Ultimate Games S.A, Moonlit, and 4Fishing have teamed together to create this fishing simulation where you don’t need to worry about catching fish but focus on catching the biggest and baddest crabs. You have multiple factors that you need to fight against at all times to ensure you have a successful season and make as much money as possible.

You are in the middle of the crabbing season and you are fighting against the clock, quotas, crab migrations, and not to mention the sea itself, does not help either. You sail from Dutch Harbour and need to find the ideal places to catch the most crabs because you need to make as much money as you possibly can. You are thrown into the deep end being the captain of your ship and also a fisherman. You can hire staff to help you along the journey but ultimately you need to learn how to use the crane or learn how to use the grappling hook because, at the end of the day, the Captain needs to lead by example. You need to make sure you are brushed up on all the rules of the sea and the crabs or you can find yourself losing some money if you miscalculate your journey and processes.

You’ll want to quickly learn the business model soon after finishing the tutorial, as everything comes with a price. The more crabs you catch, the more money you get. The bigger the crabs, the more money you get, and I’m sure you can guess, but the more money you obtain, the better staff you hire, and you can always make sure your equipment is stocked up for the next crabbing voyage.

The UI makes it a little easier with the crabs giving you either a tick or a cross for sizing, as well as telling you if it’s a male or female. If you are caught catching undersized crabs or the wrong gender, you can and will get fined, and this doesn’t help with the savings account when you are trying your hardest to run a successful crabbing business. Like a good businessman, I found I had more expenses going out than income coming in, and I always needed one more crabbing pot, or that little bit more bait to drop another pot to catch more crabs and get more money.

This is one title I would highly recommend doing the tutorial on before diving head-first into crab potting. The controls are basic enough and are quick to pick up but at the same time how their configuration feels like it’s harder than it needs to be. Like most simulation games you are given some more control of basic things from the cranes to the controls in the Captain’s chair.

I would love to see VR compatibility added into this title in a future update which would bring some insane immersion to the player. There is constantly a control cheat sheet in the bottom right corner which you can hide or show with the D-Pad to help you remember what to do.

Unfortunately, the graphics really let this title down. With the power of current generation consoles, it could have looked top-notch. There was not much work put into the textures which was disappointing. The one thing that was the main objective to catch which was the crabs, didn’t even have detailing put into them they looked like something retro and completely unrealistic. Everything felt like it could have been fine-tuned a little more with how it looked and especially the textural feel on environmental features could have used some work.

The water textures looked nicer but the rest of the game looked like it was trying to be realistic but realistic back in 2000. There was a little too much going on with the UI whilst playing and it would have been a nice feature to turn off the HUD whilst throwing the pots out to catch the best crab money can buy.

The sounds are super basic too which again was a little disappointing because there was lots of room for potential. You can hear the faint noise of waves crashing into the side of the ship you are operating but again didn’t live up to the potential of what it could actually sound like. The crane and crab pot slider also had this super generic robotic sound that could have been pulled from any other game with machinery. The ship was the best sounding thing with that loud white noise you expect from a ship that size. There was no character dialogue built into the game too which is another missed opportunity.

I would love to see some more updates to this game to make it look like a game that is from the current generation of consoles and something that immerses you into the title which is so famously known on television. If there were some more tasks to be able to do in the game it would also make it a little more fun even if more steps were added to each task to make it a little more exciting and appealing.

Written by: Hayden Nelson