A Little to the Left

Hear me out, now, I know this is a positive review, but man do I have some gripes with this game. First of all, let me get it out of the way first, the game is fine, it's fun, it's addictive somewhat. I even went out of my way to 100% both it and the DLCs although it was more out of a sense of duty than anything else; I wasn't exactly burning at the prospect of paying more money just so that I'd have a free conscience when complaining about it. Some of the puzzles in this game, -if you could even call them puzzles- are so mind-numbingly annoying and counter-intuitive yet simultaniously so minor that I feel like I'm being a nitpicking ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ even though I spent a good 40% of the game being frustrated. But honestly, I can live with that, maybe I'm just stupid and these puzzles are easy. The controls, however, are the most annoying I've ever experienced in a point-and-click game. Sure, on a lot of puzzles you barely even notice them, but on others, they will make your life miserable. For example, one of the first puzzles in the game has you sort a bunch of gray-coloured pencils. The amount of precision you need to successfully sort the pencils without missing the (barely visible) marks on the table is comedic. Speaking of sorting things you have to pick them up, and while you pick them up, you have your HUGE, SOLID COLOUR cursor blocking your view so if you need to closely examine an item for its details, better hope you can see it while it's on the floor, at an angle and 9 times out of 10 obscured by other objects (side-note, I don't know if there are settings in this game that change this so that maybe the cursor is transparent. but to be completely fair, it should've automatically been set at like 50 or 75 % opacity). Another puzzle near the end of the game requires you to allign some candles by burning or unburning (it makes sense in-game, kinda) them, the problem is that you have to time it JUST right so that they are all the same height, one wrong move and you get the other solution to the puzzle which is to allign them from tallest to shortest. Speaking of accidentally finding solutions to puzzles, if you want to 100% this game without using hints, be ready to accidentally solve a puzzle, reload, accidentally solve it again, reload, and accidentally solve it a third time. It's honestly so annoying and obnoxious, your mouse cursor is grayed out, you can't interact with anything, you hear that oh-so-tranquil "ding", the star screen pops up... and then you realise that nothing has changed. And this is even worse if a puzzle has like 5 solutions because then it'll happen all the time, even if you aren't actively trying to input a solution, you could be randomly organising the items you have at your disposal and you'll just randomly solve it. This has unironically the simplest solution, once a puzzle has been solved, just make it so that you can't solve it the same way anymore, the only reason I can come up with for them to not have it in the game is if the people they had playtesting the game all had dementia and already forgot they solved the puzzle a certain way and then kept asking "why isn't this working? it makes perfect sense", except, that doesn't even make sense, because even if you give up and try to use a hint, you have to SLOWLY open the menu, click on "hint", watch the menu SLOWLY transition to the hint page, do the stupid ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ minigame where you use the eraser (which, might I add, is only fun the first, maybe even second time you do it), then realise it's a solution you've already found, turn the page over, do the same minigame again, find the solution, close the hint menu SLOWLY, close the normal menu SLOWLY and then try and remember every detail of the hint. Good luck if you have ADHD. Also, some of the colour-themed puzzles really need a good eye for detail, thankfully the game has a colour-assist mode, but it still sucks how I kept asking myself: "Am I colourblind?" while playing this. And don't even get me started on the Daily Tidy, I believe that any game that requires you to log in to do a daily mission or challenge or whatever for an achievement is proof that the devs are insecure about the replay value of their game and result to cheap tricks like this. It's even more annoying when you have to do it for 100 days. Thankfully, you don't have to do it for 100 days straight (i believe you only need to do it for 30 days straight for a similar achievement). Also ♥♥♥♥ the calendar puzzles. I've, more than once, solved them by following the pattern but because I didn't realise that the only correct way to solve them is by ignoring the already set-up patterns and instead calculate the exact spacing between days to place the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stickers, I had to follow a tutorial some nice lady posted on youtube (you'll be in my shoes eventually, you'll find her). Another thing, I don't know if this was intentional, but the cat segments are so perfectly placed, that every time I encounter the thing I am at peak aggression, which has, in turn, Pavloved me into hating it with every fiber of my being, which means that I get angry at the mere reference of a cat in this game, and believe me, there are a LOT of cat references in this game. I also think the ending sequence goes on for way too long. As a final note I would like to add that the base game with no DLCs is not worth its current price tag of 14.99€ (or 14.99$ (or 165,000₫)), I feel it would be better if the base game was 7.99€ (or 7.99$ (or 85,000₫)) I'd just wait for the game to go on sale if I was you (which I did, by the way) You might be asking after all that, why am I giving this game a positive review? Well, to be completely honest, I do like the game, it's a fun way to pass the time, I do enjoy the some of the puzzles (drawer puzzles, mainly, those are the most replayable part about this game), am I ever going to play this game again after the 100%? probably, but it'll be a while until then, and I will probably just stick to the drawer puzzles, but I got a good 20 hours out of this game regardless so, who cares? Overall, I'd like to bestow upon A Little To The Left the highest possible honour 6 annoying puzzle types out of 10

I wish there were 2 different modes for this game: One, where you do the puzzles as intended, and one where you do them your way. This is one of the bigger organizing games, which is great, but I was quite sad that I couldn't put things the way I wanted. For example, one puzzle I put away jewelry, and I wanted to organize it by color. However, the level would then not finish because we were °supposed° to organize the rings by something else (don't want to spoil). That sadly makes it less relaxing and fun for me, and more like a guessing game of what is expected. This is also why the hints weren't very good for me because I only wanted a nudge, not the complete solution. I think having an optional "soft hint", which could literally just be one word, e.g. "color", "shape", etc. would have been better, if I am supposed to stick to specific expectations. I also wasn't too fond of the cats. Don't get me wrong, pets of any kind are cute, but if I spend a long time organizing something, and then someone comes in to undo my work, that isn't very funny to me, it is more upsetting. I also feel that the "cat break levels" should have maybe been separate, as I wanted to organize things, and not pet a kitty, otherwise I would have played a simulator. I bought the DLCs, and liked the Drawer one best because it was literally just organizing drawers, cupboards, and alike. However, I do wish the levels would have been bigger or more complex, i.e. had more items. The Star DLC was sadly a bit disappointing, as I expected there to be some link to astrology, astronomy, stars, that kind of thing, but a lot of levels had nothing to do with either. I think it should have probably had a different name. Overall, the game is nice because it is as big as it is, but I wish I had more freedom to actually tidy up, unless it's a toolbox etc., where items need to go into specific slots. I will recommend it, but be aware that you are very bound.