Life Is Strange

Life Is Strange

Developers
	Dontnod Entertainment
macOS (OS X)	Feral Interactive
Linux	Feral Interactive
Publishers
	Square Enix
OS X, Linux	Feral Interactive
Engines
	Unreal Engine 3
Release dates
Windows	January 30, 2015
macOS (OS X)	June 16, 2016
Linux	July 21, 2016
Reception
Metacritic	83
OpenCritic	81
IGDB	79
Taxonomy
Monetization	One-time game purchase
Microtransactions	None
Modes	Singleplayer
Perspectives	Cinematic camera
Genres	Adventure, Puzzle
Themes	Supernatural, North America
Series	Life Is Strange

Life Is Strange
Life Is Strange	2015
Life Is Strange: Before the Storm	2017
The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit	2018
Life Is Strange 2	2018
Life Is Strange: True Colors	2021
Life Is Strange Remastered	2022
Life Is Strange: Before the Storm Remastered	2022

General information

GOG.com Community Discussions for game series

GOG.com Support Page

Steam Community Discussions

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		Limited Edition.
Developer website		Complete Season.
Publisher website		US region. Complete Season. Episode 1 also available.
Publisher website		EU region. Complete Season.
Amazon.com		Complete Season.
GOG.com		Complete Season.
Green Man Gaming		Complete Season.
Humble Store		Complete Season.
Mac App Store		Complete Season.
Steam		Episode 1 available for free. Install with steam://install/319630 Complete Season also available.

All Linux versions require Steam DRM.

DLC and expansion packs

Name	Notes
Directors' Commentary	Available for free, both in-game and streaming on Steam Video.
Episode 2
Episode 3
Episode 4
Episode 5
Japanese Language Pack	Hidden.

Skip intro videos

Instructions[citation needed]
Use the -nostartupmovies command line argument. Notes This will only remove the Unreal Engine logo at the beginning.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Windows	%USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\Life Is Strange\LifeIsStrangeGame\Config\
macOS (OS X)	$HOME/Library/Application Support/Feral Interactive/Life Is Strange/VFS/Local/my games/Life Is Strange/Config/
Linux	$XDG_DATA_HOME/feral-interactive/Life Is Strange/VFS/Local/My Games/Life Is Strange/Saves/

This game follows the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux.

Save game data location

System	Location
Windows	%USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\Life Is Strange\Saves\
macOS (OS X)	$HOME/Library/Application Support/Feral Interactive/Life Is Strange/VFS/Local/my games/Life Is Strange/Saves/
Linux	$XDG_DATA_HOME/feral-interactive/Life Is Strange/VFS/Local/My Games/Life Is Strange/Saves/

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
GOG Galaxy
OneDrive		Requires enabling backup of the Documents folder in OneDrive on all computers.
Steam Cloud		Approx. 20 MB available.

Video

Video settings.

Advanced video settings.

Graphics feature	State	WSGF	Notes
Widescreen resolution
Multi-monitor			Use Widescreen Fixer with this plugin.
Ultra-widescreen			See Ultra-widescreen.
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)		See Field of view (FOV).
Windowed
Borderless fullscreen windowed
Anisotropic filtering (AF)		Use the Level of detail setting ingame. The highest setting gives 16 samples. To set manually, see Anisotropic filtering (AF).
Anti-aliasing (AA)		FXAA, MSAA, and CSAA. Some of these are reported broken after latest patch. Can see SMAA for workaround. Alternatively, NVIDIA users can apply SGSSAA with the flag 0x000012C1.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
60 FPS and 120+ FPS
High dynamic range display (HDR)		See the glossary page for potential alternatives.

Ultra-widescreen

Fix aspect ratio
Windows: Go to <path-to-game>\Binaries\Win32\. Linux: Go to <path-to-game>\bin\. Open Windows:LifeIsStrange.exe, Linux:LifeIsStrange with a hex editor such as HxD. Find the hex values 39 8E E3 3F. Change it to your aspect ratio (e.g. CD 90 18 40 for 21:9). Change the in-game FOV to 83.93 (see Field of view (FOV)).

Field of view (FOV)

Bind FOV to key

Go to Windows:<path-to-game>\LifeIsStrangeGame\Config\, Linux:<path-to-game>\share\data\lifeisstrangegame\config\ Open DefaultInput.ini. Add the following lines at the end of [Engine.PlayerInput] +Bindings=(Name="F1",Command="FOV 25") +Bindings=(Name="F2",Command="FOV 40") +Bindings=(Name="F3",Command="FOV 55") +Bindings=(Name="F4",Command="FOV 70") +Bindings=(Name="F5",Command="FOV 80") +Bindings=(Name="F6",Command="FOV 90") +Bindings=(Name="F7",Command="FOV 100") +Bindings=(Name="F8",Command="FOV 110") +Bindings=(Name="F9",Command="FOV 120") +Bindings=(Name="F10",Command="FOV 130") The original FOV for 16:9 is 25 in (some?) cut-scenes, 68 during gameplay. Run the game and try from F1 to F10 at any time. Notes Changing the FOV causes the interaction widget to scale incorrectly. Some visual glitches might occur during cut-scenes with increased field of view, such as some intentionally invisible parts of the screen being visible to the player.

