Something is Wrong With My Dog: Beginner Survival Tips

Your first night in Something is Wrong With My Dog will probably end badly — that is the game working as designed. These eight tips are what experienced players wish they knew on night one.

1. Do not play muted. Half of this game's horror is audio — the tells before scares are sound cues, and muted players are effectively playing hard mode. Headphones if you can stand it; speakers if you cannot.

2. Take the first death as tuition. The game's jumpscare economy is calibrated around first-night deaths. Once you know what the scare looks like, the second night is a different game.

3. Finish your business, then sleep. The sleep mechanic rewards a simple rhythm: interact with everything the phase offers, then rest. Sleeping with open threads is how runs end early.

4. Treat the dog well before anything happens. The game watches your early behavior, and the endings branch on it. Play your first run the way you would actually treat your dog — it is also the optimal strategy.

5. Solo for learning, co-op for chaos. Learn the loop solo where your choices are readable; bring the 8-player session after, when you can carry the group. Co-op is the best version of this game and the worst classroom.

6. Open doors are unfinished business. If the game lets you close it, close it. The house's state at each sleep boundary is the game's report card.

7. Read your badge case as a map. The 18 badges (tracked here) show which tier you are neglecting — survival, investigation, or endings. Let the empty tier pick your next run's goal.

8. Chase endings one lever at a time. Between runs, change one thing — a different object, a different sleep choice. The endings hub explains why variable control is the difference between 3 endings and 10.