The ocean on its surface can be incredibly beautiful, calming and a powerful reminder of how wonderful nature can be. But then under the surface, that’s a whole other story, and in the deepest recesses of what covers 80% of the planet, lies an otherworldly, bleak, and frightening realm of darkness and horrors. Yeah, just Google Deep-Sea Fish and prepare to have nightmares for the week! I guess what I’m saying is that even a seemingly innocent and cute-looking fishing game, can harbour a dark and sinister heart. Thus, Dredge enters the frame to deliver both a soothing, labour of love with neat fishing mechanics and a twisted surreal voyage of the damned where the unknown awaits in the deep.
What is Dredge?
Dredge poises itself as an open-world fishing game, with an ominous undertone, where players will explore and fish in a seemingly beautiful ocean region for riches and rewards. The game opens with our nameless sailor crashing their boat and almost facing certain death before being rescued by a local community. The mayor of this community welcomes you and presents a new trawler to go out and fish with, providing you repay the debt and give something a little extra. One thing leads to another, and soon a whole region of fishing opportunities opens, with requests coming in to find exotic species of fish, recover sunken treasure, and look for missing persons. But as you build a reputation as a professional fisherman, does the evil undercurrent and demonic fishes soon emerge.
By exploring the world, you’ll discover new villages, wrecks, and fishing spots, but unravel a grand mystery at the heart of the ocean. Upon the sea are plenty of strange occurrences, even stranger people to meet and of course, all manner of horrific creatures you’ll capture to sell on for a profit. While the world appears all beautiful and calm, there is much darkness about it, especially if you venture out at night. Fish the sea, sell your catches, upgrade your boat, and explore the vast wilds of the ocean … and be sure not to be eaten by the monstrous creatures that lurk below the surface.
A Fisherman’s Life for Me!
Things start off relatively innocent enough, as you do some fishing locally for the community known as The Marrows, and soon enough you make a name for yourself. Paying off your debt is done quickly, and once it's settled, new ventures come to be. One so the venture is helping a rather aggravated loner look for 5 relics. Why does he want these? Who knows, but you seem all the happy to help no matter the cost. So aside from gaining your rep as the best fisherman, upgrading your new boat and earning some serious cash, you’re on the lookout for 5 strange relics, with the promise of obtaining some cool abilities in return.
As you expand your fishing routes and look for the artefacts, you’ll uncover more of the shady goings on with each of the remote communities, the troubled pasts of the ghost towns, and those who have dealt with the darker depth of the water.
Dredge is pure Lovecraftian fluff in all the best possible ways but does a fantastic job at setting up a rather peaceful and blissful outset, which when you chip away at bit by bit, reveal something much more disturbing. The main plot is somewhat fragmented, and only really develops towards the very end, but the world itself and all the points of interest are what fleshes out Dredge into an utterly compelling tale.
You’ll meet a host of new faces who are either oddly pleasant and helpful, or fearfully protective when it comes to strangers like you asking questions. There are fishing villages long abandoned, and no one knows why, communities on the brink of starvation, and sailors lost at sea who have claimed gigantic beasts and ghostships have taken their crew. Dredge has it all, and it’s all wonderfully creepy and fascinating to discover.
This is the bleak heart of Dredge and how it captivates you further into the world. The oddities of the ocean and strange occurrences are quite fascinating and strangely enough, complement the calming fishing gameplay rather well. I thoroughly enjoyed the sense of discovery, speaking with residents in each community, performing the odd job here and there and seeing what would happen if I went further out. The various messages in bottles also provide some context on what is happening out at sea and what you should be afraid of, in the same vein as the warning messages/documents in any good Resident Evil game.
I was quite fine with there being no major story beats or a deeply personal journey constantly being shoved in my face as the world provided enough miniature stories, strange events and interesting supporting characters that made the world feel wholly alive and engaging to me. Everything does link up together and the ends with a neat little twist, feeling quite gratifying considering the dark, underlying tone.
