Nethermere: Quiet Fishing Game

Nethermere is a relaxing fishing game on a quiet lake, and a creepy fishing game once you go deep enough. In your first minute you sit in a rowboat at dawn, cast your line, watch the float, and strike when it dips. Your first bluegill or perch comes up out of the reeds. Then you buy more line, and fish deeper into the dark.

Line length is the only thing that decides how deep you can go, and depth is not a distance. It is how far you are willing to get from the light. This is a game about one lake and what is under it. A mere is an old word for a lake, and nether means below.

CAST, WAIT, WATCH THE FLOAT
Load the rod, throw, and let the lure sink. Then you wait, which is most of fishing and most of this game. When something takes it you get one moment to strike, and striking too early is as wrong as striking too late.

THE FIGHT IS A REEL YOU FLICK
A fish on the line is a tension gauge you have to keep out of the red. Flick the reel to wind it in. The faster you flick, the faster it turns, and it keeps spinning after you let go. Rest your thumb on it to stop it dead and let the rod carry the fish. Leave it alone and the fish takes line. Flick too hard and the line breaks, and you watch the gauge go red a moment before it does.

LINE IS THE WHOLE PROGRESSION
Everything you buy from the shed is in service of going deeper: more line, a motor to reach the far spots, a sounder so you can see what is beneath the boat. Better rods and reels give you longer in the red and more line per turn on the biggest fish. The lake does not get bigger. You get further into it.

WHAT IS IN THE LAKE
- 32 kinds of freshwater fish, from bluegill, perch and largemouth bass in the shallows to pike, walleye, catfish, trout and sturgeon further down
- Trophy fish of every kind, weighed in pounds and ounces
- Six places to fish, from Reed Bay to a drowned road, a church steeple standing out of the water, a quarry wall and a spring
- Dawn, day, dusk and night on the water, with fog, rain and storms that change what bites
- Things on the bottom that are not fish at all

WHAT YOU KEEP
Every catch goes into the box you carry, and the box is a puzzle. Each fish and find takes up cells in its own shape, so you drag it into place, turn it, and keep it. You start with a bucket and buy a cooler, then a livewell, from the shed. When the box is full, pick something you already hold and let it go to make room. A fish too big for the well can be weighed at the rail and let go for a bounty.

THE LOGBOOK
The logbook, written by the keepers before you, remembers every species, the heaviest of each, and the deepest water you have ever had a line in. Sixteen achievements wait in it, and some of them are hidden.

LISTEN
Turn on the radio. Weather, forecasts and a voice that does not always say what it said yesterday.

A RELAXING FISHING GAME THAT TURNS EERIE
The first hours are a calm, cozy lake: birds, reeds and a float on still water. The lake grows quietly wrong the deeper you go. This is a creepy fishing game of the slow kind: there is no gore and nothing jumps at you, but some moments are unsettling, and it is rated 7+ for that. An old beer can sometimes comes up on the line.

AN OFFLINE FISHING GAME
No signal needed. Cast, wait and reel on a train, a plane or a porch, because it is an offline fishing game from the first cast. No timer, nothing chasing you, and no reason to hurry. Fish for five minutes or an evening, and the lake keeps your place.

Free to play. An ad can play when you put your head down to sleep, once an in-game day at most, and never while you fish. One purchase, Remove ads, stops them for good.