Will Chloe Be in Life Is Strange: Double Exposure?

Life Is Strange: Double Exposure features the unexpected return of Max Caulfield, the protagonist of the original Life Is Strange. But what about her best friend/sort of girlfriend? Will Chloe be in Life is Strange: Double Exposure?

Will Chloe Be in Life Is Strange: Double Exposure?

Now that the game is out, I can confirm that Chloe does not appear in person in Life is Strange: Double Exposure. The problem is that Life is Strange had two endings, only one of which saw Chloe live, so this follow-up, set around ten years later, had to work around it.

Some Life is Strange games read players’ saves and give a brief nod to the events of the first game and their choices. But neither Deck Nine nor Don’t Nod, who have developed games in the series, have declared one particular ending as canon. Instead, the game works around that choice.

Life Is Strange: Double Exposure Could Have Drawn Upon the Comics

Max’s ability to jump between realities may seem new to those who’ve only played the games, but Deck Nine could be taking cues from the Life is Strange comics. There was a whole run of comics that followed the Sacrifice Arcadia Bay ending, which saw Max hopping between parallel realities. In those comics, at least, Max and Chloe were together. But Life is Strange: Double Exposure appears to mostly regard those as non-canon.

How Does Life is Strange: Double Exposure Actually Handle Chloe’s Death or Survival?

So, how does Life Is Strange: Double Exposure actually work around the Chloe situation? Even if you’re not using a previously saved game, you’re given two choices early on in Chapter 1. Max is asked whether Chloe survived and whether Max and Chloe were friends or loves.

If Chloe is dead, that’s that; she doesn’t figure into the game itself. If, however, she is alive it’s revealed that the two of them split up. I’m Team Pricefield, so I chose that Chloe was Max’s girlfriend, and learned, through Max’s journal and other collectibles, that Chloe felt Max was living in the past. It appears that Chloe was also a little wary of Max’s time-rewinding powers, and both those factors lead to a breakup.

I’ve not played the path where they were just friends, but you can assume they drifted apart for similar reasons. In my Pricefield playthrough, they were still in occasional touch via the game’s Facebook/Twitter analog, but they’re not best friends.

We do get a voice line from Chloe, but it’s credited to Rhianna DeVries. Either DeVries came back to record or it was taken from Life Is Strange: Before the Storm. In that game, she took the role over from Ashly Burch, due to the SAG-Aftra strike, but Burch was still involved in writing (via Paste Magazine).

So, the answer to whether Chloe will be in Life Is Strange: Double Exposure is no, even if you chose to sacrifice Arcadia Bay. She and Chloe parted company before the game began.

Life Is Strange: Double Exposure is available now on PC.

The above article was updated on 10/29/2024 by the original author to include information from Life Is Strange: Double Exposure.