Game Review - Dredge (no DLC)

Game Review: Dredge (no DLCs) by Black Salt Games and published by Team17 Digital

Score: +4/-0

"DREDGE is a single-player fishing adventure with a sinister undercurrent. Sell your catch, upgrade your boat, and dredge the depths for long-buried secrets. Explore a mysterious archipelago and discover why some things are best left forgotten."

Every year during Christmas, the Epic Games Store gives away a bunch of games for free on a daily basis (normally they give one away weekly on Thursdays). They've repeated various titles over the years but this is the first time I've seen Dredge, and of the new offerings in the holiday season of 2024, I feel this was definitely the winner.

Dredge is one half cozy game, one half not-scary eldritch horror story, and overall for its style and scope, does both quite well.

At the same time, if you're expecting the usual cozy game vibe, you won't find it here. If you're expecting a good scare from horror elements, you won't find it here either.

+1 Cozy mechanics

• If you want to play the game just as a "cozy game", going around fishing with line, net, or crab pots, you can with no time pressure to do anything at all.
• Mechanics are easy and the minigames are somewhat optional.
• For example, you don't have to play the minigame to reel in fish if you don't want to, it'll just take more time. You do have to play the minigame for dredging however.
• Little bit of Tetris in inventory space management.

+1 Refreshing setting for cozy games

• Unlike most "cozy" games, this one isn't about gardening, harvesting, bug catching or the "usual" activities. It's about fishing. Cozy games do also have fishing but not in the same commercial fishing type setting.

-0 Ambiance undermines the cozy aspect

• Unfortunately Dredge is also part horror-story so there is an eerie / depressing / tense undercurrent everywhere even if you discount the assorted water hazards (that can be turned off with a "passive mode" option).
• So if you're expecting a relaxing cozy game, it could satisfy but it'll be missing that "sunshiny positivity" vibe that you might have come to expect from cozy games.
• I'm not taking a point away here because going in, you already know this is going to be an eldritch horror story. That's not something you find out later to ruin your cozy game vibe.

-0 Artwork is only so-so. It's pretty low-quality low-polygon but it gets the job done without being demanding on development resources. It may be rather disappointing but really a lot of cozy games don't have AAA-game quality and hardware demands and do tend toward being cartoony anyway.

-0 No voice acting. Basically just "mm-hmm"| type noises from the various characters. This is in line with the simpler artwork but really a lot of cozy games don't have AAA-game resources or full voice either.

+1 Interesting and different regions

• The base game without looking for the alternate ending takes maybe 20 hours if you do it in a leisurely, non-optimal way and throw in some side quests. During this time you are taken to various zones, each with its own distinct character, so your hours spent won't be monotonous.

+1 The story can be deeper than you think -- and a lot longer.

• If you simply follow the main story quests you get a somewhat predictable eldritch horror type story, just without any jump scares.
• But if you really explore, you can discover the alternate ending and "what's really going on", though it will take a lot more time because it's essentially unguided (internet spoiler guides excluded).
• So for those who want to keep playing, there's plenty to do and a lot more gameplay hours even without the DLC.