principal Well’s office for leaving school. Much of the first third of episode two features a lot of self-reflection from Chloe’s perspective in the junkyard that every “Life is Strange” fan knows all too well.
Chloe taking time outside of her goals to just reflect and think to herself are the type of poignant moments that make her character so emotionally interesting. The way she balances all these new things happening in her life, both constructively and destructively, creates a simultaneous sense of inspiration and sympathy.
The only problem is that some of these moments are optional when they truly shouldn’t be. Many of these narrative monologues Chloe thinks while in moments of reprieve provide important insight into her complicated mindsight.
In these moments where Chloe is alone and emotionally strained, her inner feelings should not be something easily missed or ignored. The opportunity to skip these moments robs the player of potentially important context as to why Chloe makes decisions and her emotions during the story.
Branching off from that, since these moments of reflection are so emotionally narrative-driven, the gameplay in between is not exactly riveting. Chloe’s time in the junkyard is deliberately aimless and alone, but even still the gameplay in between inner monologues devolves into a silly fetch quest of collecting cosmetic items for the famous truck she rebuilds.
Chloe also manages to get into a little side quest with her drug dealer, Frank, after talking with Rachel. While this is an obvious set up for later conflict (because of context from the first game), this task is also one big, literal fetch quest as Frank asks Chloe to retrieve his money from some random extraneous character who isn’t even that important to the main plot.
All of this serves its purpose as emotional context, but overstays its welcome as random gameplay filler. It feels like a lot of this content could’ve been condensed or more concise in order to spare more time on some of the more important parts in “Brave New World.”
The rest of “Brave New World” prominently features Chloe and Rachel’s continued relationship in its strongest form yet, cementing the false hope of happiness and wanting to watch their relationship evolve even further.
One scene in particular that stands out is the moment with “The Tempest,” the play in which Rachel is acting. This moment is incredible; it’s super Shakespearean on the surface, but the undertones of the real conversation between Chloe and Rachel on stage was surprisingly powerful. The performance between the two characters was so emotionally charged and in tandem with the truly impressive writing, it created perhaps the best narrative sequence so far in the series.
The episode eventually ends in a heated conflict between Chloe, Rachel and her parents, resulting in an even more complicated realization that sets up a complicated cliffhanger.
“Brave New World” sets up a strong emotional rollercoaster in the last episode of the prequel. The chemistry between Chloe and Rachel is stronger than ever, and the plot has become even more complex than it was initially expected to be. The only thing that needs to be improved are the lulls between the main conflict of the narrative that just feel extraneous and mostly unnecessary.