GamingPickz
Game vs game · side by side

A Plague Tale: Innocence vs Life Is Strange

A Plague Tale: Innocence is an action-adventure horror game from Asobo Studio (2019) while Life Is Strange is an action-adventure game from Don’t Nod (2015).

Quick answer: Life Is Strange rates higher, 8.4 to 7.9 on the GamingPickz Score, and Life Is Strange is the cheaper at Free.

A Plague Tale: Innocence

2019 · Asobo Studio

7.9GamingPickz Score

$39.99

Steam: Very Positive

Life Is Strange

2015 · Don’t Nod

8.4GamingPickz Score

Free

Steam: Overwhelmingly Positive

What each one is

A Plague Tale: Innocence is filed under Action-Adventure and Horror. In contrast, Life Is Strange under Action-Adventure.

A Plague Tale: Innocence

Follow the grim tale of young Amicia and her little brother Hugo, in a heartrending journey through the darkest hours of history.

Description from its Steam store page

Life Is Strange

Episode 1 now FREE! Life is Strange is an award-winning and critically acclaimed episodic adventure game that allows the player to rewind time and affect the past, present and future.

Description from its Steam store page

Story, characters and reception

A Plague Tale: Innocence
Plot

In November 1348, Amicia de Rune is a 15-year-old French noble living in Aquitaine during the Hundred Years' War between England and France . Her five-year-old brother, Hugo, has been ill since birth; their mother, Beatrice, an alchemist, has sheltered him in their estate while trying to devise a cure. While hunting with her father Robert in the forest, Amicia encounters an unusual substance on the ground, and her dog Lion is gruesomely consumed by an… (Wikipedia)

Reception

Reception A Plague Tale: Innocence received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to review aggregator website Metacritic . Sales In the United Kingdom, the game was the ninth-best-selling retail game in its week of release. In July 2020, Focus Home Interactive announced that it had sold over one million units. (Wikipedia)

Life Is Strange
Reception

The series' reception has been generally positive, with all games receiving "generally favorable" reviews according to aggregator Metacritic . Michel Koch has described the series and the approach to its characters as an anthology series similar to TV series like True Detective or American Horror Story in 2015. Life Is Strange received generally favorable reviews, with a Metacritic score of 85/100 on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. (Wikipedia)

At a glance

A Plague Tale: InnocenceLife Is Strange
GamingPickz Score7.9/108.4/10
Steam ratingVery Positive (93%, 71,473)Overwhelmingly Positive (96%, 175,705)
Critic aggregate81/10085/100
Price$39.99Free
Install size50 GB5 GB
Steam Deckplayableplayable
Released20192015
DeveloperAsobo StudioDon’t Nod

Prices and Steam ratings are read live and move over time.

A Plague Tale: Innocence vs Life Is Strange, point by point

Each facet side by side. A round is marked won only where a figure settles it; feel and "which is better" carry no mark, because no number we hold decides them.

  1. Genre and premise

    A Plague Tale: InnocenceAction-adventure horror game
    Life Is StrangeAction-adventure game

    What each is filed as. Each game describes itself in full above; we do not judge a premise.

  2. How it plays

    A Plague Tale: InnocenceStory Rich, Adventure, Stealth
    Life Is StrangeStory Rich, Choices Matter, Female Protagonist

    The tags players apply most, in order of votes. A read on feel, not a verdict.

  3. Reception

    A Plague Tale: InnocenceScore 7.9 · 93% on Steam · 81 critic
    Life Is StrangeScore 8.4 · 96% on Steam · 85 critic

    The GamingPickz Score is a composite of player sentiment, critics and popularity, computed the same way for every game.

  4. Content and scale

    A Plague Tale: Innocence71,473 reviews · 1 add-on · 50 GB
    Life Is Strange175,705 reviews · 1 add-on · 5 GB

    Reach and footprint, not quality: more reviews or a bigger install is not a better game.

  5. Price

    A Plague Tale: Innocence$39.99
    Life Is StrangeFree

    Read live from Steam and subject to change.

  6. On a Steam Deck

    A Plague Tale: InnocencePlayable
    Life Is StrangePlayable

    Valve's own Deck compatibility rating.

Life Is Strange takes 2 of the marked rounds to 0. That is only what a number can decide, not which you will enjoy more.

The two on the grid

Compare the whole catalogue

A Plague Tale: Innocence and Life Is Strange on the axes the GamingPickz Score is built from, on the full 0 to 100 scale so each dot is its real position. Change either axis to compare them on any measure.

2 games have both

01000100PlayersPopularity

Players. The share of Steam reviews marked positive, pulled toward the catalogue average in proportion to how few reviews stand behind it. A game with 200 reviews moves a long way toward the average; one with 200,000 barely moves at all. Without this a title sitting at 100 percent on nine reviews outranks Half-Life 2 at 98 percent on 278,000.

