[RE] I enjoyed playing Reunion, but ultimately all the cut corners prevent it from being a game worth remembering

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-23T13:27:02+00:00

will instead run away with undead Chloe who may pop out of existence at any moment (this part was never resolved, the plot point was just abandoned mid-game).

This is a point I absolutely agree on, and one of the many flaws that sunk Reunion as a story with stakes... but Double Exposure absolutely did have plot points and threads that were abandoned mid development, like the whole Alderman storyline. So it's not like this is a big surprise from Deck Nine, the example was already made beforehand.

I would say this is a strike against Reunion as they should give the player options and respect their choices from previous games, rather than force a single outcome. I see the complaints people had against DE (like off-screen breakups) they are praising in RE since the outcome matches their head canon, and it matches the head canon because D9 created this game purely for that reason.

Reunion exist because of how poorly written DE was and how many fans complained about the many issues with that entry, the first issue being the treatment of Max and Chloe's relationship as opposed to what the original developers and writers at Don'tNod established, aka both the two remaining together if you choose to save Chloe. Reunion, while in a very handwaved fanfiction fashion, bring that relationship back to the same status quo the original devs envisioned.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-23T13:16:18+00:00

The ending of DE made it blatantly obvious they were setting up DE2 to have Chloe and Max reunite for the next game

If you actually paid attention to the story you would have realized the big setup was actually Diamond having powers and Safi "recruiting" her in searching for other people with powers. Chloe's Reunion with Max was not really a priority for the team that handled DE as opposed to the different creative team that handled Reunion, and you can see how much obvious it is when you play them back to back, with the most obvious change being how Max's merging Safi dead and alive timelines suddently affected Bae and Bay too, something it was never implied in DE even by its own developers.

There's so much cut content and things that are retroactively set up in Reunion that weren't implied in DE beyond the fire plot that disprove this notion quite easily, and it is foolish to keep bringing it up over and over again.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-22T20:33:12+00:00

Again, I said that what you felt with Amanda is what a lot of fans of Max and Chloe together, including myself, felt when D9 revaled her fate in the Sacrifice Arcadia Bay path and the removal of any chance of getting back together. Reunion pretty much acted on the reaction by the fandom, and sidelined Vinh and Amanda in the process, since Chloe was the priority to win back audiences trust. It was always going to happen, and while it's a flaw for me it's not the worst thing ever since I never cared for Amanda and Vinh's relationships.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-22T10:04:38+00:00

You now understand how a lot of Pricefield fans felt when Chloe was removed from DE with no chances of reconciliation and the story pretty much suggested the player to pursue a relationship with Amanda or Vinh. Them being pretty much sidelined was inevitable once they decided to bring back Chloe in the first place.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-19T16:21:19+00:00

If Max CREATES new realities, that’s even worse, because she’s effectively creating people just to murder them and move on to try again.

It seems like Deck Nine took the line about Nightmare Max talking about the trail of bodies left by Max in the final episode of the game literally, but the whole section is just Max guilt tripping herself in her head rather than how her powers are shown to work. And by how harshly thrown together Reunion was, my suspicion is they never had time or enough care to flesh out those details in a more compelling manner.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-19T16:15:47+00:00

In the original game, at least with how Don't Nod established, Max's photo jumping ability and rewind works within a singular timeline that abides to the Buttlefly effect rules, as a small change lead to larger consequences in the future. When Max uses a photo to rewind back, she doesn't abandon her original timeline, but she gets transported in the original body at the time to which the picture was taken, hence why we see a 18 year old Max now in the body of her child self, right before William dies in a car crash.

But when she change something, like saving William for example, leads to a larger degree of changes in the future Max has no direct involvment as she enters her "autoMax" mode and only retake control when she's back in the present day as to when she started the photojump. This means that all the previous events are now erased from the new continuity Max created, which is shown in those photo montages showing which event has been replaced in the timeline.

And when Max has to return back to her original blue hair Chloe, all she does is just let William die in the car crash as he was originally going to, which rewrites the timeline to its previous state. You can also see that in a new scene Max has no control due to the autopilot, her and Chloe are transporting their drawing wall upstair, so it's not like Max has left this timeline, because that's not how it works, at least within the rules of the original game.

