As far as fishing games go, Dredge floats along the border of gentle exploration and Lovecraftian horror. In it, you play as the sailor of a broken ship who finds himself reprieve on the docks of the coastal town of Greater Marrow. Aided by the mayor, the sailor is able to fix his boat and start fishing for the town.
Sailing across the open world archipelago, he sees and hears things he can’t explain. Sounds and lights across the water, aberrations, and monsters from the deep reaching out to take him under. As he works to repay his debt, he gains abilities that help him along the way. Here they are, explained.
10 Light
The first ability that you will come across is one that will help you catch those valuable aberrations, which come at a much better price than normal fish. You see, they only come out at night, but if you’re not careful, or if you sail too far from the lighthouse, you might not find your way back to shore…or to yourself.
Lights can be obtained at the shipyard, where you can use the money you earned fishing to upgrade your ship. Some lights, like the Halogen Lamp, require you to upgrade your storage slots to fit in your inventory, but there are a couple of more options, like the dependable Cloudy Lens, that will do just fine for 20 meters ahead.
9 Foghorn
It’s hard to understand exactly what the Foghorn does in a game where you want to be as stealthy as possible to catch fish and not attract unwanted attention from the many unspeakable horrors of the big blue deep, but there is a handy use for it after all.
One of the earliest monsters you meet in Dredge is the Ghost Boat, which turns out to be a rather oversized Angler Fish that capsizes your ship. Obviously, you want to stay very still and turn off the lights until it hopefully passes you by.
But if you can’t tell where it is roaming and you need to go out at night, the Foghorn will almost always stimulate a response, letting you know where it’s lurking.
8 Spyglass
In Dredge, fish usually hang out in schools. This means that each group of fish is likely the same type, and they’re scattered across spots of disturbed water all over the surrounding waters.
You can usually glean which type of fish it is once you drop your fishing line because a cutout shape will appear showing its silhouette.
Using a Spyglass, you can spot areas of disturbed water from a distance and find out which type of fish it may be, without having to sail all the way over there and drop a line. This helps you strategize your catch and save time on your fishing trips.
7 Crab Pot
Crab Pots are another fishing device that will give back in multitudes if you deploy it in the right locations, and maintain it. Like the Trawl Net, you need to make sure you don’t forget where you put it, and it also requires a bit of knowledge of the surrounding sea.
It can, however, catch you some valuable crab types early on in the game that you can sell for a great price, or catch for a special order. There are several types of Crab Pots available for you to purchase as you progress in the game, and some of them are great at catching other types of deep sea creatures that will prove equally valuable, in one way or another.
6 Trawl Net
One way to double your catch is to install a Trawl Net, which enables you to passively fish a spot of water without having to be there. All you have to do is deploy it in the right location and wait.
When strategized, you can catch specific types of fish to complete side quests to earn more money or valuable collectibles, or you can make it so no day is wasted as you follow the trail of an adventure.
The Trawl Net requires some research parts to unlock, but once it’s available, you can use it to catch the valuable but elusive Aurora Jellyfish.
5 Bait
Bait is an interesting ability to unlock because you can drop it by the side of the boat and create a fishing spot wherever you are. You can do this with the help of the Airman, a character you will meet on your journey somewhere along the Twisted Strand.
There, you can bring him a good catch, and he will slice it up into bait and use it to kill the psychedelic Mind Eaters. He will then share some of it, and the ability, with you.
4 Haste
Haste, and all the abilities that follow, are supernatural abilities that the collector from the Blackstone Isle will award you when you help him dredge up his prized items. This magical ability will speed up your ship across the water for a limited time at the expense of your engine overheating.
While this ability may be wisely used to run from predators in your pursuit or make it back home in the case of an engine breaking, it can overload your engine if you don’t pace yourself and leave you helpless in the middle of the sea, often far away from shore.
3 Atrophy
Atrophy is an interesting ability, mostly because we don’t exactly know how it works, or why it works the way it does. Allowing you to instantly harvest all fish in a fishing spot with a high chance of aberrations, Atrophy also makes it so the fish decay much faster, which means you have to make it back to shore as fast as you can or lose your catch.
This ability can be useful when you have other things you need to be doing, or if you already spent too much time out at sea following a quest and don’t want to make it back home empty-handed. It can also help you get that upgrade you want a lot faster than the good old way of spending a few days fishing and then sailing back to sell your catch.
2 Banish
Banish is arguably the most useful magical ability you will acquire because it will help you ward off nearly all monsters in the nick of time.
This includes the pesky birds who swoop in and steal your catch but does not include some of the biggest monsters in the game. These, you will just have to outmaneuver yourself.
It only works for a really short time, though, so be quick on your feet and get as far as you can from the source of threat, at least long enough for the ability to cool down so you can use it again.
1 Manifest
Another magical ability that will help you get away from predators is Manifest. This one, though, is just as useful against the big ones, because it gets you immediately out of the way by teleporting you and your ship back to Blackstone Isle.
The way it’s built, it makes you think that the collector used it himself one time, and then makes you wonder why he stopped. The ability is a really handy option though, because you can’t always outrun some of the creatures that will cross your path…or seek you out.