Reel Fishing (PlayStation)

CNET editors' rating: 0.5 stars Abysmal
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Overall score: 1.4 (0.5 stars)
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Gamespot editors' review

• Reviewed by: Josh Smith
• Reviewed on: 05/12/1998
• Updated on: 05/02/2000
• Released on: 03/31/1998

Whether you love real fishing or not, you'll probably hate Reel Fishing. No matter how patient you are, the sheer shallowness of this game will probably lull you into a catatonic state. Primarily FMV-driven, with otherwise stupid, deficient graphics, and perhaps the most repetitive gameplay to ever retard the potential of the PlayStation, Reel Fishing is really a dog.

For the most part, play involves two different screens, the first of which treats potential fishmasters to video of a real-life fishing hole, complete with unmoving camera, incessant nature sounds, and plodding new age music! Superimposed over this are little, solid, black squiggles (the lurking fish) and a very low-res vertical yellow line (the pole). This is honestly one of the silliest-looking interfaces on the PlayStation. There's just something inherently cheap and embarrassing about mixing graphical media. Once you cast your line and wait for a bite, you switch to screen two, which is underwater, and features more video (of the river bottom scrolling by), another low-res-looking fishing line, and much-improved fish graphics. This time the fish looks quite real, but it's only capable of maybe six different moves and switches from one animation to another (for example, swimming peacefully with the hook in its mouth, thrashing around and trying to break free) with amateurish jerkiness.

Reel Fishing is certainly lacking in the gameplay department. In fact, there are few moments when you're afforded the opportunity to intervene in the game at all. Now, some would say that's in keeping with the spirit of the real thing. Offering a game that demands that you leave the controls alone and let nature take its course is more... uh... natural. In practice, this is a terrible mistake. After casting your line in screen one, you spend a fair amount of time waiting for something to bite. This is excusable. Once you enter screen two, however, control proves entirely lacking. It's the same every time - it doesn't matter how many times you play it, what sort of fish is biting, or where you are: The fish approaches from the right, takes the bait, and starts swimming to the left (in profile). At the precise moment of its bite, you must push X to set the hook in its mouth, after which you must release all buttons or lose the fish. A tedious game of cat and mouse ensues. Your sole role in landing the thing is to push X when it slows down, which causes it to turn and swim to the right, and release X in favor of the D-pad (which may be pressed up, down, or right, with identical results) to keep the line taut when the fish flips out and starts thrashing around. Then, it will swim left again (release all buttons), until it tires and you can resume pressing the X button. You repeat this simple pattern until the fish is caught. That's it. All of gameplay. For level after level. The fish always swims to the left when it's feeling perky and to the right when it's tired. We spend most of the time looking blankly at the screen, doing next to nothing.

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• 3.0 stars

  "Loved the Tediousness of It!"

  on October 1, 2004

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