Fishing: Barents Sea

 PC
Metascore
69

Mixed or average reviews - based on 5 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 5
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 5
  3. Negative: 0 out of 5
  1. Gaming Nexus
    Apr 13, 2018
    80
    If you're looking to build a fishing industry empire, this is not for you. On the other hand, if you find yourself daydreaming of making your living by farming the oceans, you might enjoy Fishing: Barents Sea. It offers a fairly easy learning curve and an almost completely stress-free playing style that allows you to play the game the way you want to.
  2. Impulsegamer
    Mar 12, 2018
    76
    I really do not get too excited over tycoon style games, and this fishing simulator is a lot like a tycoon fishing game which is fine and well because it is presented surprisingly well. I love going out on the ship and hunting for a good fishing grounds.

User Reviews

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User Score
6.2

Mixed or average reviews- based on 10 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 10
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 10
  3. Negative: 3 out of 10
  1. 3t3rnal
    Dec 25, 2021
    5
    The game has some very good ideas and is perhaps a decent foundation for interesting series of large scale fishing simulators, but thisThe game has some very good ideas and is perhaps a decent foundation for interesting series of large scale fishing simulators, but this initial entry is very far from perfect, though it is playable.

    I am not a graphics maniac, but I will start with visuals first this time - the game is pretty poor in terms of visuals, with the exception of some very specific spots and a couple specific boat models. This would not be an issue by itself, at least for me, but what definitely is an issue is the very poor optimization - despite the poor visuals, you will suffer frame dips, microstutter, etc. Despite updating drivers, etc., it remained problematic, and turning up certain settings would not only cause FPS issues, but also cause graphical issues - texture artifacts, water turning pure black, etc.

    Sound design - well, the ambience of the sea is pretty decent, but most of the boats sound weird - especially the first one, which appears to have a lawn mower engine.

    The UI also leaves a lot to be desired, and you will have to search for related information by clicking through multiple menus or tabs, most of which are not really necessary other than containing the info you are looking for, which could be moved elsewhere - some streamlining would help a lot. Some crucial information is also missing completely, if you are lucky, it is on the game wiki, but a lot of it is for some reason no properly displayed in the game nor can be found on the wiki, so your options are to data mine or just go with it and see what happens - for example, the game supposedly simulates overfishing, but I never found any indicator of it in the game, and the availability of fish in certain areas changed pretty much randomly on game restarts...

    The variety of fish is okay, the crab DLC helps, the multiple fishing styles are also nice, though the minigames going along with some of them are really janky. The availability and variety of ships is pretty good, the game is a bit grindy and requires some commitment, but it's not too frustrating, and when the jank is toned down a bit, the minigames are actually fun enough. The main issue with the game is that there is no "speed up time / wait here" option when not moving, and when you move, it of course consumes fuel, which is annoying AF, and I actually decided to cheat and use a trainer to give myself infinite fuel. Wouldn't have done it if there was an option to just wait without wasting fuel. This isn't much of an issue with bigger ships where you will actually dropy your traps at different places with decent distance away from each other, but with smaller ships, it definitely is - also, fuel is much more of a concern due to A) smaller tank capacity and B) lower income, meaning it hurts a lot more to just swim around your traps waiting for them to fill.

    The game also has fog of war hiding pretty much all of the map and you have to go around all of it to uncover it. This by itself would not be too much of an issue if most of it was actually just an empty "wasteland" and so doing it is literal waste of time, but you kind have to do it, because on restart of the game, fishing ground can change and get hidden again by the FOW. I guess it could work as "hardcore" mode feature, but on first playthrough, it's just annoying AF.

    Anyways, the base idea is pretty good and I don't believe there is any real competition doing something similar, at least not right now - aside from the second game in the series, which appears to be more of the same in different location, rather than a sequel, but I have not played it, so I digress. Fishing: Barents Sea is an average game. It has some good ideas, some bad, some of it is done well, some of it is not. It can be recommended to fans of fishing or ship simulators, if they intend to buy it at a heavy discount, but everyone else should steer clear, because the few pros it has are definitely not enough to turn you into a huge simulator games fan, and the cons will probably be enough to make you never try anything similar ever again, which would be a shame, as there are a lot of good simulators out there.    … Full Review »
  2. Chrree
    Apr 9, 2021
    7
    I'm a fan of fishing games and I always liked the sea so this games was a no brainer for me. The sea looks very convincing, the ships areI'm a fan of fishing games and I always liked the sea so this games was a no brainer for me. The sea looks very convincing, the ships are really cool and catching fish has different fun little mini-games depending on how you catch them. You can use radar and sonar to find good fishing spots and fast travel to places you've already been to. Getting there the first time around can be very time consuming and boring though. When you're just exploring and not fishing there is not much to do for you that's why you should get a better and faster ship before spending time with exploring.
    Every ship can be improved and customized by changing the motor, replacing the radar with a better one and lots of other things. You can also buy better equipment for yourself to make work easier. As soon as you got your second boat you can even employ people to make life easier for you. They will do all the mini games for you which is good because buying better ships can take a while and those little games are getting annoying when you're forced to do them all the time.
    Getting bigger and better ships and making lots of money feels great and the water behaves like it should. Bad weather makes it even more interesting and it is fun to feel like a real captain fighting your way back home.
    You can even do missions for people but don't expect anything special and there is no real story either. This game is more about spending time with fishing and making money.

