All Life is Strange Games in Order, by Release and Timeline

The Life is Strange games, in order, don't follow a single line. Life is Strange started in 2015 as an episodic story about a photography student who can rewind time. Later entries moved on to new casts and new abilities before circling back to Max Caulfield and Chloe Price. The Life is Strange release order, and the story timeline don't match either, since the second game Square Enix shipped is a prequel set three years before the first.

The series now counts seven major releases: five mainline games, one prequel and one free spin-off. Below, you'll find each one in release order, with its place in the Life is Strange timeline and my verdict on whether it's worth your evening. If you want to play through the whole saga on a budget, our Life is Strange games collection carries every entry for PC and consoles.

For story order, start with Before the Storm, set in 2010 (its Farewell bonus episode goes back two more years), then play Life is Strange, which takes place in October 2013. Life is Strange 2 opens in late October 2016. Captain Spirit happens on a snowy Saturday in December 2016, between the sequel's first and second episodes, but Dontnod built it as a lead-in, so play it before LiS 2. True Colors follows in spring 2019, Double Exposure jumps to more than a decade after Arcadia Bay, and Reunion picks up from its ending to close out the Max and Chloe saga.

1. Life is Strange (2015)

Max Caulfield is an 18-year-old photography student back in her hometown of Arcadia Bay, Oregon, when she finds out she can rewind time. She uses it to save her childhood friend Chloe Price from a gunshot in the Blackwell Academy bathroom, and the two get pulled into the disappearance of a student named Rachel Amber. Max also keeps having visions of a storm bearing down on the town.

Dontnod released the story in five episodes between January and October 2015, and rewinding gave every choice real weight: you see a consequence play out, rewind, and still have to commit. Episode 1 went free on all platforms in 2016. Deck Nine rebuilt the game for the Life is Strange Remastered Collection in February 2022, with new facial animation and lighting, bundled with Before the Storm.

My Verdict: Start here. The early episodes show their age in the dialogue, but by the third one the time travel mystery has its hooks in you, and the final choice still splits fans a decade later. Grab the Remastered version on modern hardware.

2. Life is Strange: Before the Storm (2017)

Life is Strange: Before the Storm goes back three years to 16-year-old Chloe Price, a Blackwell sophomore with a short fuse and nobody to lean on after Max moved away. She meets Rachel Amber, the girl whose disappearance drives the first game, and the two build a fast, reckless friendship that can turn into something more depending on your choices.

Deck Nine took over development here, and Chloe has no supernatural ability at all. Her tool is Backtalk, a dialogue mode where you win arguments by catching what the other person says and throwing it back at them. The main story ran across three episodes, and the Farewell bonus episode (March 6, 2018) puts you in young Max's shoes on the day she has to tell Chloe she's moving to Seattle.

My Verdict: Play it after the first game, even though it's a prequel. Rachel's story hits much harder when you already know where it ends, and Chloe and Rachel carry the shorter runtime without any time travel tricks.

3. The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit (2018)

Captain Spirit is a free, standalone slice of the series that most players finish in a single sitting. You play Chris, a 10-year-old in Beaver Creek, Oregon, who spends a snowy Saturday turning his house into a superhero adventure. His father, still grieving Chris's mother, spends the same morning drinking in front of the TV, and the game handles that contrast with a lot of care.

Dontnod released it as a lead-in to Life is Strange 2, and some of your choices carry over into the sequel. A newspaper in the house reports the deaths in Seattle that kick off LiS 2, and at the very end Chris spots two boys in the neighboring garden. Those boys are Sean and Daniel Diaz, and Chris comes back as a major character in the sequel's second episode.

My Verdict: It costs nothing and takes an evening, so play it right before LiS 2 and let your save carry over. Chris's episode in the sequel lands far better once you've spent a morning inside his house.

4. Life is Strange 2 (2018–2019)

Life is Strange 2 leaves Arcadia Bay behind for good. Sixteen-year-old Sean Diaz and his younger brother Daniel flee Seattle in October 2016 after a confrontation with a police officer leaves their father dead, and Daniel turns out to have telekinesis. The two head south on foot and by car toward Puerto Lobos, Mexico, their family's hometown.

