SJ Longthorne

Here's the thing about killing dogs in games. The last two times I've seen it (A Plague Tale, Life is Strange 2) it's felt extremely unearned. Both times, you barely know the dog. It's not woven into the narrative as a climax we've built towards, it's just... insta shitty.https://twitter.com/sarahlongthorne/status/1264260866930868224 …

It feels like you're trying to take a shortcut to those endgame feels without doing the work. And it's ineffective. It doesn't make me endgame sad, it just makes me angry. At YOU. For making me watch that. For no reason. Seriously, way to guarantee I'll nope the hell out.

Same with films and books like 99% of the time >_>

YUP. I watched a Spanish horror on Netflix recently and a dog was introduced and I was immediately like "I no longer want to watch this". My suspicions were correct. Dogs are so often introduced just to be killed for cheap shock value.

It just feels so incredibly lazy =_= Oh! In case you don't use it already, @doesthedogdie is a super useful site! It's just for films though

I know of it but haven't been using it. Think I'll start.

Just recalled an e.g. of this sort of lazy storytelling – it's actually by an author I loved as a kid, & the series is great, but Book 1 opens with MC encountering a giant spider creature & to show that it's a baddy, it literally has it carry a sack of kittens and snack on them