Leave Them Outside is a single-player strategy and simulation game set in a post-apocalyptic shelter beneath Kadıköy. Players manage daily operations in Shelter 38, making life-or-death decisions about who enters while maintaining the facility and sending teams into the ruined city above.
Gameplay
The core loop centers on shelter management and moral choices. Each morning a steel shutter opens to reveal a new arrival with a name, story, and documents that may be authentic or forged. Listening to their account and asking questions leads to a decision on whether to admit them or leave them outside. Those allowed inside join the community, handling watches, rations, and dormitory life while developing relationships, illnesses, or conflicts over time.
Expansion happens room by room, increasing the number of machines that require maintenance. Players repair equipment such as the generator by hand, where correct actions keep systems running and errors risk total blackout. Expeditions are planned on a paper map of Kadıköy, with selections of crew members and supplies. Outcomes remain uncertain until the team returns, if it returns at all.
Rules for the door are signed into permanent effect, shaping priorities such as favoring children and the elderly or those able to work. Daily logs track events, yet inconsistencies appear on the missing-person board as notices accumulate. The narrative unfolds across four acts with multiple endings tied to these accumulating choices and hidden elements within the shelter.
Game Modes
No distinct named game modes appear in the available information. The experience remains a single-player simulation focused on sequential decision-making and resource oversight rather than competitive or cooperative variants. Difficulty adjustments or alternative play styles are not specified, leaving the core structure as the primary way to engage with the shelter's systems and story branches.
Key Mechanics and Systems
Resident interactions form a central system. Admitted individuals contribute labor and conversation while revealing personal troubles and opinions that influence group dynamics around the dinner table. Machine repairs demand direct player intervention, linking mechanical skill to survival outcomes. Expedition planning involves resource allocation and risk assessment on the operations map, with results feeding back into shelter supplies and morale.
Rule-making adds lasting consequences. Each signed policy alters entry criteria permanently, affecting who qualifies for admission in future encounters. The Turkish street names ground the setting in a specific locale, yet the arrivals represent a broader human experience, supported by full localization into 34 languages that extends to in-game text elements like stencils and notes.
Is It Worth Playing?
Leave Them Outside suits players interested in narrative-driven simulation and strategy games that emphasize tough decisions over action sequences. The combination of shelter expansion, resident management, hands-on repairs, and expedition risks creates a focused loop centered on consequences that build across four acts. Multiple endings encourage replay to explore different rule sets and admission choices. As an upcoming title with no reviews available yet, its appeal rests on the detailed premise of moral and logistical management in isolation. Those drawn to indie simulations with strong thematic weight on survival ethics and community dynamics will find the described systems align closely with that preference.
