Steam fishing game scores: a median of 83 %
Contents
The How to Fish card in the Steam catalogue reads 95 % positive. We pulled the same figure for all 596 entries in the Fishing-tagged catalogue and worked out how good that actually is.
How catalogue scores are distributed
| Positive share | Games | Share of catalogue |
|---|---|---|
| 100 % | 32 | 5.4 % |
| 90-99 % | 163 | 27.3 % |
| 80-89 % | 154 | 25.8 % |
| 70-79 % | 97 | 16.3 % |
| 60-69 % | 69 | 11.6 % |
| 50-59 % | 50 | 8.4 % |
| under 50 % | 31 | 5.2 % |
| Total | 596 | 100 % |
The median is 83 %, the mean 79.0 %. The catalogue minimum is 10 % and the maximum 100 %. Half of Steam’s fishing games sit below 83 % positive.
A 95 % bar leaves 99 games (16.6 %). Above 95 % there are 71 games (11.9 %), with another 28 sitting exactly where How to Fish does.
100 % nearly always means a tiny sample
Thirty-two catalogue entries score 100 % positive. Not one of them has even a hundred reviews: the median sample in that group is 15.5 reviews, the largest 56.
The other end behaves identically. Thirty-one entries score under 50 %, and their median review count is 22. The catalogue’s lowest score is 10 %, from ten reviews.
So the extremes in both directions are mostly games almost nobody has seen. They cannot be compared against a game with a five-digit review count.
Seventeen entries with both a high score and a large sample
We kept only those with ≥ 95 % positive and ≥ 1,000 reviews at the same time. There are 17 of 596 — 2.9 %.
| Game | Positive | Reviews |
|---|---|---|
| Stardew Valley | 98 % | 393,330 |
| DAVE THE DIVER | 96 % | 50,822 |
| WEBFISHING | 97 % | 50,017 |
| DREDGE | 96 % | 32,409 |
| HoloCure - Save the Fans! | 99 % | 26,518 |
| How to Fish | 95 % | 15,660 |
| FlyKnight | 96 % | 9,190 |
| Cast n Chill | 95 % | 5,112 |
| How Fish Is Made | 95 % | 4,371 |
| FATE | 96 % | 3,525 |
| Grimshire | 97 % | 2,657 |
| Megaquarium | 95 % | 2,435 |
| Tiny Aquarium: Social Fishkeeping | 97 % | 2,411 |
| Cornerpond | 97 % | 1,740 |
| Go-Go Town! | 95 % | 1,215 |
| Far Fishing | 97 % | 1,124 |
| DAVE THE DIVER - DREDGE Content Pack | 98 % | 1,006 |
How to Fish is sixth by review count here, and not the highest-scoring: HoloCure is at 99 %, Stardew Valley at 98 %.
Big games score higher, not lower
The intuitive guess is that a mass audience brings more negativity. In this catalogue the opposite holds:
- games with ≥ 1,000 reviews (90 entries) — median 87.5 %;
- games with 100-999 reviews (189 entries) — median 83 %;
- games with under 100 reviews (317 entries) — median 82 %.
We do not know why, and we will not invent a reason. At least two explanations fit: mostly well-made games reach a large audience in the first place — and small samples are simply noisier.
Price barely moves the median: free games sit at 81 %, paid ones at 83 %.
What we are not claiming
These are Steam’s percentages, not our rating. We read the figure off each game’s catalogue card without recomputing anything.
596 entries are not 596 games. A tag catalogue also picks up add-ons: our own table contains the DAVE THE DIVER - DREDGE Content Pack, and the 100 % group includes a Spiritfarer artbook. We did not drop them, so as not to shape the sample around the conclusion — but read 596 as 596 store entries.
The catalogue percentage is not the store-page one. The figure in Steam search is computed from reviews in your language and from Steam purchases only. On full API data How to Fish stands at 94.90 % from 44,256 reviews as of 23:02 Kyiv time on 31 August 2026 — a different quantity, not a refinement.
Correlation is not causation. We showed that big games in this catalogue score higher. Why, we did not establish.
Frequently asked questions
What is the average score of fishing games on Steam?
The median for the Fishing-tagged catalogue is 83 % positive and the mean is 79.0 %. Sample: 596 entries.
How high is How to Fish's 95 % score?
71 games of 596 score higher — that is 11.9 % — and another 28 sit exactly level. Counting How to Fish itself that makes it number 72, the top 12.1 % of the catalogue.
Why do some fishing games score 100 %?
Small samples. All 32 such entries have fewer than a hundred reviews, with a median of 15.5.
How many games have both a high score and many reviews?
17 of 596 (2.9 %) hold ≥ 95 % positive and ≥ 1,000 reviews at once. How to Fish is sixth among them by review count.
Do big games score worse than small ones?
Not in this catalogue. The median is 87.5 % for games above 1,000 reviews and 82 % for those under 100.