Hello and Welcome back to my blog!
When I last talked about Dredges, I was so close to getting the new Hull that I just needed some raw materials, mainly a couple of refined metals. To buy these, I went to the Iron Have in the northern part of the map. I bought the refined metal and also installed the Enhanced Foghorn.
It cost me one research part and a crate. I had enough of the crates anyway.
I found a mysterious man sitting on one of the islands. He was wearing a red robe. They wanted me to deliver a cusk eel to them. It was a Volcanic fish, and I didn't want to get to that water right now, but I needed some money anyway, so I went to the Mangroves. But if I found a cusk eel, then I would bring it to that guy.
I found a message in the glass bottle that was floating near the temple in the Volcanic area. It didn't sound important to me. I have found a lot of these already around the Marrows.
The cracks on the ocean floor here are glowing red. I wonder what's causing these? There seem to be a lot of mysterious powers around this area. I was tasked to light three statues in the temple earlier as well. Maybe these are linked to that quest?
I was running out of cash to buy the last piece of refined metal. And even after acquiring it, I still needed $800 to upgrade my Hull. This was a lot of money as I only had like 100 in my wallet. So, I spent the next few days just fishing and selling my catch at the Marrows. Sometimes I would go to the ocean to catch big fish which would give me better money.
Finally, I got enough to buy that final piece of refined metal. It was $450! That's too expensive, I think. I thought my $1200 would cover both the new hull construction and that refined metal piece but nope.
So, here we go again, fishing for more money. Sometimes, I would get research parts from the crab pots. I spent them researching the large trawler net that catches coastal and shallow fish passively. Getting 12 fish per day passively is not a small thing but it takes 6 slots and I am not sure if I can ever have enough net slots on my cargo to use them.
After a couple more days of fishing, I had enough money to buy the New Hull Upgrade. This is one of the best upgrades you can have in the game. Getting 9 more cargo slots is no joke in this game. You get to catch a lot more fish and it unlocks new upgrades which were blocked because of this.
I had a lot of raw materials that I gathered in the last few days. I could use all of those now to get some more upgrades. The easiest one was modifying one cargo space to hold lights. More light means less panic at night and it only costs $75. This upgrade was a no-brainer.
The most useful one has to be adding 4 more cargo spaces to the hull. Luckily, I had all the materials for this one too. But unfortunately, it required $300 to upgrade this one and all I had was $50.
Another one was motifying a cargo space to also hold an Engine. I had all the materials for this too but not enough money again. All of a sudden I felt like I focused less on catching and selling fish than on dredging out the raw materials required for the upgrades.
Well, another cycle of fishing started which went on for a couple of days only. I found some good spots for sharks.
And 4 more cargo spaces are done! What a relief. With each new cargo space, I can fish for longer sessions and get more cash on a single session. This is going to make my life significantly easier. First the 9 cargo spaces from the new hull and now these 4 more spaces. What else I can ask for?
I installed the new engine part which only took one space. This made my boat slightly faster.
I went to see the Collector to give him the Key. I had this big key in my storage for a long time not realising that I had to put it on my cargo before talking to the collector. That's how he realises I got the relic that he wanted me to fetch.
When I showed him the key... instead of rewarding me and praising me, he wanted more. He asked for a lock too.
He calmed down and told us to look for other parts of the relics. To aid us in our travels he used some kind of spell from his book and gave us a new ability, Haste.
This haste gives me a speed boost but there is an overheat meter which should not fill up or our engine will get damaged.
This was an incredibly useful ability. It will help me make my long journey faster. I was thinking that the boat speed was too low for the map and there were no quick travel features too but this speed boost is such a game changer. This can also help me get away from danger. There are some monsters luring in these oceans and close to Gale Cliffs. This boost should help me avoid their attacks and explore the cliffs with more freedom.
I had a lot of useful upgrades in this session. I think there is still a long way to go in this game and I love every bit of it. No wonder the game had overwhelmingly positive reviews on Steam.
- All the content is mine unless otherwise stated.
- Screenshots are from the game, Dredge.