Dave the Diver has so many cool ideas and fun gameplay loops! Unfortunately, the pacing of the game is ALL over the place and is really inconsistent, making it feel excited at times, and a chore at others. There are a lot of basic systems and pieces of content that get locked away for 20+ hours because it's tied to story progression for no real reason, making some of the sushi restaurant elements feel even more detached from the rest of the game/story than it already kinda is.

But man, that early game where you are first exploring the first few areas of the sea, unlocking new weapons and tools, and getting new restaurant unlocks to make more money? It's fantastic and it really hooked me. It's once you meet the sea people, the game starts to really slow down significantly and become a lot more tedious. The final couple of areas, while visually rad and have great music, require so much backtracking and gating for what ultimately ends up being pretty small and unexciting zones. Overall the game is really neat, and I'm glad I played it! There's just a lot of missed potential on both halves of the game to really shine sadly.