Drawing of Max's journal found inside it in form of a sticker.
Max's Journal records Max Caulfield's experiences throughout the events of Life is Strange. It includes her diary, details on some characters Max encounters, notes on items of Max's interest, her optional photos, and SMS messages. Her journal pages are full of scribbles, drawings, watercolor doodles, stickers and other memorabilia such as photos, booklets, postcards, notes, stamps or calendar pages.
Max's journal is designed, laid out, and illustrated by Alexis Bauzet and Alyzian.
In "Polarized", Max must use her journal to escape the clutches of Jefferson briefly before traveling to another alternative situation in which the journal is burnt, disabling her from using it against Jefferson.
In Max's nightmare scenes, opening the journal reveals violent and contorted versions of her entries which become laced with Jefferson quotes. This also affects her pictures, texts, and character notes.
Cropped Pieces and Scraps[]
Flyers[]
Five flyers and a diary agenda page in Max's journal have matching pieces that can be found on other pages. Out of these six things with matching pieces, only three have completing "halves" - the remaining three have missing information that was cropped from the middle in the layout stage during development of Life is Strange. The top three items in the image below are the only items that can be fully completed.[note 1] The bottom three are those with missing information which cannot be found in the game files. According to journal artist Alyzian, the missing information is as follows:
Sugarcoat everything - a fair entertainment - Main place, Arcadia Bay - 8th to 30th of July, - $10 adult, $5 children under 14.
Top-Down Reversed.
Dusk&Dawn gallery Seattle Presents "Bodies and Splatters" photography exhibition.
Other flyer facts and missing information provided by the artist:
Alyzian states this is just "a random piece of music paper, no trivia there."
"Do More of What Makes You Happy."
This was a parody of the artist's own school work. It was a fake concert poster for "Of monsters and men" that she had made. This parody says "Of youngsters and deers, 20&21 June 2014."
"Good Morning Arcadia Bay." The only other text missing is 'Diner,' and there is a little baby chicken with sunglasses and a old-school radio mic. (Homage to Good Morning England.)
"Your off beat guide to Oregon." (The waterfall is Multnomah Falls in Oregon.)
"Do Small Things With Great Love."
This flyer features a bio T-Rex with a flame thrower saying, "HAVE YOU SEEN ME? If you do, you need medical help. Please call Doctor Duerf you're not ok."
"Who let the cats out?" (with two derp cats). "Seriously who did. They can't handle it out there. They're derps. They're gonna die. Bring them back."
"Karaoke Night. One song = one cocktail! Every Friday night at 8PM, Howling Lupes Cave."
Map Scraps[]
Three map scraps can be found in Max's journal. When these are pieced together, they make an incomplete map of Oregon, California, Nevada, and Idaho. (The "Rogue" and "Snake" in different colors may be references to X-Men and Metal Gear Solid. TBC with the artist.)
Stickers[]
Some text and phrases are also obscured or missing completely on the stickers in Max's journal, which has occurred during the layout stage in game development.
Cat sticker: According to Alyzian, the missing phrase for the cat sticker on page 3 of the journal is, "Go Meow Yourself."
Trivia[]
If Max looks at her journal in "Chrysalis", she thinks that she hasn't kept up with it as much as she should. As she reads it, she wonders what other people would think if they looked at it. If she looks at it again after rewinding time, she notices that nothing has moved and wonders what is going on.
Max's journal is visible and Max may open to read it on her classroom desk at the beginning of "Chrysalis", and on the small stand next to her bed at the beginning of "Out of Time".
Warren's age is listed as 16 on his Blackwell Student Record, which makes it seem contradictory to the fact that Max writes in her journal that he is "her age" since they are two years apart by age.
In the alternative timeline, Max creates by preventing William's death, her diary entries are also altered. In the timeline Max creates by handing in her Everyday Heroes Contest photo to Jefferson though, her journal remains the same and all entries made in the previous timeline are still accessible.
The font used in Max's Journal is called "Dudu Calligraphy" and can be downloaded here.
According to journal illustrator, Alyzian, some of the coffee/cocoa stains in Max's journal were digitally scanned cocoa stains from her own desk spillages!
Alyzian gathered inspirational ideas for Max's journal on a Pinterest board she created.
Max kept a journal even in her childhood. She would write entries about which anime character she wanted to be, about her dreams of being a famous photographer, and what she and Chloe would be doing when they are older. [1]
In Episode 1: Chrysalis, page 10 of Max's journal will display the photo she had taken of the blue butterfly in the bathroom at Blackwell Academy. Later, in the same episode, Chloe will take this photo from Max during a conversation they have in Chloe's room.[2] From this point, the photo has disappeared from page 10 because Chloe now has possession of it.
On page 17 of Max's journal, she has drawn a sketch of Chloe with a red hoop earring even though Chloe wore no earrings in the game. On the next page, page 18, Max does refer to Chloe having piercings (plural), but there are no visible ones at this early point in the game. (We later see in Episode 3 that Chloe has a belly button piercing but still no ear piercings or earrings in general.) Even though Max's sketch could be put down to an idealized version of Chloe from Max's imagination, the sketch is a replication of early concept art. As for the journal entry about piercings, this could have been an early writing remnant that the concept art was based on, or vice versa.
The "Et in Arcadia ego" sticker from Max's journal may be a reference to the painting Et in Arcadia ego, a work by Nicolas Poussin a leading painter of the French Baroque style.
The sticker "Not all those who wander are lost" is reference to a phrase from a poem by J. R. R. Tolkien, "All that is gold does not glitter", that appears in his most famous work The Lord of the Rings.
The "My hair is being pulled by the stars again" sticker may be a reference to a quote by Anaïs Nin.
The "With great powers comes great bullshit sticker" is a reference to the quote from the Spider-Man comics; "With great powers comes great responsibility".
On Page 22 of Max's journal, she writes about Chloe: "It's so strange where our lives have gone since the last time we hung out when we were thirteen." With their birth dates (Chloe - March 1994; Max - September 1995), there is no way that they would have been aged 13 at the same time. Chloe would have turned 14 six months before Max turned 13. A possible explanation for this could be that Max is simply generalizing their ages, using the age that she remembers herself being. Another example of when she does this is in Episode 4 when she sees the pirate CD in Chloe's room: "Oh my God, I made that mix for her when we were twelve."
Also, on page 22 of Max's journal is a sticker graphic that says, "Three Meters Above The Sky", which appears to reference the 2004 Italian film inspired by the novel Tre metri sopra il cielo by Federico Moccia (literally "Three meters above the sky"). The film is summarized as "A romantic drama for teenagers that tells the story of two youngsters belonging to opposite worlds. It's the chronicle of an improbable relationship that is practically impossible but just as inevitable. It will end up dragging the couple along for a voyage of discovery on which they will experience true love together for the first time. She is a well-to-do girl. He is a rebellious boy, addicted to risk and danger."[3]Variety magazine writes: "Slowly, he becomes more tender, [the girl] more rebellious." The descriptions of these two characters appear to match the characters of Max and Chloe rather well.
Journal laying on Max's nightstand in "Out of Time"
Max journal (ingame object) in XPS
Notes[]
↑Completed by using the original textures found in the game files, as all of the flyers and scraps in the journal's left and right margins are partially obscured during layout.
References[]
↑Max: "I remember when my journal entries were about which anime character I wanted to be. Or my dreams of being a respected globe-hopping photographer. Or what me and Chloe would be doing when we were finally adults... at least we know how that turned out so far." (Episode 3 - Journal.)
↑Chloe (to Max): "And I'll snag this picture as a symbol of our reunion. Cool?"
