How to Fish review: the bait has escalated

The big picture

How to Fish sounds like the sort of game that might teach you about casting, bait and sitting quietly beside water. Then the weapons appear. Dazed Games has taken a peaceful activity and asked whether it could support more violence, more showboating and considerably worse decisions involving boats. Anybody seeking practical angling advice should probably stop before purchasing the equipment the game recommends.

The full Windows PC release arrived through Steam on August 20, 2026. Catching creatures still pays the bills, but quests, bosses and island progression turn the trip into a small action adventure. That structure matters. Friends can produce nonsense without assistance; a game earns its place by giving the nonsense a destination and a reason somebody needs to remember where the boat is.

The next island gives everyone a direction

Quests and bosses create milestones across the islands. Finish an objective, regroup, spend the earnings and move onwards. This helps prevent a co-op sandbox from becoming several people doing unrelated things while the most organised friend slowly develops a headache. There is an adventure to follow, even when somebody is currently treating the shoreline as an audition for the world's least sensible fishing programme.

Expect combat and equipment escalation rather than a careful simulation of recreational angling. If your ideal fishing game involves reading conditions and enjoying stillness, this one is waving a weapon from the other end of the pier. Its deliberate disrespect for the activity is central. The fish are targets, obstacles and funding for the next purchase, which is an unusually comprehensive list of reasons for them to dislike you.

August's 1.0.9 update added easy and hard settings around the original difficulty, changing creature health and damage. That gives groups with mixed combat confidence a useful adjustment. An easier setting can keep the evening moving without requiring every friend to become equally committed to fighting aquatic wildlife. Difficulty should serve the trip, not turn it into a surprise examination for the person who came to chat.

More water, more questionable opportunities

September's Islet Update is already released, adding smaller islands, creatures, a weapon, a mini-boss, bait and other items. The smaller destinations fit a game built around curiosity and shared detours. Spot something nearby, investigate it, then return to the main plan, assuming the main plan has survived contact with the rest of the party.

Patch 1.1.3 also made a creature's bait information appear in the fishipedia after its first kill. That separates the surprise of discovery from the practical business of returning for another catch. Once you have met the creature, you can prepare more deliberately instead of treating every repeat hunt as a fresh guessing contest. Apparently the fish's final contribution to the expedition is a useful note about what it liked eating.

These additions reinforce the existing adventure rather than asking players to adopt an entirely different hobby halfway through. They offer more reasons to explore and collect. That is a healthier form of extension than simply making every purchase require more fish and hoping nobody notices the extra evenings disappearing.

Keep the save out of the water

Steam Cloud support arrived in September. Existing players need to launch and exit the game on the PC holding their saves to upload them. Do that before moving to another machine; losing progress is a much less charming mishap than whatever the group did with the last catch.

The preceding patch added aim and sprint toggles, hold-to-attack and save backups, and confirmed Steam Deck verification and GeForce NOW availability. Those are useful ways to play and adjust the controls, not promises of a particular frame rate or flawless multiplayer. Inventory and item-handling fixes also feature in the patch history, so some previous chaos was less intentional than the fishing equipment.

Windows remains the released native platform. Mac and console versions are planned without dates; cloud access and Deck compatibility do not turn those plans into launches. The content includes cartoon violence against fish and simulated gambling without real-money betting. If either clashes with the evening you want, the friendly title will not soften it.

Verdict

How to Fish gives its absurdity a useful backbone: shared goals, island progression, collection targets and purchases that make the next trip possible. It is a promising fit for friends who enjoy making a simple task far more elaborate than necessary. Bring an appetite for a compact, silly action adventure. Bring eight people if you like. Leave any expectation of a dignified relationship with nature safely on shore.