Jonathan Carlson

About Hook, Line & Skillet

Cast it. Cut it. Cook it. Sell it.

Hook, Line & Skillet is a first-person, hands-only rogue-lite where you play a fisherman racing a rising daily quota. Every fish is touched five times — lure, fight, fillet, cook, sell — and nothing is ever abstracted into a menu. Miss the quota and the run ends, leaving only your permanent upgrades behind.

Core Gameplay

Each run plays out over a string of in-game days. Pick a location, fish until your stamina runs dry, then head back to the cabin to fillet the catch, cook it into dishes, and sell everything at the counter before the day's quota comes due. Clear the quota and an upgrade web opens up before the next sunrise; miss it and the run is over. Two clocks pull against each other all the while — stamina limits how much you can fish in a day, and the quota limits how little you can get away with selling.

Key Features

• Every Fish, By Hand - A full tactile chain of cast, lure, fight, and reel minigames stands between you and a basket of fish — nothing is left to a loading bar
• Fillet Table & Kitchen - Cut each catch along guided lines for a quality grade, then cook it across grills, skillets, smokers, fryers, and more, each with its own hands-on minigame and failure state to recover from
• Rising Quota, Rising Stakes - The daily quota climbs faster than raw fish value, pushing players down the value chain from raw catch to fillet to finished dish to stay afloat
• PoE-Style Upgrade Web - A roughly 70-node spider-web of upgrades across five spokes — Gear, Angler, Fillet, Kitchen, and Utility — that resets each run and pushes players toward a distinct build identity
• Optional Risk, Real Loss - Roulette and blackjack tables can rescue a bad day or sink a good one, with the house edge always shown in plain sight
• Meta-Progression - Scales earned at the end of every run unlock permanent upgrades at the Tackle Shed, making future attempts start stronger without ever replacing in-run skill

Development Journey

Hook, Line & Skillet grew out of a love for tactile, hands-on minigame loops — borrowing the daily-quota tension of Bills Must Be Paid, the catch-by-day/serve-by-night rhythm of Dave the Diver, and the spider-web build depth of Path of Exile, all wrapped in a cozy-slapstick low-poly world. The project is currently in design and early production, with the core fishing, filleting, and cooking minigames being built out alongside the upgrade web.