Being a pirate means knowing the ocean, knowing your crew, and knowing the correct time to reel in your line…wait, what? Well, that last one is only indicative of pirates serving in the seas of Rule with an Iron Fish, a combination of adventure and RPG brought to you by Kestrel Games. The game was originally released on mobile platforms to overwhelming success, and I had no chance to experience this surge of excitement over the indie darling that once was, that is until Kestrel Games finally decided to port the success to Steam, my chief domain. I was excited to dig into the tiny adventure and set sail towards a tide of oddly-named fish.
Our adventure starts swiftly as your character and sibling experience a rogue storm toppling your tiny ship and sending your bodies in different directions. When your head rises, you are crudely introduced to a band of misfits and scum: your fellow pirates. Their makeshift little island, Buccaneer Bay, serves as a hub world both for claiming quests and talking to the characters who’ve been with you since the beginning. Oddly enough, your quest picks up when you realize you need money to build your grand ship back up, this way a trip across islands is not only possible but safe. The only way to make money in this odd archipelago? Fishing.
A few islands dot the map you now hold to navigate the waters around Buccaneer Bay. Each one is accessible only by means of obtaining a stronger ship, something only possible with more money in your measly pockets. Traveling to the islands on this overhead map brings you to each of your destinations, or fishing spots. Each new island brings with it several things, one of which being a new environment, and another being a new set of fish to catch. Catching these slippery animals means being quite good in QTE action.
To catch a fish, I’m told to throw my line, and with a single click of a button, it’s in the water surrounded by pockets of shadowy figures. As I wait, the fish come flowing toward my line, and a bite eventually comes my way. After this, a circle appears around your hook, and when it turns green, it’s time to real in. Plopping up out of the water will come a fish, if you executed the timing somewhat good. The fish adds to the destination’s goal. Some have twenty different species, while others have thirty. After this, the money you receive from fishing can be used to purchase more bait, better hooks, and other items which help you tread on in your wild quest to each new shore. You may also choose to build up the Buccaneer Bay and attract more allies. Pets are also purchasable, though they are much more about looking cool than having tangible benefits in-game.
What immediately got me about Rule with an Iron Fish was its ability to make me smile so often and so genuinely. The minute I entered this whimsical world of fish finding, I noticed one thing over anything else: the writing. From casual conversations with the NPCs to the descriptions of the fish you catch, the writing in Kestrel’s mini RPG added a personality to the game which comes as a rarity from indie devs. It wasn’t the cheesy one liners or the drama-filled noir-styled paragraphs of text, it was the smart use of language which made the experience worth every word. Even more, the almost Dr. Seuss-like scripture matched the water painting backgrounds and wrapped it all together, making the product feel much more cohesive and thematic.
That being said, the graphical errors (like the moment to moment gameplay) showed through the lush greenery and flowing blue water more obviously than I originally anticipated. Character models look much less detailed and even quite misplaced at times, some animations involving fishing don’t make sense when scaling the size of various items, and last but not least, some of the environments actually had the bottom of the pond cut from the screen. I don’t know if these kinks were impossible to transfer correctly from the mobile build, or if the developers were too lazy to implement more improved technical art at release. No matter the cause, these art hiccups sadly weren’t the only things holding Rule with an Iron Fish back in terms of overall value.
The sounds of the game were all okay. The crickets and bird chirps in the various islands were great. The noises of fish fighting your line put me right there with my character. The only problem was with the game’s very limited soundtrack. This music changed based on the island, but each island only included one song, if any. This wouldn’t be bad if I were constantly switching islands, but when I’m sitting in the same sound loop while fishing for twenty minutes or so, the routine just feels that much more taxing. The actual gameplay of Rule with an Iron Fish doesn’t help either.
RPG’s have a very particular gameplay loop, and most use this as a way to hook the player in. You go to the town to get quests, you go do the quests, you come back, you get gold, you by new weapons, rinse and repeat. While I understand that Rule with an Iron Fish isn’t exactly an RPG, I also think it could have provided more compelling gameplay than simply throwing your hook and clicking when a fish was on it. I found myself often bored with the monotonous ritual of clicking, clicking, maybe pressing an arrow, and clicking some more in the same exact way I did before. It all made my experience more void of any variables or dips in the casual gameplay I was experiencing. Besides the cool upgrades I was earning at times, the moment to moment addiction just wasn’t there. This being said, I understand game design and the design of mobile games In particular. If I were sitting in line for food, I might have loved the repetitive, mindless tapping. Sitting on a desk, however, it made me just desire something more action-focused.
That might be Rule with an Iron Fish’s biggest problem, it was designed as a casual mobile game. The art probably looks great on a smaller screen, the gameplay most likely feels satisfying when you need something to distract you from the monotony of daily life, and the writing is surely heartwarming when read in the middle of the day. All of this would make Rule with an Iron Fish a magnificent example of wonderful mobile design, but it just doesn’t feel at home on my PC. It feels like a much less exciting, less interesting version of Diablo for kids.
Developer: Kestrel Games
Publisher: Kestrel Games
Platforms: PC, iOS, Android
Release Date: 24th August 2017