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| From left to right - Nora, Kat, Swann, and Autumn. |
Editor’s note: Although the author has not revealed major plot points, some spoilers are unavoidable. As always, be sure to play the game first if you are interested in experiencing the story for yourself.
From the makers of Life is Strange, Lost Records: Bloom and Rage is a familiar experience to anyone who has played DON'T NOD’s games. There’s a slew of dialogue options to choose from and a story wrapped in tragedy and nostalgia, fused with a supernatural twist. Yesterday I finished the game, and my initial impressions are very positive, with a few constructive critiques about characterization that I'll ruminate on below.
When you think of DON'T NOD, the first game to come to mind is likely Life is Strange. If I had to compare Lost Records to it, Life is Strange had more innovative gameplay thanks to Max’s time reversal power. Lost Records, on the other hand, substitutes time reversal and powers in general for a camcorder mechanic that allows you to capture various events throughout the game on film, and then manipulate and edit said film to create your own personal home videos. I’m not very creative when it comes to those things, so I didn’t do anything wild with this feature. But even with the mediocre footage I took, there was a good payoff at the end of the game in terms of how it takes everything you record and makes something that feels very impactful when the credits roll.
There are also some comparisons to be made with Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden, which I played last year. It's clear that DON'T NOD took some inspiration from their 2024 title. While they are set in wildly different time periods and are not comparable at all in terms of gameplay, Banishers deals heavily with the themes of death, loss, and how people move on in ways that are often troubling or problematic, themes which Lost Records focuses on exclusively.
Put simply, Lost Records tells two stories at once, both featuring the same four central characters. One story is set in 1995 when they’re 16, and the other in 2022 when they’re 43. Being in the same general age group as them (albeit a little younger), the general themes of youthful naivety and big dreams contrasting against the more grounded, boring, and at times stressful nature of adulthood spoke to me.
You play as Swann, a goofy offbeat nerdy girl with niche interests who has trouble fitting in with others. I had trouble connecting with her as a character at first, especially compared to Max. I was able to put myself in Max’s shoes pretty easily—especially the older version of her in Life is Strange: Double Exposure. Swann though, felt like I was playing somebody else. Which isn’t exactly a bad thing, and perhaps aligns with Swann’s own tendency to disassociate with those around her using her camcorder.
Very early in the game, Swann meets the three other main characters: Autumn, Nora, and Kat, and quickly the four become inseparable. It’s a friendship with a time limit though—Swann is moving at the end of the summer of ‘95, Nora’s parents are divorced and she clearly prefers living with her mom in Los Angeles, and Kat has her own trials you’ll uncover during the game that will necessitate her departure too.
The choice and consequence of the game mainly arises based on how you treat and interact with your three friends, all of whom can become love interests (or not) depending on how you play. For example, I didn’t really vibe much with Autumn or Nora in my playthrough, but did connect with Kat, and the game does a great job of reflecting how this impacts character relations both in 1995 and 2022.
In fact, I’d say the choice and consequence worked too well in my case. Because I didn’t connect much with Autumn or Nora, they were far colder to me in 2022, and this resulted in an ending where they didn't support me nearly as much as they could have.
If I had a critique of the game, it’d mainly be in how the 2022 versions of the characters were portrayed. As noted above, some of this was my fault based on my choices, but I did feel like the present day versions of the characters were a bit too cold, detached, and depressing. Almost like caricatures of a child’s conception of adulthood.
Maybe that was DON'T NOD's intention, to contrast it with the freedom and hopefulness of 1995. But as someone who was a child in the 90s and an adult in the 2020s, I thought the older versions of these characters felt too distant, jaded, and frankly, unlikeable to be realistic, and it took me out of the experience a bit.
Put simply, Lost Records tells two stories at once, both featuring the same four central characters. One story is set in 1995 when they’re 16, and the other in 2022 when they’re 43. Being in the same general age group as them (albeit a little younger), the general themes of youthful naivety and big dreams contrasting against the more grounded, boring, and at times stressful nature of adulthood spoke to me.
You play as Swann, a goofy offbeat nerdy girl with niche interests who has trouble fitting in with others. I had trouble connecting with her as a character at first, especially compared to Max. I was able to put myself in Max’s shoes pretty easily—especially the older version of her in Life is Strange: Double Exposure. Swann though, felt like I was playing somebody else. Which isn’t exactly a bad thing, and perhaps aligns with Swann’s own tendency to disassociate with those around her using her camcorder.
Very early in the game, Swann meets the three other main characters: Autumn, Nora, and Kat, and quickly the four become inseparable. It’s a friendship with a time limit though—Swann is moving at the end of the summer of ‘95, Nora’s parents are divorced and she clearly prefers living with her mom in Los Angeles, and Kat has her own trials you’ll uncover during the game that will necessitate her departure too.