Popularity. A blend of two things that are not the same. Audience is how many people wrote a Steam review, which is a floor on how many played it. Reach is how many language editions of Wikipedia document the game, which is cultural footprint rather than sales. A game can score high on one and low on the other: a huge free-to-play title has audience without reach, and a landmark console exclusive has reach without a Steam audience at all. Where both exist they are averaged; where only one does, that one carries it.

  • Mobile
  • Multi-platform

Every point links to that game's entry. The value map and the reception map are fixed views of the same data.

See the whole grid

How positions are decided

No paid placement, no favouritism, live third-party data
  • Placed by the published method, not by us. Every coordinate is computed from the axis definitions and weights printed on this site. Nobody moves a point. See the axes.
  • Nothing here is paid for. No sponsored placements, no promoted slots, no arrangement of any kind affects a position. If that ever changes it will be labelled and sit outside the ranking.
  • No favouritism, including our own. The 16 games we have written full reviews of are scored by exactly the same formula as the other 1,510, from the same third-party inputs, and they land where it puts them. Our own opinion of a game does not enter its coordinates.
  • A position is not an endorsement. It says how a game was received and what it costs, not that we recommend it. Where we do recommend something, it carries a written review with a name on it.
  • Fetched from live third-party data. Player sentiment from Steam, critic aggregates as published on store pages, prices checked hourly, attention from Wikipedia. Each figure carries its source and the date it was read, and we do not adjust any of them.

Which to pick, by what you want

  • The higher-rated of the two: Life Is Strange (GamingPickz Score 8.4)
  • The cheaper right now: Life Is Strange (Free)
  • Lighter on storage: Life Is Strange (5 GB)
  • The safer bet by weight of reviews: Life Is Strange (175,705 reviews)

What they have in common

Both are tagged by Steam players with:

Story RichAdventureFemale ProtagonistAtmosphericSingleplayerThird PersonActionGreat Soundtrack

Where they differ

A Plague Tale: Innocence is also

StealthMedievalDarkHorrorHistoricalEmotional

Life Is Strange is also

Choices MatterTime TravelEpisodicTime ManipulationMultiple EndingsMystery

Tags players apply to one game and not the other.

Difficulty and who each is for

By the tags players apply, A Plague Tale: Innocence is middle-of-the-road on difficulty. Life Is Strange is relaxed, easy to pick up.

System requirements, side by side

A Plague Tale: InnocenceLife Is Strange
Minimum GPU2 GBATI
Minimum CPUIntel Core i3-2120 (3.3 GHz)/AMD FX-4100 X4 (3.6 GHz)Dual Core 2.0GHz
Minimum RAM8 GB2 GB
Install size50 GB5 GB

Can your PC run them? Check each against your own kit: A Plague Tale: Innocence · Life Is Strange.

Accessibility features

Steam store pages declare 1 accessibility feature for A Plague Tale: Innocence and 4 for Life Is Strange. A declaration is a floor, not a review.

If you like one, also try

Common questions

How different are A Plague Tale: Innocence and Life Is Strange in scope?

A Plague Tale: Innocence has drawn 71,473 Steam reviews, ships 1 add-on and installs in 50 GB. Life Is Strange has drawn 175,705 Steam reviews, ships 1 add-on and installs in 5 GB.

Is A Plague Tale: Innocence or Life Is Strange better?

By the GamingPickz Score, Life Is Strange rates higher (8.4 to 7.9). That is a composite of player sentiment, the critic aggregate and popularity, not our taste. "Better" also depends on price, length and platform, which the table above lays out.

Which is cheaper, A Plague Tale: Innocence or Life Is Strange?

Life Is Strange is cheaper right now at Free, against $39.99. Prices move, so this is read live from Steam and can change.

Should I get A Plague Tale: Innocence or Life Is Strange?

Life Is Strange rates higher, 8.4 to 7.9 on the GamingPickz Score, and Life Is Strange is the cheaper at Free. It also depends on what you want: the "which to pick" section above calls out which is cheaper, lighter on storage, better on a Steam Deck and the safer bet by weight of reviews.

Do you rank one above the other for a fee?

No. Neither game, nor anyone else, pays for placement or a verdict here. The order and every figure come out of the same public data the rest of the site uses.

How we compare, and what we will not do

The GamingPickz Score is a composite of player sentiment (adjusted for sample size), the critic aggregate and popularity, computed by the same code every ranked list on this site uses. The Steam rating label is Valve's own, reconstructed from the positive percentage and review count. Prices are read live. We do not write an opinion of which game is "better": we report the numbers and say which wins each measurable question above.

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