Screenshots
Watch trailer on Steam ↗The Things Left Behind
Information Experience Lab · Published by Information Experience Lab · Official site ↗
Last updated 28 Sept 2026
A narrative-driven 2D indie game composed of short slice-of-life vignettes exploring queer and disabled experiences through conversation, exploration, and gentle interactive moments. Each level is co-designed and created by queer and disabled developers, grounding every story in lived experience.
Indie, Free To Play, Early Access, Casual · More free games
About this game
The Things Left Behind is a narrative-driven 2D indie game built from short, intimate slice-of-life vignettes about queer and disabled life.
In this game you move through everyday moments shaped by care, honor, humor, intimacy, and connection. Each self-contained level invites you to explore, talk, notice, and interact gently with the world around you. The experience centers on presence.
Experience Quiet, Playable Moments
Move through a child’s birthday party as sound builds and imagination becomes grounding.
Walk beside someone through a forest where conversation, collecting small objects, and subtle visual shifts reflect intimacy and transition.
Navigate a chaotic morning where tasks overlap and time feels slippery, capturing the experience of overstimulation and survival.
Each vignette stands on its own, with distinct art styles, mechanics, and tone. Together, they form a growing collection of playable experiences grounded in lived reality.
Designed Around Care
• Narrative-driven 2D gameplay
• Short, self-contained vignette structure
• Dialogue and exploration-focused interaction
• Distinct art styles and mechanics per level
• No fail states, no score pressure
• Keyboard, mouse, and controller support
• Built in Unity
A Community-Centered Design Process
The Things Left Behind is created through partnerships with disability and LGBTQ+ organizations that support workforce development and inclusive creative practice. Collaborators are brought into the project from the beginning. Partners begin by learning Unity-based game development, contributing to design and narrative decisions, and participating in playtesting and iteration. This is not a game about marginalized communities made from the outside. It is a game co-designed and built by queer and disabled creators, with paid roles, mentorship, and shared authorship embedded into the process. The result is a project where lived experience shapes not only the stories, but the mechanics, pacing, and emotional tone.
System Requirements
Will my PC run this? →Minimum
- OS: Windows 10 or newer
- Processor: Dual-core 2.0 GHz
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: Integrated graphics (Intel HD 4000 or equivalent)
- Storage: 1 GB available space
- Sound Card: Any
- VR Support: N/A
Supported Languages
Latest news
AnnouncementsOfficial
Developer Diary #2 — When Story and Gameplay Click
I think the biggest breakthrough for me was when the narrative, art, and gameplay finally started to click together.Early on, it felt like I was juggling a bunch of separate pieces. I had a story I cared about and gameplay that worked, but they didn’t quite feel like they belonged to the same game.There were a lot of moments where something technically worked, but just felt… off. Instead of pulling you further into the experience, it pulled you out of it. That was frustrating, especially because everything was being built at the same time. Changing one thing often meant rethinking a bunch of others.At some point, though, it started to come together.The gameplay began to feel less like something sitting on top of the story and more like an extension of it—like you were actually playing through the narrative instead of just watching it. That shift was really satisfying.A lot of the process came down to making small adjustments over and over and trusting that eventually everything would land in the right place.And it did.Read full article on Community Announcements (LostMyDoodleBear)AnnouncementsOfficial
Developer Diary #1 — Making Queer Chaos Feel Playable
This is the first in a series of developer and creator diaries for The Things Left Behind. Through these posts, we want to share honest insight into the creative process behind the game, the struggles, breakthroughs, frustrations, and moments of pride that shaped development along the way. Our goal is here is not only to document the journey, but also to give back to the community by sharing what we’ve learned, while uplifting and giving voice to the creative team behind the project.This first diary comes from Lanxin, a team lead and developer on the project, reflecting on the development of “Harried” and the redesign of the Make Breakfast minigame. Lanxin is a cozy-game lover, kitchen experimenter, occasional dancer, and collector of cute little joys in everyday life.I really love working on Harried (one of our level's names)—it's been such a rewarding experience.When we first started talking about redesigning the Make Breakfast minigame, I was excited, but also nervous.The moment I would say: when I first heard about redoing the Make Breakfast minigame with new development ideas (i love new ideas!), I was honestly overwhelmed. Could I really pull this off in just 1-2 weeks? It felt like a big challenge.Once development started, the biggest hurdle appeared much earlier than I expected.The hardest moment came early on when I was rebuilding the core breakfast mechanics. Something that should have worked just... didn't. I spent the entire day stuck on this bug, going through the code over and over, testing different approaches, copying the old script. It was frustrating, but when I finally figured it out, it felt amazing—like everything suddenly made sense.As the systems became more complicated, the real challenge became making all the distractions interact naturally with each other.Adding the distractions like the spills, ants, and phone notifications turned out to be way more complex than I expected. Each one needed its own clear logic, but the real challenge was ma...Read full article on Community Announcements (LostMyDoodleBear)
