Dredge does not shy away from the horrors that lie just below my fisherman's puny boat. Indeed, my bright daylight hours are filled with gentle fishing to a gentle piano tune, a quaint loop of sailing for prey and selling it to buy upgrades and gear. Then, at dusk, my paranoia is triggered and the dredge bares its monstrous mutated teeth.

Life at Dredge is hellishly Lovecraftian, wonderfully sinister, and effortlessly enjoyable. Things begin simply: my poor unnamed fisherman has sunk his boat near the small island town of Greater Marrow. After being offered a replacement boat and a small debt, I immediately set about fishing.

Actually fishing is relatively simple: when a moving target hits the green zone of Dredge's various mini-games, you press a button to fish. They vary in complexity, from a simple spinning ball to alternating swings between two curved bars. The real challenge is what to do with the catch once it is caught. The fish in the "dredge" come in all shapes and sizes and must be efficiently placed in the tiled vessel's inventory.

A bass made of two tiles can fit almost anywhere, but an L-shaped cod or an irregularly projecting hammerhead shark have to think a little harder about where everything should go. I loved this puzzling gameplay loop in "Dredge" and was forced to strategize how much to deplete each fishing spot before moving on to the next. There are also materials to fish for to upgrade your boat, each of which has a strange shape to them. [Not only that, but tiles are shared by designated slots for equipment and engines. Whether you want to equip your boat to be a lean and mean fishing machine or save precious tiles for more fish and more money, ...... Playing around to maximize my efficiency kept me incredibly busy during my playthrough.

Fish also have a freshness meter that determines how much they sell for. The fresher the fish, the more coins you have in your pocket. The freshness meter is useful in one side quest, but otherwise I found it to be a pointless addition. I was going back and forth so often to sell the fish I caught that I rarely fell into the "stale" or "rotten" reputation.

Before I knew it, I had paid off my debt to the somewhat shady mayor of Greater Mallow and helped some of the residents on various side quests on Dredge. An island not too far away is calling my name, and that's where the real story and all the danger begins.

Scattered on four surrounding islands, relics awaited me, and my objective was to dredge them up and return them to a mysterious collector who lived on an island I was very curious about. Each island has its own peculiar characteristics, Gail Cliff has a giant monster lurking among the rock walls, and Stella Basin has vicious tentacles that will try to destroy my ship if I don't find a way to appease them.

Each island I visit means new fish to catch, new quests to complete, and new dangers to fight. For the most part, I thoroughly enjoyed the challenges each island offered. The most frustrating for me was my first visit outside of Greater Mallow, Gale Cliff. I was most frustrated by the lack of a clear way to deal with the snake-like monsters that appeared every time I tried to venture through the cliff's narrow waters, which were much faster than I was. I had much more fun on the other islands of Dredge, and I fear that Gale Cliffs will be a stumbling block to frustrated players.

There are a few ways to deal with these pesky problems: give the Relic to a collector for a rather strange and mysterious ability. Before heading to Gale Cliffs, you are given the ability to haste, allowing you to speed through the ocean even if your engines are still old and rickety. But this comes at a price. As day and night tick by, the eyes at the top of my screen open from time to time to look around more and more erratically; Dredge has a panic meter, which rears its head as the sun sets and this mysterious force is used.

The more the panic meter grows, the more frightening things become. I begin to hallucinate red-eyed crows swarming my boat. Shadow boats rush toward my boat, or giant monsters emerge from the sea and tear my boat to shreds. Reading some sort of skill book or having lots of lights on the boat somewhat eases the panic at night, but the paranoia still strikes.

Some fish only appear at night, so you have to take risks and push yourself even when you don't want to venture out. As for the dredge, I appreciate this very much, but it could be taken further. The day/night cycle is too short and we play it too safe. When I venture out at sunrise, in just a few minutes I am already fighting the fear of night. With the money, materials, and research parts dredged from the ocean, we can get faster engines and go faster underwater.

It can be a long journey, especially since research parts are few in number and there is a lot of equipment to study. For the most part, however, progression feels fast-paced, and I did about 90% of my upgrades in 20 hours of play. However, given that it takes about half that amount of time to complete the story, even a small increase in the rate at which research parts appear would have made a huge difference.

The fear my poor fishermen have is not just anxiety. Some of my catches are quite different from others, and all the fish in Dredge have twisted and unusual variations, from tame, multi-eyed fish to badly gouged skates with corroded skin and immobile jaws. The Dredge's The art direction is gorgeous anyway, but the horrific moments make it seem strangely even more gorgeous. I loved hunting around for these twisted shapes, and kept playing with them long after the game's short but sweet story credits had rolled.

Its story is also wonderful. The selfish part of me wants more story time to pick things apart. But instead of telling the story face to face, "Dredge" tells the story through the words of NPCs, message bottles floating in the ocean, and strange side quests hidden on small islands. I really enjoyed assembling the pieces through these different paths, and the time-sensitive side quests in particular were of great interest.

None of the quests can be tracked on the map, so you have to rely on the intuition and wisdom of the fisherman to remember where things are. I was able to jog my memory with vague descriptions on the quest board, but most of that was left up to me. I am directionally challenged, so I often forgot where the quests were, but it did allow me to observe my surroundings and find landmarks to get a sense of direction.

For a game that can be completed in 10-15 hours, Dredge is worth sailing through. If you like horror and fun fishing mini-games, this is definitely the game for you. It's not perfect, and throughout the excellent bite-sized experience, there are some frustrating moments that stand out. But that won't stop me from coming back to fill in that twisted encyclopedia and right the wrongs made in one side quest.