Pet death, Life Is Strange 2

The Life is Strange series is prone to moments that could be reasonably criticized as emotional manipulation, but I don’t think I’ll ever forget just how disappointed I was in Life Is Strange 2, when the game unceremoniously decided to kill off Mushroom, Daniel Diaz’s sweet puppy in Episode 2 – Rules.

Life is Strange 2 follows brothers Daniel and Sean Diaz as they embark on a road trip through America to reach the Mexico/America border, and in the first episode, the younger brother meets and adopts (steals) an adorable little puppy he names Mushroom.

She’s a wonderful addition to their journey, and I would have loved to have seen her grow big and strong throughout the Diaz brother’s journey. But, instead, the game decides to kill her off at the beginning of the second episode by way of a fucking cougar finding their hiding spot in an abandoned cabin.

It feels like a moment of buyer’s remorse on the developer’s part, like they wrote a character into the story in one episode and didn’t want them there anymore. It doesn’t play into any decision the player makes, and only serves to do something needlessly cruel in a story that was already running its characters through the wringer. If you wanted to illustrate these boys were losing things they cherished, was it not enough to kill their dad? At least that felt like meaningful commentary. This is just mean. – K.S.