All Wounds is a fanwork written by Destiny-Smasher that starts off as one continuation of the Sacrifice Arcadia Bay ending. The prose version of the story was completed 1st January 2018, while a visual novel version is currently in development.[note 1]
Overview[]
Shortly after the events of Life is Strange, after having chosen to let 'The Storm' pass over Arcadia Bay and spare Chloe's life, the pair are on the road, heading north to Max's family in Seattle. Both are dealing with survivor's guilt and PTSD, and over the course of the narrative, which jumps ahead in time by five years partway through, they both help encourage and inspire one another to gradually heal and move on from the events they have endured. Both the prose and visual novel versions of All Wounds rotate point of view back and forth between Max and Chloe (though this pattern is broken during one revalatory chapter). Max is dealing with remorse and guilt, agonizing over whether the choices she made were 'the right ones,' while simultaneously facing the antagonistic alternate persona she argued with during 'Max's Nightmare', dubbed an 'Other Max.' Chloe, meanwhile, deals with social issues ranging from accepting the loss of Rachel to accepting the roles of fellow Arcadian survivors in Max's life (specifically Victoria, who ends up befriending Max after the two make amends). In general, the nature of Max and Chloe's character conflicts are internal and external, respectively, and "the primary intent of the narrative is to explore the hardships of growth and healing being a gradual process -- and often a painful one -- and how having even one person who genuinely supports someone can make all the difference in enduring that process."
While the bulk of character interaction in the story is focused on the romantic relationship between Max and Chloe, noteworthy supporting characters include 'Other Max,' Stella Hill, and Victoria Chase. As the story progresses, alternate timelines come into play in various ways, depicting various characters living alternate lives, including a prominent focus on one potential outcome of the 'Save Arcadia Bay' Ending, as well as exploring gaps in time during the events of Life is Strange where Max's 'primary consciousness' (ie the Player) was not present.
A prominent recurring location in the story - highlighted in the prologue to the visual novel - is a dream of 'The End of Time', based on the location of the same name in the SNES title Chrono Trigger. While not literally the location from that world, this abstract place is in actuality a dream that is visited in much the same manner as locations during Max's Nightmare. Both the Nightmare as well as the 'End of Time' dream are constructs of Other Max's design, and the intent and purpose of these dreams, as well as Other Max's origin and endgoal, are revealed as the narrative progresses, serving as the primary devices driving the plot forward after the story's time skip.
Despite the story's grim presentation at times, the narrative ends in a place where Max and Chloe are happily married and starting a new future together in the San Francisco Bay Area. A real life proposal between the author and their fiancée took place in a diner in the SF Bay Area three months after the fanfic was finished, and they currently reside in the United Kingdom.
Originally intended to be a visual novel that functioned like an 'Episode 6,' All Wounds began development in the fall of 2015, shortly after Episode 5 of Life is Strange was released. The original project was going to be a visual novel that ended at the point where the final story reaches Chapter 6. However, it was decided that writing the story out in a singular, linear fashion and posting chapters online as it was written would help solidify ideas and provide feedback. By the time Chapter 6 was written, it was decided to extend the scope of the project beyond an 'Episode 6' into something more like a 'Season 2,' and thus the time skip and focus on new plot conflicts were developed.
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Notes[]
- ↑ An "All Wounds" visual novel is still in progress, but as of January 2019, it is on hiatus. A further update was released in June 2019 regarding intentions to improve existing content in Autumn 2019 and to eventually share "an updated version of the VN with Chapters 3 and 4?."