Fishbowl is a slice-of-life narrative game from imissmyfriends.studio, a developer based in Goa, India. You play as Alo, a twenty-one-year-old navigating her first job, a new city, and the grief of losing her grandmother, all while working from home as a video editor. It launched on April 2, 2026, across PC, Mac, PlayStation 5, and Steam Deck.
What is Fishbowl about?
Fishbowl drops you into Alo's daily routine with no combat, no fail states, and no skill checks. The focus is connection and memory. You edit videos for work, stay in touch with friends, family, and coworkers, and go through your late grandmother's belongings to reconstruct fragments of your childhood.
The heart of the game is grief and independence. Alo just relocated to a new city by herself, and the game nails that specific contradiction of being digitally surrounded by people while still feeling alone in an unfamiliar place.
Alo's home workspace in Fishbowl
Where can you play Fishbowl?
Fishbowl released simultaneously across four platforms on April 2, 2026. Here's where you can play it:
The Steam Deck verification happened before launch, meaning the game cleared Valve's full compatibility testing. Controls, text readability, and performance all work properly on the Deck without any tweaking.
Steam Deck verified at launch
How do you access the free demo?
Go to Fishbowl's Steam page and download the demo. No purchase needed. imissmyfriends.studio put out an extended version of the demo on both Steam and PlayStation 5 before the full launch, so you get a substantial preview rather than a five-minute teaser.
If you're on PS5, the demo is available through the PlayStation Store.
Free demo on Steam
What makes Fishbowl different from other narrative games?
Most narrative games build emotional beats around external conflict. Fishbowl flips that. The tension lives entirely in internal and interpersonal territory: balancing work, maintaining long-distance relationships, and processing grief through your grandmother's physical belongings.
The video editing job isn't window dressing. It's how the game establishes Alo's daily structure and grounds her world in something tangible instead of just dialogue trees.
Is Fishbowl worth playing?
The game tackles the loneliness of early adulthood and the weight of grief without turning either into a gameplay gimmick. The free demo is your best tool for figuring out if the pacing works for you before you spend money.
If you connected with games like A Short Hike, Unpacking, or Coffee Talk, Fishbowl occupies similar space: low pressure, high emotional payoff, and designed around a specific human experience instead of genre conventions.
For more narrative game recommendations and the latest releases, browse more guides on GAMES.GG to find your next play.
Quick-start tips for new players
- Try the demo first. The extended demo on Steam and PS5 is generous enough to tell you whether the game's pace works for you.
- Play on Steam Deck if you have one. The verified status means the experience was specifically tested for handheld play, which suits a slow narrative game well.
- Don't rush. Fishbowl is designed around Alo's daily rhythm. Skipping through dialogue or interactions works against the game's intent.
- Sort through everything. The grandmother's belongings are central to the story. Engage with each item rather than treating it as a checklist.