Do you remember ‘Life Is Strange’? It was an indie hit from Square, which had two possible endings (in case you don’t know the ending) and has slightly expanded through comics… but not through video games. And for years, we have wondered, bitterly, why there has never been a true sequel to the game instead of those with the same title of the franchise but outside the universe that were released afterwards.
In Square they are grid-like
Michael Koch, director of the first game, has now stated that they only intended to release that one, which had a subsequent problem: they did not think about sequels when writing the story and characters. “When the game was a success, Square Enix asked us for a second part. We managed to fit Life Is Strange 2 into the same universe, and even create interesting connections, but we could never create intricate and complex connections or sequels between the games.”
And the problem, in part, was Square’s own fault: “We would have loved to have more freedom to decide where the characters and plots were going to go”. So, Square, who owns the rights and intellectual property, decided what was going to be done… And what wasn’t.
Or in other words: “Square Enix planned and supervised the expansion, they hired Deck Nine to make other games in the franchise apart from ours, they found authors to write the comics and created their own plan for this universe.” So yes, if ‘Life Is Strange’ is not going as you want… it’s Square Enix’s fault.