    What I didn't like was the lack of things to do when exploring the sea. You're just sitting there, starring at the water, looking at your ship and waiting like an hour, or more, to get from point A to B. There should have been anything to entertain you while waiting.
    Another thing I don't like is that you can only see your crew when you're giving them tasks. As soon as you tell them to get some rest you're alone on your ship. You can't even find them at their quarters. Not only that but animations of characters are stiff, they look ugly and when they're doing their work all you see is them fondling the air. That should have been improved.
    What's also pretty ugly are the things happening on land. Buildings and vehicles are very low rez.

    The game is fun if you are ok with grinding. Making money when finding the right fishing sport is addictive. You need a lot of patience and you should be interested in fishing and the sea, then you should like this game.    … Full Review »
  3. GamerGuysNGals
    Dec 29, 2019
    7
    Ever wanted the experience of fishing the Norwegian sea? Pulling in fish wow you look at the beautiful Looking up at those beautiful auroraEver wanted the experience of fishing the Norwegian sea? Pulling in fish wow you look at the beautiful Looking up at those beautiful aurora borealis over Norway? Then Fishing Barents Sea probably has something for you. You are left with the task of following your families legacy when your grandfather passes and leaves you his officially licensed Hermes trawler along with his fishing equipment. You will start out really small but will earn officially licensed Scanmar Equipment as well. Will you be able to keep the families long history as fisherman a float. (Bad fishing joke) or will you fail miserably?
    Fishing: Barents Sea is a simulation of real fishing so you won't be blown away with action at all times. A lot of the time you will feel it as a chore, as you should. It's the oldest profession in the world, and is really hard work. In a true simulation you should feel like this.You should feel you are grinding it out, and putting the effort in. The pay back in the overall experience is the feeling of a hard days work, and the bounty of what you were able to pull in that day. Not every day will be a winner, there will be some days that feel wasted where you didn't bring in what you expected and days where your boat is full of more fish than you could have ever dreamed. That is why I love simulations like this. When they can simulate the true work ethic and day of a actual profession. I know this will seem boring to some, not everyone has the same work ethic and not everyone will relate to that sort of grind. To some though it will be an addiction, I see a lot of Youtubers that have that same love for it all the time. They put weekly and monthly fishing episodes, and that shows the type of respect they have for this industry, and the game as well. I recommend checking some of them out as they are really done by some entertaining individuals.
    You are able to purchase new boats I can't remember the exact amount. I'm going to say around a half a dozen. You can purchase these by how much time you put into sailing and collecting fishing licenses . That is a grind though so while you are out there your going to do some fishing I'm sure. To fish you play a mini game. The mini game changes, as you do different styles of fishing with different types of boats. They start off with really simple timing button hits, and then progress as you do to button combos. It is very easy to learn, but can be very hard to master. I love this aspect, because you will have to practice and learn. You aren't going to go out there, and just dominate your profession from the start. Like I said earlier the work and time learning will be put in and your bounty will be earned. It also keeps it from growing repetitive. Later on you can hire a crew to do this while you take on other duties. One of these is cleaning fish another job you can take on with a different style of play to keep from feeling the grind and repetitiveness.
    The map is huge, and the different times of day and night really add to the beauty of the scenery behind you. I love the northern lights. I love how they look in this game. I'd say maybe the second best I've seen then in a title PUBG being the best. I loved running over the mountain in Vinkendi. and looking up at the aurora borealis while killing but let me get back to fishing. I believe it's a true recreation of the area, if not it at least seems that way. The area is just huge and can take forever to explore. One more way that the game beats the repetitiveness of the simulation. It could take hours and hours to truly explore the entire map, and in the winter the ice forms and blocks off certain areas. So you need to plan on where you want to explore based on the season as well. I told you it was a simulator the whole thing feels so real. It also looks beautiful. I've never seen a ocean look this amazingly beautiful on my One X except maybe in Sea of Thieves.
    There is a DLC coming and I'm really excited they will add more boats as well as crab fishing. So I can't wait to get time to give that a play. There is also more styles I didn't cover because I could talk about this all day. Like trawling , I didn't even get into this, or the fishing radar system.This is a true simulation of fishing, and I could get into this for hours covering all the techniques and styles, but I'll let you go pick it up and experience it for yourself now. If you like hard work, and commercial fishing simulation you are gonna be addicted to this one.    … Full Review »
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