Goldentoe's Full Review: Reel Fishing for PlayStation 1
Yes that's right, fishing on the Playstation, now before you run off and buy it out of your excitement you may want to let the adrenaline run out of your system and sit down and actually read my review before you do anything rash. In my pursuit to have a extremely diverse collection of games I bought this game hoping to find a gem. Reel Fishing didn't really disappoint but it didn't really bring any of the fun of actually fishing to the home console. You can't enjoy just setting and enjoying your surroundings with a friend and occasionally getting a nibble, and you can't really brag about how big of a fish you got, because simply no one would care. In essence this game is best used as an atmosphere for the TV, much like those videos of fireplaces this game is best just left running, so you can look at the pretty scenery and listen to the sound of the bristling brook while you try to go to sleep.
The graphics in Reel Fishing is its strongest asset. All 7 of the fishing locations are picture perfect. They are all believable fishing locations, the environments are quite static though, since you can't move or look anywhere other than the one screen that you have to fish on. Other than the fact that the game makes it pretty believable that the water is actually moving it gets pretty boring looking at the same picture for half-hour periods. When you get a bite it switches to an underwater scene that also look pretty good, with rocks or moss on the bottom with (but I've never seen a lake so shallow).
The sounds are very good at making you go to the bathroom every half-hour. With trickling and tinkling of brooks and streams very realistically recreated. There is no music to speak of in Reel Fishing which is a good thing considering it would just sound stupid if it did. The fishing action actually sounds as believable as it could, which isn't exactly a thrilling sound.
The control is pretty hard to get a hold of considering that it is fishing. With three different types of fishing to try to master, bait fishing, fly fishing or lure fishing it will take a while to master. The most challenging part of the whole game is the fact that you have to play the fish almost perfectly every time or you'll end up losing all your good lures (or bait or flies) to the fish that have a nasty tendency of getting away with your stuff. You have to play these fish for a very long time even if you use every trick in the book they still don't wear out and take a very long time to catch them (I in the real world have never had to fight a fish as long and hard as in this game, maybe their just super fish that I have never run into).
The base of the gameplay in Reel Fishing is trying to accomplish a preset goal in each stage, like catching 10 trout or catching a 15.0 lbs. bass to unlock the next fishing area (you start out with only one available fishing area). Once you have unlocked all the stages then you go back and try to complete even higher goals, there are a total of three goals in each stage, that I was able to conquer in a surprisingly short time (I beat the game in less than a day). Of course you can always continue to fish, but since you will have already caught the biggest fish in the pond there is no real incentive to continue fishing. Even if you do catch a bigger fish you don't get rewarded or anything for it, and trust me you won't get many bragging rights for catching a big fish on the Playstation. The game also includes two aquariums for you to bring in your fish you caught to watch them grow, or in my case die. No matter what I did I would get the same results with ever fish, they would either be "miserable" or "deceased". The fish in the aquarium are to picky and are simply not worth the effort (yippie I get to watch a fish swim, fun), plus if I were to choose a virtual pet it sure as hell wouldn't be a fish.
Reel Fishing is quite possibly the best fishing game out there, but the fact that it is fishing really doesn't thrill. I may love this game if I were a avid fisherman, but the fact that I'm not a avid fisherman brings this game down. You don't feel any of the thrill of bringing in a real fish, instead the whole game feels pretty shallow, and simply not exciting at all. The fact that there are no tournaments or fully interactive areas to explore (it would be much more fun to move around a lake and try to find the fishes' hiding spots) or anything else leaves the replay value at zero.
Natsume s fishing simulator is one of the oldest on the PlayStation, yet it still has some of the most impressive graphics seen in the PS fishing genr...More at Buy.com
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