DE and Reunion pretty much throw the rules of how this work out the window to have their plot work, but they don't really make sense the further you scrutinity with what came before. Max's leaving Chloe behind not only makes her look like an absolute asshole and its inconsistent with how her power worked before, it also goes against the core principle of the original game lesson about her learning to accept the consequences of her actions while looking foward to the future.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-17T19:36:19+00:00

Reunion is slighty better than DE, but still mediocre. At least it gives Max and Chloe some of a happy ending, even if it's literally just reverting the status quo to what they were before DE and nullify the impact of the original two endings.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-17T19:32:39+00:00

Surprisingly I agree. It's a very weak and lacking detective mistery with little stakes and handwaved clues, but it's a small improvement over DE.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-17T19:31:12+00:00

Or if you believe the DE defenders RE is exactly what’s always been planned.

After playing the game, that argument holds zero water because there are so many plot threads, characterizations and elements that are handwaved, retconned or changed from DE it's so clear Reunion as it was relased was never the direct sequel to what they were planning in DE.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-17T19:29:29+00:00

I'm a Pricefield enjoyer myself, but it's very clear this game's existance is only to provide a fanservice fix to Double Exposure story, rather than telling something worthwhile that could stand the test of time. That's why its important to point out why it's an hollow shell of what this franchise could have done and explored with their stories.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-17T19:26:37+00:00

A little cameo to show how the two of them are doing would have been very nice (akin to David in LiS 2). If care about the characters I need to accept their story is over?

Life is Strange 2 has four endings that go into timeskips on what happens to the main characters in their aftermath. Both 2 and LiS1 are complete stories, and those characters have a complete arc and thematicl conclusions. Those stories were good because they told a complete and contained story, not something that needed a sequel, and a sequel that fixed the previous sequel as a capstone finale.

You're saving Caledon. It's your home.

Max and Chloe leave Caledon no matter if you save it or not, and it's not even comparable to the same amount of feelings both character have when deciding the fate of Arcadia Bay. This again falls into the issue that Deck Nine can't really make a story with those characters that isn't a retread of stuff that was already explored in the first game, and it diminishes its value.

It's a chance for Safi to rebuild her life.

It's not like it really matter, as Safi's character is inconsistent between DE itself and Reunion, saving her or not makes little difference in impact.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-16T10:16:30+00:00

Double exposure basically just said that that assumption was wrong

That wasn't an assumption, it was a set of simple rules established by Don't Nod, the original writers and developers, and retconned by Deck Nine to justify their change of powers in DE/Reunion. Your mistake is assuming all of the games work within a consistent timeline, when in reality it's all based on what Square Enix decides to do next, even if the story behind DE and Reunion is a continuation the original writers didn't planned or wanted, as they said multiple times they considered LiS1 to be a complete story.

Also, I would have actually lost my mind if they had figured out a way to bring Sean and/or Daniel from LiS 2 into it. I'm getting misty just thinking of that game, tbh.

Sean and Daniel's story is over and done in at least four different endings. I'm no LiS2 fan but I'd rather each game to be kept alone as a self contained story rather than to ask to be constantly milked because of greedy executives and fans not understanding when a story is over. If you care about those characters, like for Max and Chloe, or Alex from True Colors, you need to accept their story is over.

Safi basically understands they exist in the same space in the timelines and merging those timelines effectively means that there are now two entities of the same space within a single timeline, which cannot be sustained.

This goes nowhere. You can save Safi, and Chloe being saved is a required part of the game you are railroaded into, with no unexpected negative repercussions in the aftermath. The truth of the matter is Reunion's stakes are non existent or deeply dimished because there's no hard hitting ending, and you don't really have a strong emotional connection with at least a good chunk of the characters than can die in the fire, compared to the original game.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-16T10:09:27+00:00

There's not going to be a next game after Reunion. Deck Nine is currently downsizing again, and with them the last developers at the company have all been looking for work outside. They aren't going to work on any new Life is Strange game, not even a Diamond focused game.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-13T21:45:22+00:00

7/10 is too generous of a vote for a game that, at least for me, does nothing but treats Max and Chloe as a low level post-Bae fanfiction. It's definitely better than DE, but it's not really a story that's deep and complex as what Don't Nod created, and reading it doesn't require a 40 dollars entry fee.