You play Sean, the older brother, and the telekinesis stays Daniel's: you can only tell him when to use it or hold back. Every choice you make in front of Daniel teaches him something, from stealing food to lashing out at people who threaten the brothers. How he turns out, and how close the two stay, decides which ending you get. Dontnod spread the five episodes over more than a year, and the Switch port arrived on February 2, 2023.

My Verdict: The most ambitious game in the series and also the slowest. The long gaps between episodes hurt it at launch, but played back to back, the road trip and its endings hit hard. Skip it only if time travel is the main reason you're here.

5. Life is Strange: True Colors (2021)

Life is Strange: True Colors moves to Haven Springs, a small Colorado mining town where 21-year-old Alex Chen reunites with her older brother Gabe after years apart. Within days, Gabe dies in what the town writes off as an accident. Alex uses her empathy, the ability to see other people's emotions as colored auras and feel them herself, to find out what really happened.

It's the first entry that launched as a complete game, though it keeps a five-chapter structure. Haven Springs is packed with small side activities and feels more lived-in than any setting since Arcadia Bay. The Wavelengths DLC, out September 30, 2021, puts you in Steph Gingrich's shoes during the year before Alex arrives. Steph is the Before the Storm side character who becomes one of Alex's possible romances.

My Verdict: The easiest entry to hand a newcomer, since it's self-contained and needs no prior game. The mystery wraps up a little neatly, but Alex is the best-written lead the series has had outside Max.

6. Life is Strange: Double Exposure (2024)

Life is Strange: Double Exposure brings Max back more than a decade after Arcadia Bay, now working as a photographer-in-residence at Caledon University. When her friend Safi turns up dead in the snow, Max's attempt to rewind tears open a parallel timeline where Safi is still alive. She has to solve the murder in one world and stop it from happening in the other.

The new ability is Shift, which moves Max between the two timelines at set spots, and she can also glimpse the other timeline without crossing over. Game director Jonathan Stauder said during the reveal livestream that Deck Nine treats both endings of the first game as valid. You pick Arcadia Bay's fate again in an early conversation with Safi. The ending, where Max merges the two timelines, sets up Reunion directly.

My Verdict: Worth playing mostly as setup for Reunion. Seeing Max as an adult is a treat for longtime fans, but the second half drags, and the cliffhanger means you'll want Reunion ready to go the moment the credits roll.

7. Life is Strange: Reunion (2026)

Life is Strange: Reunion picks up from the end of Double Exposure, with Max now teaching photography at Caledon. She comes back from a weekend away to find the campus on fire, escapes by rewinding through a selfie, and gets three days to find out who started it. Chloe then turns up at Caledon, haunted by nightmares of a past she never lived, a fallout of Max merging the timelines at the end of Double Exposure. The launch announcement places their reunion eleven years after their last adventure together.

For the first time in the series, you play as both heroines in the same game. Max works through time puzzles with her Rewind, and Chloe brings back Backtalk from Before the Storm to pressure suspects and reach places Max can't. The publisher bills it as the finale of the Max and Chloe saga, and your choices decide who at Caledon survives the fire.

My Verdict: The payoff this story needed. Having Chloe back as a playable character fixes the biggest gap in Double Exposure, and the three-day setup keeps it tight. Play the first game and Double Exposure before it at the very least.

FAQs About Life is Strange Games

Final Words

The Life is Strange series reads best as two stories sharing a title. One is the Max and Chloe saga, which runs through Before the Storm, the original, Double Exposure, and Reunion. The other is a set of standalone stories about new people with new abilities, and those work in any order, as long as Captain Spirit comes before LiS 2.

If you only have time for a few, play the first game and True Colors. Anyone who gets attached to Max and Chloe should then play Double Exposure and Reunion back to back. The two work as one long story, and Reunion's payoff depends on the merged timeline from Double Exposure's ending.

Square Enix framed Reunion as the last chapter for Max and Chloe, so the next Life is Strange will most likely follow a new lead. True Colors is a decent guess at what that could look like.

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