Life is Strange: The Musical

By Chloe Hanks

Summary-

Life is Strange is an adventure game set in ‘Arcadia Bay’. Its style is like a choose your own adventure book; you make choices throughout the game depicting the outcomes of future moments within the game. Max is the main character, she has powers that cause her to be able to rewind/go back in time. In the game, she is followed by her best friend Chloe. Chloe was Max’s childhood best friend until Max sadly moved away to Seattle to pursue her passion in photography, later on moving back to Arcadia Bay where she reunites with Chloe. The moment when this scene is set is at the end of the game when a tornado is threatening to hit Arcadia Bay, the scene is made to be an insight into Max’s mind when deciding on the last choice. The tornado is caused by a butterfly effect from when Max first used her powers to save Chloe from death at the very beginning of the game. In the end, Max has to decide whether to save Chloe and let Arcadia Bay be destroyed or save Arcadia Bay and go back in time to let Chloe die from the very beginning.

Song-

Verse one

This is it, the final decision

All my choices have lead to minutes

This predetermined, destined image

The one I love or the place I live in

Chorus

A door closes a window opens

Butterfly effect goes unspoken

All this devotion

Has left a choice that's broken

A game with my heart

A hella dumb change

This is Life is Strange

Verse two

She's my partner in time

My ride or die

No time to decide

No time to rewind

Just realities set to this consequence

Hopefully this purpose is relevant

Chorus

A door closes a window opens

Butterfly effect goes unspoken

All this devotion

Has left a choice that's broken

A game with my heart

A hella dumb change

This is Life is Strange

Bridge

Stranger and stranger life can be

A danger to change her

She agrees with me

but shes my saviour and I need to save her

Desperately

But danger, danger is what’s stopping me

Chorus

A door closes a window opens

Butterfly effect goes unspoken

All this devotion

Has left a choice that's broken

A game with my heart

A hella dumb change

This is Life is Strange

Blocking-

Verse one/verse two-

This verse will be designed to have the bigger meaning of how she is stuck on a choice she has to make and her mind is a swirling mess and clutter while also having that base meaning of the tornado.

Chorus-

This part will show back to the important part of the game where Max sees the butterfly right before the first time she had to save Chloe. This butterfly is an important symbol within the game because it represents many things like the butterfly effect, Chloe, and the whole game logo.

Bridge-

This part is to show the meaning of how Max can’t keep saving Chloe and get the best of both worlds. The storm (also known as fate) is pulling Max away from Chloe while Chloe is held stationary by the storm (fate).

Rationale-

The musical created is based upon the game Life Is Strange the style is meant to be an indie-style song. The idea was found because I was wanting to write about a game with a storyline I enjoyed. I came to choose Life is Strange out of all the games because the storyline has characters with a rewind power and there are many big decisions that the player has to make, this enhances the player to the mind of Max. Having that help from the game made it easy to find what and how I wanted the musical scene to be. The game is also very cliche and basic with its wording that made creating the lyrics a lot easier to write, for example, the line “A door closes a window opens” is based on what Max says at the start of the game when Max first sees the butterfly. The idea of the verses and the tornado is based on the Hamilton song Hurricane, the style of the debris being held by people and run around the stage. Max sings the whole song because it is an insight into her thoughts and brain. All the scene's meanings separately are for the verses the tornado in this part is meant to be showing the chaos in her mind while Max is set still. The tornado is also all the chaos she has caused in other realities and her physical world. Lastly, the tornado built up for the chorus. The chorus part is a representation of the beginning of the game when she first discovers her powers, first saves Chloe, and first sees the butterfly. In the blocking the debris is now sitting on the ground still there but settled because it is only the begging of it, on the outside turntable the actor for Chloe is now put into a butterfly costume, Chloe needs to be the butterfly because if it wasn't for her life being saved in the game all the events to the end wouldn't have occurred so the butterfly effect was happening because of her and it is always around her. Max's head follows the butterfly around because she is chasing a dream of keeping Chloe alive that slowly causes that one butterfly to turn into a tornado. The bridge part has people wearing black pulling Max away from her saving Chloe, the people in black are seen as fate or also seen as the tornado. Chloe is standing not doing much to be saved and is only getting held by one person in black, this is to show that Chloe understands that fate known as death is on her back and there is not much running from it, so she is wanting Max to let her go.

The main overall conventions of Musicals are the choreography/blocking, stage design, and, of course, music. A song being mandatory, the convention I also chose to do is choreography/blocking. The relationship between the blocking and song, the parts are written to build up and drop into each verse. All the parts are written to be slow in the song and blocking until the bridge where the blocking and song get more intense and upbeat. Musicals have a few main conventions “Musical theatre is almost uniquely equipped both to entertain and to divert through its combination of narrative, song, dance and spectacle” (‘Make ‘em Laugh’: The Politics of Entertainment) this quote lists a few. Solo singing is a convention within musicals and that is what I have done within writing the song. Within the blocking there is a little bit of dance incorporated, when the debris is going around they are meant to go to the ground gracefully and roll to the other side, also in the bridge when they are pulling Max away. There are a few cliche lines put into the song to incorporate important phrases and scenes into the musical. As stated in the previous paragraph “A door closes a window opens” is one them, there is also the line “She's my partner in time”, that line is a line Chloe said to Max within the game that showed and indicated the strong bond between them so including this incorporates that important part. “A hella dumb change” is another line that incorporates something said within the game and that is the word “hella” this game is known for that word being said so it being meaningful to the game I added it to the song. Within the song, I also decided to incorporate the title of the game into the song. Within the text, I used rhyme (e.g. Unspoken, unbroken), semi-rhyme (e.g. opens, devotion), alliteration (e.g. determined, destined), repetition (e.g. stranger), and emphasis with some words and phrases.

When starting the creative I instantly knew I wanted to do it about a game, and within that day I ended up choosing Life is Strange. I used the end of the game and manipulated the tornado to have many meanings within the play and like said previously I used a few conventions to create the musical. Overall I was hoping to involve many hidden meanings within the musical and show within Max’s head and thoughts.

References-

• ’Make “em Laugh”: The Politics of Entertainment. (N/A). N/A.

• Deck Nine and Dontnod Entertainment, 29 January 2015, Life is Strange, CD, All platforms, Square Enix.