You will "feel Max's presence through her absence"

We talked to Deck Nine Games' Chris Floyd about the possibility of Max appearing in Before the Storm and Dontnod.

We were recently given an opportunity to sit down with co-game director Chris Floyd from Deck Nine Games to learn more about the upcoming prequel to Life is Strange, Life is Strange: Before the Storm.

Given the premise of the prequel, fans have been wondering whether or not Max would make an appearance in the game.

Can fans expect to see Max?

"So Max, at this point in time that our story takes place, this is two years previous, before the original game, and as we know from the first game Max has left Arcadia Bay for Seattle and is actually not in touch with Chloe, and that's a big part of who she is and her story at this point in time, so you'll really feel Max's presence through her absence."

"So as an example, Chloe has a journal like Max did in the first season, you know, Max had a journal where she would write down what happened in the story and let the player catch up on what's happened in the story so far, and we wanted to provide that same feature in the game, but we didn't think Chloe would be someone to keep a diary like Max did, so her journal takes the form of these letters she's writing to Max. She's been frustrated by how Max hasn't responded, so now she's not even sending them, so she feels this need to reach out to somebody, but there's really no-one there for her. So these are unsent letters to Max that just [...] keep the account of what's going to happen in our story, and that's just an example of how Max was sort of always present in Chloe's mind, and so in that regard she's always present in our story."

Just days prior to the announcement of Before the Storm, the developers of the original, Dontnod Entertainment, announced they are working on a sequel, but just how close are the ties between the two studios working on the franchise?

How much have you guys been talking with Dontnod about Life is Strange?

"Yeah, well, so they announced not too long ago, as you probably know, that they're working on a follow-up to Life is Strange, so they're super busy doing that, we're super busy working on Before the Storm, but we have had, and we're really happy to have had, opportunities to put our work in development in front of them and really get their input. They're really the founders, they laid the foundations for this, so their input means a lot to us. We're really proud that we've gotten to have a lot of freedom with the story that we build, but their input means a lot to us. They've looked at our story early on [...] and told us what they thought and gave us a lot of insight into the characters and the places in the game."