The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit

It was quite the surprise when Square Enix and Dontnod announced The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit at this year's E3. Something of a free prologue ahead of Life is Strange 2, Captain Spirit revolves around young Chris Eriksen, his superhero alter-ego (Captain Spirit), and his alcoholic father. It's an equal parts heartwarming and depressing experience, exactly what you'd expect out of a Life is Strange episode.

Chris has a vivid imagination and on this Saturday morning, you're given free reign to play outside and inside, engaging various super-villains, helping out around the house, tracking down a treasure, throwing snowballs and beer cans, and so on. As such the structure of this demo is very different from that of Life is Strange and Life is Strange: Before the Storm. Here you're able to roam around the house and the yard outside, the garage and the treehouse too, and there's plenty of stuff to interact with everywhere you look. It's a denser experience, one you can easily spend a couple of hours with if you want to explore it all, but you can also rush through the main narrative which deals the relationship between Chris and his father.

The Eriksen house is not in the best of shape. It's Saturday and therefore game day and Charles, the former college basketball hero and father of Chris, opens his first can of beer at breakfast. Dontnod has done a great job of balancing Charles' flaws with genuine care for Chris and the reasons why he's the way he is are there to be explored and studied. It's not that he doesn't care and doesn't want to be a good father, a nice change of pace to how a "deadbeat dad" is most often depicted in films and video games. We'll leave it to you to uncover why Chris's mom isn't in the picture, but needless to say Chris is a lonely kid, hence his heavy reliance on imaginary sidekicks. It's easy to like Chris, from the way he mispronounces some words to his steadfastness and good nature. You can role-play him a little bit in how he deals with his father, even if this game is pretty linear as far as its main narrative goes.

Captain Spirit has a number of sidekicks that help him deal with villains like Snowmancer and Mantroid. You start out the game by picking some choices for Captain Spirit's suit (neatly presented via a drawing Chris makes), then you need to collect various parts for his costume.

There are ties here to the rest of the Life is Strange universe. For instance, you can find out that Chris's mom was once accepted into Blackwell Academy. But it doesn't just tie back to Arcadia Bay as Chris will play a part in Life is Strange 2, and while we don't know how big his part will be, the fact that he stars in this self-contained chapter suggests that he's got an important role to play.

An area that has been markedly improved since Life is Strange is the visuals. It still has that trademark painted look to it, but there is a great deal more detail and the animations are much better this time around.

While the graphics are improving, one thing that started out excellent and helped elevate the first game was its pacing and there are several places here where you can sit back and just enjoy some music and the scenery. It's also something that helps put forward the sense of Chris is a lonely kid. The voice work on display here is really strong, particularly the fact that Chris makes various voices of his own as he explores the imaginary world of Captain Spirit.

In between the highly imaginative encounters with super-villains, there are some highly contrasting and dark sections where real life comes crashing in. Whether through letters you read or through the conversations you hear you can sense the pressure on Chris to grow up quickly or escape to his imagery superhero world. Dontnod does a great job dealing with this delicate balance, and the finale makes us even more curious as to what role Chris will play in Life is Strange 2.

Anyone who enjoyed Life is Strange should definitely download this episode as it gives some indication of where we're heading next, but even if you've managed to miss Life is Strange, this prologue has enough merit on its own to be worth your time.