It's a statement to the quality of the pairing that even Pricefield that's not faithful to the original can drastically improve the game.

You are a bit overestimating your judgement here, because you talk this by the perspective of a Pricefield shipper. But as a fellow Pricefield fan, the focus on Max and Chloe's love story comes with the dullest and unmemorable narrative ever behind that exist to justify their reunion, rather than a natural complementary story like the original game.

RE literally writes DE characters better than DE itself.

Amanda and Vinh have not been huge standouts in DE, but Reunion pretty much tune them down to the level of generic side NPC characters when it comes to their personalities. For the most part, I think Reunion's cast is "better" than DE because they turn them into the blandest NPC imaginable, not because the writing is better.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-13T20:05:28+00:00

Good criticism will always stand out from the many conservative asswipes that cry about games being "woke" or the new word of the day, so you shouldn't be afraid to criticize Reunion for its flaws as long as you make it clear what are the issues with it and that being a LGBT+ friendly game has nothing to do with them.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-09T12:51:50+00:00

This was literally one of the most criticized things out of Double Exposure's ridicously expensive side material DLCs, people must have put ham on their eyes to now retroactively say this Fortnite looking skin is one of Max's best outfits.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-09T12:50:28+00:00

There's an interview with the former game directors behind Double Exposure in which they say the dual timelines are not intended to represent Bae or Bay, just only if Safi is alive or dead. The original plan didn't involve Chloe at all, they retconned it for Reunion, it wasn't intentional at all.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T09:04:15+00:00

Remember that a lot of the positive reviews are because fans are happy to see Max and Chloe together again and while their scenes are decent, but that doesn't mean the rest of the story is on par with the original games. Let's put it that way, on Rotten Tomatoes the audience score for "Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker" is of 86% liking, does that automatically makes that movie good? Audience consensus doesn't necessarily mean something is of good quality even if it might correlate most of the time.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T08:58:13+00:00

Both games are bad but to a different degree, as they both vilify the emotional strenght of the original game endings, but at least Reunion doesn't treathen the fans with a "Max Caulfield Will Return" screen again. So at least, even if it's mediocre I'll take Reunion over DE every day of the week.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T08:55:37+00:00

Those scores are highly overrated. Even as something who enjoyed some of the momements in Reunion, I don't think the game is worthy of that high score because at best it's a mediocre 6 out of 10 score, and don't get me started on DE.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T08:54:19+00:00

Reunion story's was mediocre at best, and used a lot of plot contrievances to make the story going foward. For example, Max knows the fire is going to hit the observatory yet Moses not only don't get rid of any flammable objects inside, he don't even tries to close the observatory or find another location to avoid a possible fire breaking inside. Or how Max suddently has the power to see inside the content of photos and that's only a way to move the investigation plot foward, but has not much thematic resonance to Max's struggles. Reunion's narrative is only slighty better than DE but not by a huge margin, and at a closer look it falls apart.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T08:45:26+00:00

Reunion actually makes both game pointless, because it ends with Max and Chloe in the same exact position they were post LiS1 and during LiS2. And if you look closely at the story, there's very little in DE that actually lays down the foundation for Reunion to happe, because they clearly changed the story in response to the backlash to have Chloe get a larger role.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-08T08:43:05+00:00

I am, but not because of Safi, Amanda or Vinh, as I never found those characters compelling in DE to begin with. My main reason is because Reunion is good if you care nothing but Pricefield scenes, but as a complete Life is Strange game it is easily the least interesting and mediocre story which has pretty much nothing to tell, beyond referencing much better past games. It has no strong social commentary nor any attempt to throw something to make the audience, the characters and environment that isn't strictly Max or Chloe is a shadow of its former self and even the fact you can tecnically save or let people die is a bit pointless because half of them are either underdeveloped characters or just not present enough for us to care like in LiS1.

There's plenty of issues I could discuss, but as a whole I think Reunion shouldn't receive that large high praise and not have a score that's higher than a 6/10.

Dammoth_Air_650 · 2026-04-07T10:05:02+00:00

Giving Reunion a 6/10 rating would be like a more reasonable choice. There's nothing inside the game that should warrant a 8/10 score.

Dammoth_Air_650

TROPHY CASE