Life is Strange and True Colors: Arcadia Bay to Haven Springs

In October 2013, Max Caulfield returns to Arcadia Bay and has a vivid precognition of a tornado destroying a lighthouse and coming for the town. She and Chloe later visit the lighthouse, where Max reveals her powers; in the final episode they return there and Chloe offers Max a choice between saving the town and saving her. The real Cape Meares Light is an inactive lighthouse south of Tillamook Bay, built in 1890 and deactivated in 1963. It is open to the public and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It has served as inspiration for the lighthouse in fictional Arcadia Bay.

Location precision: The lighthouse is fictional; Cape Meares Light is the real Oregon tower named as its inspiration, and the pin marks that tower.

Visitor guidance: The lighthouse is open to the public; the site is on the Oregon coast south of Tillamook Bay.

Dontnod first modelled Arcadia Bay on Astoria, a hillside city on the Columbia River, but found it too big for the small town they wanted. Max returns to the fictional Arcadia Bay in October 2013 to attend Blackwell Academy. Astoria is the oldest city in Oregon, founded in 1811 and the first permanent American settlement west of the Rocky Mountains. Its economy once ran on fishing, fish processing and lumber, and visitors can climb the 125-foot Astoria Column on Coxcomb Hill for a view over the town and the river mouth.

Location precision: Arcadia Bay is fictional; Dontnod first modelled the town on Astoria, which the pin marks.

Visitor guidance: Visitors can climb the Astoria Column for a view over the town, the river and the Pacific.

Dontnod found Garibaldi after Astoria: a much smaller town whose main street runs along the coast, and close to the one in the game. Elsewhere in the game's Arcadia Bay, Max explores the junkyard where Chloe and Rachel Amber used to spend time, and she and Chloe later find Rachel's remains there. Garibaldi is a city in Tillamook County with a population of 830 at the 2020 census. It was incorporated in 1946; the Whitney mill opened in 1921, and its tall smokestack is all that remains of it.

Location precision: Arcadia Bay is fictional; Garibaldi's main street was the model for the town, and the pin marks Garibaldi.

Visitor guidance: Garibaldi's main street runs near Tillamook Bay; the old mill smokestack still stands.

In April 2019, Alex Chen leaves foster care after eight years to reunite with her brother Gabe in Haven Springs, Colorado. Gabe shows her around the town, where many people work for the mining company Typhon, and she meets ranger Ryan Lucan, DJ Steph Gingrich, bar owner Jed Lucan and flower shop owner Eleanor Lethe. Haven Springs is fictional, but Idaho Springs is one of its main real models. The town was founded in 1859 during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush and sat at the centre of the mining district; the Argo Tunnel drained the ore lodes, and the Argo Gold Mine and Mill is open for tours. It lies in Clear Creek Canyon, 30 miles west of Denver.

Location precision: Haven Springs is fictional; Idaho Springs is one of its main real models, and the pin marks the town.

Visitor guidance: The Argo Gold Mine and Mill is open for tours; the historic downtown runs along Clear Creek.

Georgetown is one of the Colorado towns Deck Nine's producer listed as inspiration for Haven Springs. The town was a silver mining camp established in 1859 during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush, and it was a historic centre of Colorado mining that earned the nickname the Silver Queen of Colorado. Its historic centre preserves many structures from the silver boom, and the Georgetown Loop still runs as a tourist railroad between Georgetown and Silver Plume. In Haven Springs, Alex meets bar owner Jed Lucan and flower shop owner Eleanor Lethe, the kind of small businesses that line the town's main street.

Location precision: Haven Springs is fictional; Georgetown is one of the Colorado towns Deck Nine photographed for its storefronts.

Visitor guidance: The preserved downtown and the Georgetown Loop railroad are the draw.

In the game, Alex comes to Haven Springs weeks before the Spring Festival. That fictional festival draws on real Colorado celebrations: Deck Nine's producer points to Frozen Dead Guy Days in Nederland and Crested Butte's Wildflower Festival. Nederland's festival began in 2002 and is usually held on the second weekend of March, with coffin races, a hearse parade and lookalike contests; the 2019 event drew an estimated 25,000 visitors. In the game, Alex's friends surprise her with a concert at the festival, with Steph accompanying her, and later she meets Ryan or Steph on the roof of the bar. The festival moved to Estes Park in 2023.

Location precision: Haven Springs and its Spring Festival are fictional; Nederland's Frozen Dead Guy Days is one of the real festivals behind it.

Visitor guidance: Frozen Dead Guy Days moved to Estes Park in 2023; Nederland is 17 miles west of Boulder.

Haven Springs is placed near the real towns of Marble and Carbondale, in country of mountain views, aspen and a gold rush-era main street. Marble is a statutory town of 133 people in Gunnison County, in a valley of the upper Crystal River along the Elk Mountains. Its Yule Marble quarry opened in the late 19th century and supplied the Tomb of the Unknowns and parts of the Lincoln Memorial. The game's valley turns deadly: a blast brings down a landslide that knocks Gabe into a canyon, and later Jed takes Alex to an abandoned mineshaft, confesses the deaths of miners he oversaw, and shoots at her; she falls into the shaft.

Location precision: Haven Springs is fictional; the pin marks Marble, one of the real towns the game's valley is placed near.

Visitor guidance: Marble is a summer tourist town; the Yule Marble quarry is the local sight.