If you’ve been reading us on here with any semblance of consistency, you may have picked up on a few things about this writer.
One of them is, yes, I like weird video games.
(I also love traditional video games, but there is something scintillating about playing a type of game you’ve literally never played before.)
One such oddball video game this writer absolutely enjoyed in 2023 was the cosmic horror fishing game, “Dredge.”
Yes. Cosmic horror, as in H.P. Lovecraft, and fishing, as in the elite pastime.
Despite the two elements not exactly sounding like peanut butter and jelly, they went spectacularly together.
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The basic premise of the game: You, a fisherman, end up in a strange village where your skills as a fisherman are put to use. As you fish up stranger (and more lucrative fish) you eventually unravel a rather macabre, Lovecraftian story.
The gameplay loop involves fishing, selling fish, upgrading your boat and gear, fishing up rarer fish, selling rarer fish, upgrading further, and so on.
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It’s an addictive loop buoyed by the horror undertones of the game.
And yet, color this writer skeptical about the recently announced movie adaptation of “Dredge.”
According to a report from Variety, “Dredge” will be getting the live-action movie treatment thanks to a partnership between Black Salt Games, who made the game, and production company Story Kitchen.
The outlet cited the film’s official logline: “Think ‘The Sixth Sense’ on the water. A grounded atmospheric cosmic horror blend of HP Lovecraft and Ernest Hemingway.”
“We are excited to partner with such an experienced studio team to bring the world we created to live action and ignite the imagination of audiences across the globe,” a joint statement from various members of Black Salt Games said.
Meanwhile, a similar joint statement from Story Kitchen reads: “‘Dredge’ is a captivatingly eerie and profoundly rich story that had us completely hooked from the very beginning!”
There are a couple of key reasons for why I’m rather dubious of this living up to its enormous potential.
First and foremost, a key part of the horror in the game stems from the juxtaposition of fishing during the daytime versus surviving at night.
It’s not clear how one can take the almost meditative loop of fishing during the daytime, followed by rushing back to the village at night lest the unseen, eldritch horrors get you, and properly convey that sensation. Horror movies are all about building suspense and horror.
Secondly, and speaking of suspense, a lot of the horrors of “Dredge” are not overt — at least not at first. The game does a subtle job of trying to convince you that the game is, in fact, a fishing game first and a horror game second.
Much of the horror of the game is left to the gamer’s imagination, which is a tactic that doesn’t always translate well on the silver screen.
Thirdly, finally, and perhaps most importantly, I have my doubts about “Dredge” the movie because video game movie adaptations in general are typically not very good.
That may not be a fair criticism to lobby at “Dredge,” but it’s a real criticism and a criticism that the movie will only be able to shed upon release.
There does not appear to be any sort of a release window for “Dredge.”