I do wish however there were some more messed up, cosmic horror bits that would come about and freak me out. I do love the creepiness of the night-time ventures, and the strange events here and there, but nothing truly escalates into mind f*** territory. I would have loved to discover an old fishing village, where everyone is turning into fish people, or that some of the people you befriend become corrupted by some unknown force, soon to become ill and maybe even worse become a monster.
There is an instance early in the game where you deliver strange parcels to a dock worker, who soon becomes ill and almost becomes a zombie. However, even at the end of the game, there is no new development and no exciting conclusion to follow. It’s a shame, as it could have been a cool side quest to track him down after he leaves the town and discover he has become a sea creature of some kind. There needed to be more of this, more meaningful side quests that really evoked the Lovecraftian horror.
Dredge’s dark side is there and indeed some neat ideas are planted, but nothing really excels into truly monstrous. It feels very PG-13 and slightly afraid to deliver on any true oceanic horror gore. But what Dredge offers is quite a surreal and engaging experience regardless, with its seemingly cute overlay, that conceals a dark underbelly which is neat to see when it rears its ugly head.
Dredging the Depths for that ultimate catch
The core of Dredge sounds perfectly simple but overall presents a satisfying and highly rewarding gameplay loop. Along with some neat otherworldly touches which amplify the intensity of the darker sections of the game.
As the captain of the newly acquired trawler, your day-to-day routine will consist of sailing out to various fishing spots, getting your catches of the day, along with any loot and resources, and heading back to the local town for the evening to sell your catches and upgrade your ship. Also, most importantly to rest which every fisherman needs. But being told to rest up at night might be due to all manner of horrors that lurk out in the open ocean when the sun sets. Best not to travel too far unless you fancy a chance of facing the creeping unknown.
What Dredge offers is quite a classic gameplay loop which many roguelikes and various crawlers grasp due to it’s gratifying and enriching sense of progression. You start off small, with a boat which is incredibly slow, and only a simple fishing pole which can catch fish in shallow water. As you make your small catches, you earn enough to acquire a faster engine, a fishing net, a brighter light and better means to go further and further out, even to brave the endless darkness of the night.
There is a bit of repetition, but the loop itself from day to day is short, and sweet and will keep you coming back for more. I will admit, I did lose track of time on multiple instances as I sailed out, caught my fair share of catches and came back in the nick of time, before the darkness could engulf me. And that thought of the dreaded night presenting new threats and evils kept me unnerved as the time vanished while fishing.
The sense of progression is immense, as you work towards bettering your ship and gear, to be able to do more, explore further and discover more horrors. There is a multitude of fish to catch, with many species needing specialist gear to do so. Wanting to go out further towards the corners of the region will mean you need a better engine that will take you there quickly, and more importantly, get your day-to-day job done quicker. As nighttime brings about a whole heap of wonderous evils.
The thought of being out at night was unsettling and being out after dark early in the game was utterly terrifying. As night falls, your sanity meter comes into play, and being out too long, or having too many sleepless nights will cause you to become more erratic and unhinged. The more unhinged you are, the more dangers present themselves. My favourites were the rocks that would appear out of nowhere, and the creepy ghost ships that would lure you in with their foghorn and come in for a devastating attack. The night was just a thrill ride, and it does present some great rewards if you dare venture out for the more exotic kinds of fish.
I always got a kick from finding the weird abominations while fishing, and just reeling these ugly mothers from the ocean bed gave me chills throughout the campaign.
Aside from fish, you can scavenge up useful resources such as metal parts, wood, and research token, which will upgrade your ship from a simple trawler to the beast of the ocean. You can research new gear, from rods that will fish the deepest parts of the ocean, to specialised nets that gather fish in the most troubled of waters. Your ship can also see several makeovers, allowing for more storage, better lights, and more equipment/rods to be installed. It’s truly a remarkable sense of accomplishment when you work, risk your life fishing out in the dark, and gather everything you need to build a better ship.
I did manage to unlock every upgrade for my ship, research all new equipment and have the best ship overall about two-thirds of the way into the main game. Once I had done everything, I felt a little disappointed that catching fish and earning money had no real purpose anymore. It was cool to still go out and fish, but I felt there could have been easily another tire of gear or ship upgrades to work towards easily.
