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Originally Posted by matxer
The border line between game and simulation is often thin.
Is the Silent Hunter series a game or a simulation ?
And the Flight Simulator series ?
And rFactor in the car racing area ?
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SBP exists for only one reason: the military has demanded it to be in the form it is in right now. Not we casual gamers decide about it's design, but military customers. Professional crews train certain aspects of mechanized warfare with it. The military spends 18000 dollars per 10 seat-classroom license for it - I assume it knows why it is doing that. Obviously it gets from the sim what it wants to get from it.
Which does not mean that we civilians cannot enjoy it and have exciting "gameplay" with it.
It also is the military from many countries ordering it. they even order additional systems and vehicles to be implemented.
Draw your conclusions. What you get is a professional training tool that competes with hardware simulators for mutliple million dollars by ways of extremely aggressive pricing - and accoding to insiders the simulation does many things better than the software of these hardware simulators. the pro and personal edition differ concerning map size and possebilities to include new digital maps, and number of players joining in team play - beside these differences it is the same software you would get when buying the PE version. The SAME software. It is no round package like games usually are with animated menues, career stats, and such. There is a set of missions, and a perfect mission editor, and the selection menu of wether to play alone, or online. Plenty of missions available via download. You don't get more, not less than all this, and the sim. The way the sim is presented is not game-like. The sim itself is a tool to train some aspects of mechanized warfare, shooting, and tank management. The Australian government ordered thousands of copies and distributed them to the members of their tank units so that they can practice at home in private. The sim is used at military academies in Denmark, Australia, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Canada (Air Force - don't ask me why) and the Netherlands. Others still considering it. This field of customers is the reason why german tanks are overrepresented, and american tanks are the smaller faction. Most if not all customers mentioned are operating Leopards, no Abrams.
I think no racing team in the world trains with rFactor or GTR2. Air Forces do not train with Falcon 4, and navies do not train with Silent Hunter.
BTW, the difficulty of SBP lies in the tactical field, not so much in handling board system and the tank itself. Expect to die very often without even knowing why, when, where, how.