It's said you will not necessarily remember a person's exact size or shape - does it really matter that they had a bit of a tum, no tum at all, multiple freckles, skin like a blank sheet of paper? So what if they were taller than you or shorter than you? These metrics become less and less important as a relationship and your memories together grow. You also probably won't remember everything someone has ever said to you. Snippets, but not every word.

What you will remember, though, is how a person made you feel. You will remember the ease you felt in their company, you will remember the joyous laughter you shared together, you will remember any feelings of hurt. Often when you tell stories about your time with someone, these are what come back to you.

I have been thinking about this since playing Life is Strange: Reunion, which Square Enix has already said will serve as the final part of Max Caulfield and Chloe Price's story. When we first met Max and Chloe in the original Life is Strange, they were two young girls with their own complexities and stories waiting to be unwrapped. So was I. And, much like looking back on the time I spent with my own friends from school and university, when I think about the first time I played Life is Strange, I really remember how these characters - and the game - made me feel. I remember my love for these girls growing with each passing chapter. I remember the protection I wanted to give them and the anger I felt when they were dealt a bad hand. And, of course I remember the gut wrenching moment I knew I had to choose between saving Arcadia Bay from a ravaging tempest, or saving Chloe, knowing that no matter what I chose, I would always wonder if I had made the right decision.

In the end, and I know this will be controversial, I saved Arcadia Bay, after listening to Chloe's impassioned speech about the people there who deserve to live. In her final moments, Chloe thought about her mother and the diner she works in, before thanking Max for showing her so much love during their time together. "You made me smile and laugh, like I haven't done in years," Chloe tells Max. "Wherever I end up after this… in whatever reality… all those moments between us were real, and they'll always be ours." Chloe remembered the feelings.

So even though I loved Chloe deeply, I believed that Max and her relationship would be tainted by guilt once the storm had passed, and they were left with the devastation of its wake. I have lived with this decision for many years now, and while I still feel sad remembering that moment near the lighthouse, with the wind and rain whipping violently around, I had made my peace with it. At least, I thought I had, until I was once again confronted with my decision on booting up Life is Strange: Reunion. Did Chloe live, or did she die? Well for me, she died.

This has been a bit of a sticking point for me ever since Life is Strange: Reunion was announced. I've been trying to decide how I actually feel about seeing Chloe back again, having already learned to accept her death. Even in a world with characters who can rewind time, shapeshift or experience the emotions of others in a burst of colour, having someone come back from the dead like this wasn't sitting right with me. I went to Chloe's funeral. I said goodbye. And it hurt. But that was the path I chose. So, while I have felt moments of joy seeing a face I cared for so deeply return, I have also wondered if Reunion will ultimately dilute the impact that the original Life is Strange left on me.

Now, I haven't played enough of Reunion yet to definitively say if this will be the case or not, but I have played the best part of an hour, and I am at least pleased to report that Deck Nine has treated Chloe's return to the series sensitively. I joined the game roughly an hour or so in, and was first reunited with Max, who is back at Caledon University after the events of Double Exposure, a game which now appears to have been developed as a stepping stone to orchestrate Chloe's return.

Max is of course able to rewind time in Reunion, which came in handy when a rowdy heckler at the local bar continuously interrupted one of her friend's stand up comedy acts. No one ruins my friend's evening and gets away with it, so with a bit of time manipulation and a canny choice of words, I was able to ensure this ne'er do well was out of the way before the set began, and the evening could continue on smoothly. So far, so Life is Strange.

As the evening went on, I talked to more and more locals, and started to piece together bits of information which would tell me more about a fire Max knows to be arriving in the coming days. Again, I was able to use Max's ability to rewind time to ensure conversations ultimately ended the way I needed them to, and soon Max set off for a building due to be demolished in search of further answers.

I then played as Chloe, who while unable to rewind time or anything supernatural like that, has the gift of the gab, and could use her backtalk ability to 'confront' others via conversations (a returning feature from Life is Strange: Before the Storm).

As Chloe, I managed to sneak my way into the same bar Max had been in earlier, as she looked for answers to the nightmarish memories she has started having of a life (or death) she may (or may not) have lived out. In Chloe's mind, the only person who can help her make sense of these strange visions is Max, who, no matter which Life is Strange ending you may have chosen, she has not seen for years.

Again, these various backs and forths ultimately led Chloe to the same building Max had also left the bar for. And, after a slightly tense chain of events involving some explosives, police and the sinister rumblings of a cultish fraternity, the two girls were reunited, with sirens and flashing lights making for a dramatic backdrop (which seems fitting). It was these next moments which made up the crux of my Life is Strange: Reunion preview: how the girls reacted to being back together after all this time, and after - let's be honest - some shared trauma.

I don't want to go too heavy into the details here, I fully appreciate that many people looking forward to Reunion will be looking forward to, well, the reunion. But I will say that I am pleasantly surprised with how Deck Nine has handled things. There were the little details in namely Max's actions that really made me feel how she was feeling to see her once dead friend back. Max, bless her, stayed up all night as Chloe slept in her bed, so worried that if she allowed herself to close her eyes for even one moment her friend may once again disappear. Who hasn't wanted to hold on to someone or something so deeply, that its very existence seems too unbelievable to be true? Eyes heavy with sleep but a heart so full with a mix of love and the desire for a night to never end that staying awake seems like the right thing to do, just to treasure (or process) this time for as long as possible.

Then, on Chloe's side, there was of course confusion, fear and frustration due to the fraught 'memories' that she does not understand. Thankfully, I was able to tread the boards of these topics in a way that felt right for me, with multiple dialogue options for both girls. This meant I could be to the point or I could be sensitive, depending on what I believed these characters needed in those moments.

I know from sneaking a look at my neighbour's screen during the preview, they chose a different conversation branch which suited their personal narrative journey for Chloe and Max. And that is something that - even as that one, ultimate decision gets somewhat upended - continues to be so beautiful about the Life is Strange series.

Attribution

I would be lying if I said I no longer had any concerns about Life is Strange: Reunion after my short spell with it. From a purely technical point of view, there were times when the graphics were not as crisp as they should have been, with fuzzy patching particularly around the ends of a characters' hair often drawing my eye. But, there is still time for this to be fixed. The characters' expressions, though, were the best for the series yet.

Gameplay wise, meanwhile, there is nothing revolutionary about Reunion so far. The mechanics and the worlds are what you will have come to expect from a Life is Strange game. The leaf strewn community, the quirky bar, the bands, the varsity jackets, the struggling artists. They are all once again there. Is it now a worn out formula? I honestly can't say just yet.

But from a narrative point of view, while I am going to save my final judgement for the full release, I will say the reunion between Chloe and Max was sweet and well scripted. I felt genuinely emotional seeing the two girls who I thought had said their final goodbye to each other back together again. As Isabel Allende wrote in Portrait in Sepia: "True friendship resists time, distance and silence." That certainly seems to be the case here. I just hope the rest of Life is Strange: Reunion's story holds the same gravitas and momentum, so that this reunion can really stick its final landing.