It sets out as a game where you go fishing and gather materials.
Then come quite a lot of fetch quests, during which you will die occasionaly.
When they are done comes the short and unsatisfying end.

Imo, a very shallow, almost empty game.
After watching the credits, I asked myself how so many people can deliver so little...

Yep, my impressions as well. A good lesson about the hype waves - reviewers play it for an hour, write a rave review, flock mentality users jump on board, play half an hour, write a stupid, but enthusiastic review, abut play three hours or more, and you find the game empty. The lack of discussion about it in the forums speaks volumes.

Why would people feel the need to discuss differing opinions?

As in, of course to some players, this game will absolutely not be their thing. Sure. Stardew Valley doesn't appeal to everyone, either. Or FFXIV. Or Mortal Kombat. Or Call of Duty.

But I already mentioned another game there that also has this "effectively you're just mindlessly grinding"-setup, Stardew Valley. And as you might gather from that, a lot of people seem to really really enjoy this style of gameplay, and invest a lot of hours into it.

Dredge is no different in that regard. It's mindless, sure. There's no skill challenges, no complex puzzles, no deep progression tree or endless daily quests. It's just some relaxed fishing minigames in a pretty world with a creepy atmosphere.

And it turns out, that's exactly what a whole lot of people desire when they sit down to play video games after work.