Anisotropic filtering (AF)

Edit LifeIsStrangeEngine.ini[citation needed]
Go to the configuration files location. Open LifeIsStrangeEngine.ini. Change MaxAnisotropy between 0 - 16 under [SystemSettings]. Save the file.

Chromatic aberration

Disable chromatic aberration
Go to the configuration files location. Edit LifeIsStrangeEngine.ini. Change bDNEAllowChromaticAberration=True to bDNEAllowChromaticAberration=False.

Depth of field

Disable depth of field
Go to the configuration files location. Edit LifeIsStrangeEngine.ini. Change bAllowDNEDOF=True to bAllowDNEDOF=False.

SMAA

SMAA Anti-Aliasing with SweetFX
Download custom SweetFX Extract archive contents to <path-to-game>\Binaries\Win32\

Input

Input settings.

Key rebinding.

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping
Mouse acceleration
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support
Full controller support
Controller remapping		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers
Xbox button prompts
Impulse Trigger vibration

DualShock 4 controllers		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.

Generic/other controllers		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.

Additional information
Controller hotplugging
Haptic feedback
Simultaneous controller+KB/M		Rapidly changes button prompts.

Steam Input
Steam Input API support
Hook input (legacy mode)
Official controller preset(s)
Steam Controller button prompts

Mouse smoothing

Disable Mouse Smoothing[citation needed]
Go to the configuration files location. Open LifeIsStrangeInput.ini. Locate line bEnableMouseSmoothing=true in the [Engine.PlayerInput] section and change it to false. Save the file.

Audio

Audio settings.

Language and subtitle settings.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls		Music, voices and SFX.
Surround sound		7.1
Subtitles		Choices for three sizes and overlay.
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Simplified Chinese				Fan translation, download.
Traditional Chinese				Fan translation, download.
French
German
Hungarian				Fan translation, download.
Indonesian				Fan translation by IGTC Team, download.
Italian
Japanese				Japanese Language Pack is region locked to Japan, but can be bypassed with steam://install/425570. Only available for Windows.
Korean				Fan translation by kibme0325.
Polish				Fan translation, download.
Brazilian Portuguese
Russian				Fan translation by «Tolma4 Team» (Subtitles) and «ElikaStudio» (Audio and Textures). Download page.
Spanish
Latin American Spanish

VR support

3D modes	Native	Notes
Native 3D
Nvidia 3D Vision		Use Helix Mod: Life Is Strange (All Episodes).
vorpX		G3D Officially supported game, see official vorpx game list.

Issues fixed

Windows

No audio during certain cutscenes

Affects photo cutscenes and EP4 ending cutscene.

Install DirectX 9 Redistributable

Blue screen of death during cutscenes

Cutscene audio may stutter followed by a BSOD crash (DPC_WATCHDOG_VIOLATION).

Unplug Xbox One Controller

Game won't start (crash at startup)

Change System Locale
See Microsoft Windows article how to change systems non-unicode language and how to use AppLocale. Use AppLocale with Japanese language. OR Change systems non-unicode language to English (United Kingdom/United States) and reboot the system.

Weird graphic glitch around characters bodies on some AMD GPUs

Having MSAA Anti-Aliasing enabled might cause a weird graphic glitch around characters bodies, if your system has AMD GPU.

Disable MSAA Anti-Aliasing in the game's Video settings menu.

Glitchy interaction prompts

Change Screen size to any value below the maximum one in the game's Video settings menu.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D	9.0c
OpenGL		macOS/Linux only
Shader Model support	3.0

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows
macOS (OS X)
Linux

Middleware

	Middleware	Notes
Physics	PhysX
Audio	Wwise
Interface	Scaleform
Cutscenes	Bink Video

System requirements

Windows

macOS (OS X)

Linux

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	Vista	7
Processor (CPU)	2.0 GHz Dual Core	3.0 GHz Dual Core
System memory (RAM)	2 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	5 GB	14 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia card ATI card 512 MB of VRAM DirectX 9 compatible	Nvidia GeForce GTX 260 ATI Radeon HD 4890 1 GB of VRAM
Other	Intel integrated graphics are not recommended

macOS (OS X)
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	10.11	10.11.4
Processor (CPU)	Intel 1.8 GHz	Intel 2.4 GHz
System memory (RAM)	4 GB	8 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	15 GB
Video card (GPU)	ATI Radeon HD 4850 Nvidia GeForce GT 130 Intel HD Graphics 4000 512 MB of VRAM	1 GB of VRAM

Intel HD Graphics 4000/5000 require at least 8 GB of RAM.

Linux
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	Ubuntu 16.04, SteamOS 2.0
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i3 AMD FX-6300	Intel Core i5
System memory (RAM)	4 GB	8 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	16 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GT 640 AMD Radeon R9 270 Intel Iris Pro Graphics 6200 1 GB of VRAM	Nvidia GeForce 700 series
Other	Nvidia GPU's require Driver version 367.27 (tested) AMD and Intel GPU's require MESA 11.2 (tested) AMD GPUs are not supported on SteamOS

A 64-bit operating system is required.