DREDGE: The Iron Rig review

There are hundreds and hundreds of video games that I adore, play once, then never think about ever again. With the constantly increasing issue of too many games and too little time, it’s difficult to find a free moment to dive back into even your favourite games if you’re trying to keep up with the current releases. And yet despite all this, I’ve been able to find myself in the world of DREDGE time and time again. Admittedly this is partially because of the release of two pieces of DLC that have been added to the Lovecraftian fishing adventure since release, but I’m always happy to get back on the waves and catch more horrors of the deep. Well DREDGE: The Iron Rig is a rather good reason to grab the rod again, adding a lovely chunk of new content to one of the best games of 2023.

As with previous DLC The Pale Reach, The Iron Rig adds a new area to the game to sail to. This can be done as soon as you have enough early-game abilities to reach it, and once you do you’ll find a massive metal structure waiting for you. The titular rig doesn’t feature an additional area to navigate, and instead is home to a slightly suspect corporation looking to drill the resources out of the world for profit. This goes about as badly as you’d expect, and ends up spewing out mysterious black gunk across all those places you’ve fished before as well as bringing out some new breeds of fish.

As the seafloor cracks and pollution spreads across the entire DREDGE map, you’re tasked with researching all the new cursed crustaceans and freaky fish that it reveals. This means finding patches of black sludge painting the oceans and whipping out new custom rods to catch them. This is as compelling as ever, thanks to all those little mini-games that make reeling in a mackerel that bit more engaging. You’ll also still need to arrange the horrors in your hull to fit them all in and maximise your profit for all the additional upgrades, of which there are plenty.

You won’t just be upgrading rods and gear on your own ship either, you’ll be upgrading the Iron Rig itself too. With a whole host of different departments to build and expand you’ll unlock facilities that help you manufacture new materials, facilities that help with your own abilities, and much much more. Whereas The Pale Reach was largely superfluous if you’d already completed DREDGE as you’d already bought everything you needed, there’s loads to spend your hard-earned money and dredged-up materials in the latest DLC offering.

While in many ways the few hours of content added in DREDGE: The Iron Rig are a nice reason to return to the game, they do suffer from the same main issue that the previous DLC had. DREDGE is at its best when you are narrowly escaping new horrors in a rickety old boat, while upgrading it as you go to expand into more dangerous waters. But with a completed save file I was just able to warp around the world with various mystical upgrades, zoom across to new fishing spots at top speed and largely avoid any danger that came my way. If you buy the new complete edition of the game that has just been released and play this content on a fresh save slot you’ll likely have a better experience. Despite this though the sinister narrative kept me hooked for a nice nostalgia trip, even if it didn’t bring the same DREDGE tension I was hoping for.

DREDGE: The Iron Rig adds new fish and an evil corporation to the eerie fishing experience everyone loved last year, and adds plenty of new stuff to do alongside this. If you play The Iron Rig after completing the main game it won’t add a whole lot of danger to the seas that’s worth worrying about in your pimped-out boat, but as an excuse to do more fishing, it’s still a perfectly good one.