In PC games, fishing is a very popular and sought after hobby. Sometimes it’s a side activity or a mini—game, and other times—like in fishing simulators-it’s the whole point of the game. But in MMOs, survival games, sims, and other genres, fishing is close and dear to our hearts.
A good fishing experience should provide two things: relaxation, and excitement. The act of fishing-throwing your line and waiting for a snack-should be a calm and calm experience. Once you have a bite, however, wobbling in your price should be a bit of an emergency.
Below, in no particular order, we have evaluated the fishing experiences in a number of PC games, whether they are minigames, Time-killers, or full fishing simulators, by how relaxing and exciting they are. Just for fun, let’s start with a game that you can’t even play yet!
FAR CRY 5
I grew up flyfishing with my father, a method of catching trout in which the fisherman wraps a pile of feathers and fur around a small hook to look like an insect and whips around it like a bullfighter. He calls it “the philosopher’s sport”, probably because you spend a lot of time sitting around doing nothing or disentangling your brush line. Far Cry 5’s take gets away with the brush and long waits but gives you a character who can throw the line through a damned football field with the grace of an Olympic javelin thrower. It feels and seems incredible, supported up by a detailed rendition of Montana. Catching fish is easy and satisfying, but all the meditative properties are eviscerated from afar by the insistence of Cry 5 to entertain you. Expect to catch as many dead cultists, bears, and mountain lions as you make Trout. And expect all philosophical thinking to sink into nihilism-it’s hard to appreciate your place in nature if it’s drenched in blood. – James Davenport
Relaxation: 2/10
Exciting: 8/10
THE SIMS 4
There are a number of relaxing activities in The Sims 4, although I have come to the conclusion that fishing is not one of them. It looks like it is, at first: you throw away your text and you see what happens. The problem I have is that once you are there, the game will immediately send other Sims fishing next to you: friends, neighbors, strangers, pets, they all flock to your place as if they were responding to a distress call. Your personal needs begin to pile up, relational counters begin to appear, and the Zen experience quickly loses itself in the middle of a cloud of distracting icons. When you catch something, on the other hand, it’s not exciting but a relief: now I can go do something else just to get away from the crowd. – Chris Livingston
Relaxation: 1/10
Exciting: 1/10
WORLD OF WARCRAFT
I want to cut World of Warcraft a little slack because its minigame fishing has more than a decade at this point, but it’s damn disappointing all around. There is not much: just launch your line, click on the bobber when it moves a little, and voilà, you have a fish. There is a skill system related to that, of course, but it doesn’t really mean much since you can still fish wherever you want. Legion has also added an ultra rare fishing rod for these zealous true fishermen, but once again, fishing looks like a waste of time and I won’t blame you for skipping it all. – Steven Messner
Relaxation: 5/10
Exciting: 2/10