higle's Full Review: Zebco Fishing for Game Boy Color
I guess I should start out by saying that I didn't have particularly high expectations from this title to begin with. Strangely enough, this game didn't manage to meet even those low expectations.
I've had the fishing jones ever since Spring came and the bass started biting. I've had it so bad this year that when I'm not out on the water, I'm thinking about being on the water. Then I got the bright idea, "hey, I've got one of those Gameboy Color deals, why don't I get a fishing game
for it!" That way, I thought, I could fish while I'm at work! WOOHOO!
I did some searching, and after reading reviews from different game magazines and whatnot, I found that Zebco Fishing! was the highest rated and most highly recommended fishing game for the Gameboy Color system. After a quick browse through eBay, I found a copy (they don't carry it in stores any more) and bought it. Probably the biggest waste of $13 I could have made.
Even though the game carries the name Zebco (a manufacturer of sub-par fishing equipment), it seems as though absolutely no knowledge of fish or fishing was put into the design of this game. I understand that the Gameboy Color platform is primarily marketed toward youngsters, and most games are meant to be simple and straightforward, but this thing is lame. Seriously. Let us examine why:
Firstly, there are a few (maybe five?) different fish species to catch. That's fine, except they all behave the same. For instance, walleye, perch, largemouth bass, and crappie can all be caught anywhere in the 2 lakes available, no matter what depth, what the shoreline structure is like, or whatever. Which brings me to another point, apparently all of the areas of the lake are the same depth. Right up against the shore, it takes your lure the same amount of time to sink to the bottom as it does in the deep blue center of the lake.
And it also seems extremely random as to what fish you're going to catch. No matter what area you fish in, you're just as likely to catch a walleye as you are a bass, or anything for that matter. There isn't any skill involved
whatsoever.
The fish are also unrealistic in terms of their weight. When you catch a fish, you're given a picture of the fish caught, its weight, and a description of its size (small, medium, large). All of the fish can range in weight from 1 to 10 pounds (except the minnow, which always weighs 0.1
pound... more on that later). There is a voice that tells you something encouraging every time you land a fish, such as "nice fish, but you can do better", or "Wow! That's a whopper!" Hell yeah a 10 pound crappie is a whopper! The current world record weight of a caught crappie is 5 pounds 3 ounces! If you catch a 6 pound crappie, it tells you that it's a medium sized fish!
The lure selection is ridiculous. All of the lures behave the same, catch the same fish, and require no movement or reeling or anything to use them. And they have very innacurate names. There is one lure called a "chartreuse". The last time I checked, chartreuse was a color. The picture looks kind of like a topwater lure commonly called a soft plastic jerkbait, but it isn't even chartreuse colored. Whatever.
As mentioned before, all of the lures will catch the different fish under any condition. The instruction manual suggests matching your lure to the temperature and cloud conditions, but in the game it doesn't matter. Your lure gets hit by a fish literally every two seconds, no matter which lure you use. Every time that you reel in the fish, it could be anything from a 10 pound crappie to a minnow (which wouldn't attack a lure that is twice as big as the fish itself). There is no skill involved in the lure selection.
The casting and retrieving graphics are silly. After you cast the lure, it is represented on the screen as a red and white circular thing. It kind of resembles a plastic float, which is ridiculous because you wouldn't be using
a float if you're doing the kind of fishing that is supposed to be going on in this game.
Want to know an easy way to cheat? Just cast the lure as close to your boat as possible, and let it sit for two seconds. When the fish bite (and they will), all you have to do is set the hook and just tap the reel button to
bring him in. Wow, I thought landing a 10 pound crappie would be a lot harder than that!
There are two modes of play, the Tournament mode and "Blackjack Bass" mode. In the tournament mode your objective is to catch the five heaviest bass you can in a certain amount of time, raising your rank from "amateur" onward. Not really like a tournament, but I can let it slide.
Perhaps the only mildly entertaining thing about the game is the Blackjack Bass mode, where you are essentially playing a game of blackjack by catching bass. If your total weight of caught bass equals 21, you win. If you go
over, or "hold" on a weight less than 21, you lose. Or, you can get an instant "blackjack" if you catch the "elusive" Loch Ness Bass, which weighs 21 pounds. The instruction manual made it out to be a task to catch this
Loch Ness Bass. I've caught the damned thing every time that I've played the game. Elusive, indeed.
There are probably more things that I've forgotten that make this game a stinker, but I'll not bother. Alls I set out to do was forwarn any serious fishing gamer to stay away from this floater. The built in rumbling thingumy gets very, very old after a while, especially since the fish bite every other blink. The graphics are ok by Gameboy Color standards. But there is no depth to the game whatsoever. Bummer.
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