I was also a little underwhelmed by the sense of consequence and how the night-time loses a little of its lustre when you have a half-decent ship. You can breeze through from port to port and avoid most of the main dangers. And what I feared most was losing out on gear, upgrades or rewards I had unlocked, but instead, when you take too much damage be it otherworldly or not, you just die and restart from the last checkpoint. I don’t know why, but having some rogue-like elements here would have worked wonders in my opinion. Once I had experienced death, the fear of the fog, darkness and unknown horrors lost a bit of its street cred.
However, you will still have to deal with the sanity meter, and those pesky rocks. And I did still love egging on the ghost ships to chase me as I fled or made my mad dash to the nearest port. It’s a great concept and I still enjoyed the thrill of being stuck out at night in a place I didn’t fully map out in my mind.
The ocean of endless eyes, and unspeakable horrors
Speaking of which, you will venture to some interesting locations, five main hubs in total with various outposts and islands to discover. In the centre are The Marrows, which is split up into town settlements. Fairly innocent looking, with just the touch of sinister goings-on to pique your interest and will be your main go-to for selling loot and story events. There are four other locations, each with its own unique look, rewards, and dangers. There’s a seemingly beautiful island which is made up of a tall cliff, jagged rocks, and a circular maze home to a massive nasty fish which scared the s*** out of me when I first saw it. There’s a tropical region, with another big, nasty creature at the heart of it, which will reach for you if you venture over it.
Then we have a remote volcanic island, littered with ruins, and engulfed in ash, which was once home to a menacing cult but is now just a hollow, decaying shell with some horrible beasts roaming the waters. Lastly is a twisted swarm, where giant brain-like creatures suck the life force out of any unfortunate visitors. I have to say all of these locations were really cool to discover and explore, with each of them having compelling backstories, neat characters to meet and cool objectives to complete. Again, maybe a little more could have been done with each location to add more objectives, or dynamic events, but nevertheless, they’re still a lot of fun to venture off to and overcome their challenges.
Dredge does a fine job at giving players plenty to do for the most part, as you will discover random events such as finding stranded sailors and being asked to help those who wish to run away from the local town which is becoming more and more corrupt. Or even finding a stranded dog and having to build their trust so you can take them somewhere safe (and yes, you can pet the doggo, bonus point for Dredge!). Or even the many shrines that require special actions and fish to open a heap of rewards, and the gnarly giant crabs that would just pop up and smash your weak point for massive damage (yes, that was a reference to something nearly 20 years ago, I am that old). As previously mentioned my only gripe with the side stuff was that, some quests didn’t evolve as much as I had hoped, and just ended at a point which left me wanting more.
I was utterly thrilled with what Dredge had to offer and discovering all its many secrets made me wish there was more. I can see that if there is a Dredge 2, the developers could indeed go bigger and bolder, and I would absolutely love that.
Overall? I have to say that Dredge, while lacking in a couple of areas, is a phenomenally good game. The concept alone is something that should gain your interest, but the Lovecraftian elements, relaxing and rewarding gameplay, mixed in with the more intense and brutal gameplay, will surely and thoroughly engage throughout its 8-to-10-hour campaign. The art style is beautiful (and a perfect mask for the true horrors of the game), the sinister elements creepy and utterly captivating, the gameplay loop immensely enjoyable and the sheer fun of exploring is some of the best I’ve done this year. Dredge gets a high recommendation from me, and I surely hope the developers are working on Dredge 2 as I write this glowing review.
++ Immense world to explore, filled with cool discoveries.
++ Great Lovecraftian horror elements
+ Engaging and rewarding gameplay loop and fishing management.
+ Cool night-time scares and side discoveries
- More horror/side story elements could have been implemented
- More research/upgrade options are needed to flesh out the final act of the game
An Xbox Series X/S and Steam review key of Dredge were provided by the publisher, Team 17, for the purpose of this review.
