DogLife: BitLife Dogs tips and beginner guide

Aakrit Sharma
DogLife promo art

You can enjoy the simulation mechanics of BitLife but play as a dog in DogLife. Here’s a beginner’s guide to all the important features and tasks in DogLife that’ll help you live the happiest virtual life.

Just when we thought BitLife couldn’t get more interesting, the developers came up with DogLife which is a must-try for dog lovers and simulation game enthusiasts. The game works like the original in many ways but the biggest difference is that you’re a dog/cat.

You’re born and have the option to start your journey from a pet shop where someone adopts you. Subsequently, it’s all about exploring new areas, new owners, and making the most of your dog years.

If you’ve just started DogLife, check out this guide for some great beginner tips.

Different animal avatar options in DogLife

How to start a game in DogLife and progress

You start DogLife with a random character unless you’ve paid to choose certain special attributes. You become a dog/cat with a random breed and location. However, you can choose your name, gender, country, city, and habitat (home, street, or shelter).

The goal thereafter is to perform different activities that are available through an option on the right.

You can perform activities and whenever you feel that they’ve been enough for three months, click on the +age option in the middle. With your age, the story moves forward and you’ll meet new people and animals, reach new surroundings, and most importantly, build new relationships.

Animal-human and animal-animal interactions in DogLife

Animal-human interactions

You can Cuddle, Nuzzle, and Lick humans at the outset of DogLife. These actions are available in any habitat including Shelter, Home, and others. You’ll also be able to Sniff but we do not guarantee good results after doing so as sniffing might annoy the humans.

With time, the game will allow you to bark at humans, beg them for food, and seek attention. At the age of nine months (+ age three times), you’ll get all options such as Act Sick, Attack, Hump, Lunge, Mess, Snarl, Spend Time, and Urinate.

The options are self-explanatory and the outcomes largely depend on the setting and the NPC that you’re interacting with. Having said that, do not expect a good outcome after urinating on a human.

Activities during an encounter in DogLife

Animal-animal interactions

At the beginning of DogLife, you can only Sniff other animals and add them to the Scent Tab (a list of all animals you’ve interacted with that allows you to locate them). After six to twelve in-game months, more options like Mate, Attack, Snarl, Lick, Hiss, Seek Attention, and Submit will be available.

Hissing and submitting play a major role in street-based gameplay as these actions will decide if you’ll be the most dominant animal in a fixed area.

You can also eat small animals in the game. The implications can be positive if you gain Respect from other animals in the neighborhood and can be negative if your owner/shelter employee feels disgusted.

What is the ‘In Heat’ mechanic in DogLife

In Heat is a unique status effect for female dogs and cats in DogLife and it signifies their will to mate. This is an imitation of how animal hormones function in real life and you can remove the In Heat effect by mating with other animals or humping a nearby human.

Removing the In Heat effect is necessary as failure to do so can lead to your character’s Happiness reducing. Tap on the Scent tab and choose the amount of hormones you’re releasing. This attracts potential mates and helps in removing the effect.

Do note that humping can remove the effect but at the same time, you might deteriorate the Love stat.

DogLife Scavenging encounter

How do attributes work in DogLife

There are four major attributes in DogLife:

  • Happiness – Showcases if you’re happy with your current life or not. Usually, the goal of the game is to be at your happiest and then maintain it till the end.
  • Health – Showcases your Health Points implying that being at 0% could be game over. It is largely affected when other animals or humans beat you.
  • Cuteness – Decides how attractive you are and impacts the odds of people adopting you.
  • Love – Depends on your relationship with other humans and animals.
  • Respect – Attacking, killing, and eating animals affects Respect. Eventually, this decides your rank in the Dominance Hierarchy charts.

While these are the attributes available to free-to-play players, there are many hidden attributes you can edit with the Top Dogs plan which costs real money like the God Mode in BitLife.

Everything you do in DogLife affects the aforementioned attributes and figuring out the consequences shouldn’t be an issue because of its realism. For instance, having a good bond with your owner will increase Happiness while being thrown out will decrease it.

Similarly, doing Tricks can add to your Cuteness while attacking people can decrease it. Such attribute changes become really important in situations like the Dominance Hierarchy that has been explained below.

Attributes in DogLife

Tricks and their uses in DogLife

It isn’t a surprise that DogLife allows you to learn tricks that help in pleasing your owners and shelter employees, among other humans. Tricks become available after you spend six in-game months and practicing them regularly is recommended.

There are many Tricks and their complexity increases with age. It starts with shaking hands and with some experience, you’ll be opening beer cans with the owners. (yes, DogLife allows its virtual animals to do that).

Tricks are helpful for boosting stats like Love and Relationship if you perform them at the right time and have practiced them enough.

DogLife screen to choose an anima's identity

How to escape your pet store, house, or shelter in DogLife

To escape your home in DogLife, you’ll have to beat mini-games. Escaping the house has a separate mini-game while escaping the shelter or pet store has the same mini-game completion requirement.

The mini-games can be challenging as they’re based on your timing and reflexes. Focus on learning them to enjoy the liberty of leaving your surroundings.

Living on the street in DogLife

The street in DogLife is where you unlock new activities like Scavenge, Sewer, and Wander. Scavenge opens up a new mini-game and completing it grants food and health.

Completing a mini-game that activates upon using the Sewer activity gives you the option of going on a ship and entirely changing your country.

Lastly, Wander lets you go to a new street or return to a former pet store, shelter, or household.

How to become an Alpha Male or Alpha Female in DogLife

You need to be at the top of the Dominance Hierarchy in DogLife to be an Alpha Male or Alpha Female. Dominance Hierarchy is a list of animals near your area which ranks them on their power and authority over others.

The Dominance Hierarchy is different for streets and pet stores as you’ll be competing against a different set of animals. Having said that, going up or down in the rankings still depends on the Respect attribute that is mostly affected by you successfully attacking animals or submitting to them.

Dominance Hierarchy list in DogLife

What is the goal of DogLife?

Now that we’ve covered all the basics including activities, attributes, and habitats, it is a good time to talk about your goal in DogLife.

As a simulation game, DogLife allows you to be who you are. However, if we were to talk about the most advantageous outcomes, they are:

  • Household – Learn tricks and be obedient so that your owners love you. This will boost the Relationship and Love stats.
  • Pet store/ shelter – Do tricks to attract new owners so that they adopt you. Being more playful and learning the best tricks certainly helps in landing up with the best owners.
  • Street – Earn Respect and get to the top of the Dominance Hierarchy. In short, become the Alpha Male and Alpha Female.

Long story short, DogLife is all about Tricks, Activities, Habitat, and Attributes. Everything you do will affect your Attributes which eventually impacts the interaction between you and other NPCs (humans and animals). Clearly, it’s a cycle and messing up one aspect of the game can ruin the entire experience.

With the right strategy, you can be at your happiest towards the end. Or, you can simply cause chaos with attacks and be a bad dog/cat. Neither of these outcomes will make you win or lose the game, which, to be fair, is the point of all simulation titles.

An animal's tombstone in DogLife

This was everything to know about DogLife. If you’re also interested in BitLife, make sure to check out these guides on how to become an Actor or CEO in BitLife.

Image Credits: Candywriter

About The Author

Aakrit is a games writer with over 2000 published articles for EssentiallySports, Sportskeeda, FortniteINTEL, and CharlieINTEL. Currently, he writes guides on Minecraft, Roblox, Pokemon games, Genshin Impact, and Brawlhalla. Aakrit loves playing shooter games and in his free time, you can find him queued up in Valorant, Fortnite, Apex Legends, or Halo Infinite. You can contact Aakrit at [email protected].