Over the past year, I’ve had a greater appreciation for relaxing with more calming games. Sometimes, I’d rather play something a little more low-key and chilled out than an action game. A Little to the Left hits a rather specific niche that I think games like Unpacking, Powerwash Simulator, and House Flipper all sort of fall into. Specifically, this niche is the concept of gamifying mundane tasks in a way that makes them both engaging and relaxing.

Over a variety of puzzles, A Little to the Left asks you to organize and sort various items. Some puzzles may have up to 3 solutions, while others may only have one. They may range from sorting Tupperware by color, or even sorting a toolbox so that every tool is in its natural place. It can be played entirely via the mouse, and there is even a daily puzzle that is given to you every 24 hours. The holiday season even had seven holiday-themed puzzles, so that may continue for various other holidays as well.

The story for A Little to the Left is largely left to the imagination, but the music and bright colors offer a fun, cute atmosphere anyway. A few of the puzzles are a little on the obtuse side, but there is a hint option that can help you if you are stuck. I only ran into a total of 3 (out of over 50) puzzles that stumped me, even with the hint function.

This was mostly because those puzzles were less about any sort of logical organization and more about symmetry or some other abstract idea that isn’t present in most of the other puzzles. The biggest problem I can see people running into though, is the lack of accessibility options for people with visual impairments. A lot of the puzzles rely on color in order for you to organize things properly, so without a high contrast option or a colorblind mode some puzzles may be fully inaccessible.

A Little to the Left offers a “let it be” function which lets you skip a puzzle. However, that doesn’t solve the issue of not being able to complete it. The hints are decent enough for most of them, but if you can’t see differences in colors, no amount of hints are going to help you. Overall I really like A Little to the Left, but I can see some folks having some issues with it.

I hope future updates provide large amounts of new puzzles as well, since I blew through the main game rather quickly. Maybe an accessibility update could be worked in as well, so that people struggling with various things can adjust settings to make the puzzles more user-friendly. Either way, A Little to the Left is a great, cozy puzzle game to enjoy over an afternoon or a weekend.

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A Little to the Left

$11.99

8

Score

8.0/10

Pros

• Fun Puzzles
• New Daily Puzzle
• Can be Played With Just the Mouse
• Relaxing Gameplay
• Can Skip Puzzles

Cons

• No Colorblind/Visual Accessibility Options
• Short Main-Game Length
• A Few Puzzles are Obtuse Even With Hints