The choice and consequence of the game mainly arises based on how you treat and interact with your three friends, all of whom can become love interests (or not) depending on how you play. For example, I didn’t really vibe much with Autumn or Nora in my playthrough, but did connect with Kat, and the game does a great job of reflecting how this impacts character relations both in 1995 and 2022.
In fact, I’d say the choice and consequence worked too well in my case. Because I didn’t connect much with Autumn or Nora, they were far colder to me in 2022, and this resulted in an ending where they didn't support me nearly as much as they could have.
If I had a critique of the game, it’d mainly be in how the 2022 versions of the characters were portrayed. As noted above, some of this was my fault based on my choices, but I did feel like the present day versions of the characters were a bit too cold, detached, and depressing. Almost like caricatures of a child’s conception of adulthood.
Maybe that was DON'T NOD's intention, to contrast it with the freedom and hopefulness of 1995. But as someone who was a child in the 90s and an adult in the 2020s, I thought the older versions of these characters felt too distant, jaded, and frankly, unlikeable to be realistic, and it took me out of the experience a bit.
As I said though, I'm sure it was a conscious design choice to really lean into Nora and Autumn being inverted reflections of their past selves. Due to their characterization, my Swann was far more interested in solving the big mystery rather than reconnecting with her friends in 2022.
For reasons that will become apparent when you play the game, the 2022 version of Kat seemed to be the most unchanged from her 1995 self, and thus she was the most interesting, and, ironically, hopeful character to me by the end. Swann too seemed practically unchanged both visually and personality-wise from her 1995 self, at least compared to Autumn and Nora.
In my playthrough this made sense given how I directed Swann and interacted with Kat, but again, I'm sure this was also done with some intentionality by the writers. Nora and Autumn move on and practically became different people whereas Swann and Kat stay nearly the same. Swann even maintains her exact same interests and has a job that reflects her teenage personality. Nora and Autumn, meanwhile, both took their lives in different directions, and seem to look upon their pasts with disdain and regret.
For reasons that will become apparent when you play the game, the 2022 version of Kat seemed to be the most unchanged from her 1995 self, and thus she was the most interesting, and, ironically, hopeful character to me by the end. Swann too seemed practically unchanged both visually and personality-wise from her 1995 self, at least compared to Autumn and Nora.
In my playthrough this made sense given how I directed Swann and interacted with Kat, but again, I'm sure this was also done with some intentionality by the writers. Nora and Autumn move on and practically became different people whereas Swann and Kat stay nearly the same. Swann even maintains her exact same interests and has a job that reflects her teenage personality. Nora and Autumn, meanwhile, both took their lives in different directions, and seem to look upon their pasts with disdain and regret.
Outside of the characterization, I thought the story was very good. It didn't hit the high notes of Life is Strange for me (few games do), but it did a good job of weaving the two timelines together in a way that is compelling. The story is told over two "tapes," or episodes, with the first being much longer than the second. Tape 1 mostly covers how the girls became friends and what they did during the bulk of the summer of '95, and ends with a dramatic event that leaves the girls shaken. Tape 2 picks up from there, and it's mostly a frenetic run to the climactic conclusion in 1995 and the big mystery reveal in 2022.
The supernatural aspect of the game is consistently present, but it's subtle, and it's not something you directly interact with or have control over like in Life is Strange. How it's handled is somewhat controversial, at least in terms of the extent to which people are satisfied with it and how it shapes the story by the end. The good news for those who aren't satisfied with the ending is that there are clear indications that DON'T NOD will continue the story in a sequel.
There wasn't much in the way of "gameplay" here besides making choices on behalf of Swann, walking around the carefully crafted environments, interacting with various items, and taking videos with Swann's camcorder in 1995. Like I said, I'm not very creative when it comes to video editing, so I didn't interact much with the in-game video editor. But I was kept very engaged by the frequent choices and the contextual reactions from the other main characters based on what my Swann was doing at any given time.
The soundtrack was great, featuring a quality selection of indie alternative rock that reminded me of Life is Strange. Beach House's Myth and Lazuli featured heavily, which was a personal highlight for me as those songs used to be on my playlist a decade ago, so in a way they were doubly effective in terms of capturing a sense of nostalgia. Sparks by The Dø popped up as well, and that one is still stuck in my head.
I'm no Digital Foundry, but the game seemed to run well on a base PS5. As an Unreal Engine 5 game, there were the typical stutters and it didn't really hold a locked 60fps. I'd say the environmental graphics were quite impressive, whereas the character models were good to great overall. Compared to Life is Strange: Double Exposure, which uses the same engine, I thought that Lost Records looked and played better in nearly all ways.
To close, Lost Records is a worthy successor to the original Life is Strange, and I'm excited to see what DON'T NOD does with the abyss next...
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