Animal Abuse in video games

[TheSelfishGene]

I forgot about the wolf in the bear trap. Don't see how that animal abuse...It just means the bear trap did it's job and got a wolf...

Humans trapping animals to presumably kill later on... A horribly cruel and inhumane trap too I might add.
Leon can totally ignore it aswell (not active abuse, but not circumventing it's pain either), although he doesn't get the benefit later on.

[Rose312]

I hope that benefit is a wolf pelt

[TheSelfishGene]

Pokemon.

/thread

[jagger916]

Pokemon.

/thread

Good point.

[Rose312]

Ya. In Pokemon, you pretty much make animals fight. Like Dog Fighting. You force them to breed. Yuck....harsh stuff

[Vector]

Pokemon.

/thread

Spoiler:

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[OKeijiDragon]

Spoiler:

show spoiler

Oh you mean cock-fighting?

[Darkmoon]

Note to self; never click the spoilers when my kids are in the room. Fuckers.

[REmaster]

Note to self; never click the spoilers when my kids are in the room. Fuckers.

Yes, you never know what twisted images they conceal. Looks like Pikachu got into the ketchup again, OH PIKA!

[Rose312]

What the hell is up with it's eyes?

[Enrico Marini]

What about poor Earth Worm Jim? In one he has to whip pete and in 2 he has to "Rescue" puppies being flung from a burning building, and you can just sit there and not save them with your bouncey pillow.

As far as I'm concerned in games if what ever poses me a threat I kill it and if it poses me no harm I leave them alone. As whats already been said its knowing the difference between reality and fantasy.

Luckily its not like these games allow you to mutilate animals. That I'd have a problem with.

[Enetirnel]

I'm pretty much with Enrico on this...

However, (seeing as it hasn't been brought up) there is Demento/Haunting Ground.
*Spoilers for Demento/Haunting Ground in this post*

We see Hewie, an albino/white German Shepard being tied in a noose to a tree after being captured, beaten and left to die with the wire noose being so tight, the wire dug into his neck and he was unable to move, barely able to breathe or whine.

You can see Hewie whining for help in this and Fiona's response to it in these cutscenes I've captured.

To obtain a playtitle (and in some cases, a particular ending) - you have to kick, practically tackle, feed Hewie food such as Onions (which are actually toxic to dogs and cats raw and cooked, they can cause hemolytic anemia - which destroys red blood cells in their bloodstream and causes them to become lethargic and will often have trouble breathing).

In Demento, Hewie actually shows those symptoms upon being given a whole, raw onion and begins to whine. He'll limp around whining or yelping in pain, before collapsing. In-game, enemies will also beat him. A lot of players that can't get Hewie back up by apologizing to him, will beat him to the brink that, that he eventually uncurls himself from the fetal/"ball" position, he becomes aggressive to Fiona (will attack her) and also skiddish (avoiding her), growling at her and so-on.

There is other animal cruelty in this game, if you pay attention in a particular area of the game - an enemy can sometimes shoot a rabbit, and if the player is quick - Fiona can actually kick the rabbits.

Due to the gameplay mechanics, it's quite a common thing to accidentally kick Hewie if he walks in front of Fiona during a fight - however some enemies specifically go after him.

It does make me rather sad to see such things in video games, especially on this level and this animal cruelty is included in the backstory of particular characters and is shown in cutscenes (as a fair amount of people have issues against the slaughtering of pigs, the opening shows a pig carcass being chopped up, and others hanging on meat hooks in a damp, dingy cellar that has chains hanging all around, the cellar itself has a fair amount of bloodsplatter too).

Of course, there is a little bit of good - Fiona is actually against animal cruelty and comments on it in-game and responds to it in the game as a huge contrast to the enemies of the game itself. Even though I'd rather animal cruelty wasn't in games, I'd prefer to see characters responding, such as we see with Fiona freeing Hewie instead of "Shoot this, get a reward! =D", which doesn't exactly provide a good general outlook on animal cruelty which can be influenced by many things (not saying that "video games are bad influences", just they can be rather good influences on people and having animals being saved for a good reason can be memorable in contrast to as I've mentioned before - the reward factor for either causing harm OR simply killing an animal for the sake of a reward, whether it's an item or a trophy required to platinum a game or not).

That's just my opinion, seeing as I volunteer at animal shelters, search and rescue abandoned animals and rehabilitate abused animals for pets constantly - I do feel disgusted when I see rewards given for animal abuse, even though it may not be mutilating them, rewards are still given for cruelly abusing or killing of an animal without a sheer thought of the animals' perspective (which, you can actually see in Demento literally and visually).

I'd rather see animal abuse in games, be handled with how it's been done (in some parts) of Demento - with Fiona Belli being completely against it.

[Carnivol]

I know that in some games like Mega Man Legends where you can do more then just kick dogs. In fact, in its Japanese counterpart, Rockman DASH, you can not only kick the dog to save a certain female character early in the game, but you can even kick cats, and shoot down birds too with no penalty whatsoever.

Uhm... wasn't it so that you had a hidden reputation meter in Megaman Legends? Where certain choices (and actions, such as animal abuse) will make your armor darker, increasing your attack power or something, but also creating various negative responses from NPCs? I know it was in the second game ('cause I spent a tiny forever kicking a pick to go dark, at least, but I can't remember if it was in the first game too.)

[Shadow Stalker]

What the hell is up with it's eyes?

Possibly added for a creepy effect. ...And "Nightmare Fuel", when it comes to Darkmoon's children.

To get back to the topic on hand, I personally prefer to kill human beings in video-games. I only abuse animals in video-games if they attacked my player character first.

[Rose312]

Possibly added for a creepy effect. ...And "Nightmare Fuel", when it comes to Darkmoon's children.

ya but it's eyes are like...bejeweled lol