I hear there's this new Silent Hunter game...

[Onkel Neal]

Looks like the model is free to play, flash based. How realistic will it be? How will the game manage time compression, transit to base, 3D crew, role-playing options, game saves, upgrades for pay, and many other elements?

Stay tuned.

[Rilder]

I'm going to go ahead and just side with Jefmajor on his opinion on this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQgtSgtey5w (Be warned language!)

My thoughts:

WHY UBISOFT, WHY GODS WHY WHHHHYYY WOULD YOU DO THIS?!?!?!

Oh right, Money.

[Onkel Neal]

:haha: Well done.

[Herr-Berbunch]

Could somebody merge all fifty-squillion threads on this, please.

Or should I start a new thread?

:O:

[Sailor Steve]

Or should I start a new thread?

:O:
By all means, please do. Somebody may have missed the others.

Sorry, Neal. I know you started the new forum that was asked for, but I couldn't resist. This is a good thing.:sunny:

[Herr-Berbunch]

By all means, please do. Somebody may have missed the others. :har:

Sorry, Neal. I know you started the new forum that was asked for, but I couldn't resist. This is a good thing.:sunny:
I didn't even realise it was in it's own little section. That's a good thing, it'll get people here and maybe into the other games. :arrgh!:

[Sailor Steve]

I didn't even realise it was in it's own little section. That's a good thing, it'll get people here and maybe into the other games. :arrgh!:
Neither did I at first. I had to go back and change my post, luckily before you saw it.

I notice he's also moved as many of the other threads here that he could find.

[Herr-Berbunch]

Good! They were becoming a bit too much. :DL

And yes, you beat me to noticing it. This time . . . :-?

[nikimcbee]

So is this SH6 then?:hmmm:

[Hector McLean]

I noticed the heading New SH game is this correct ?

Herr Captain :damn:

[skookum]

Judging by the sparse screenies depicted on ubi's site, it looks like a dressed up Aces of the Deep or Silent hunter 1, minus the awesome campaign structure.

The golden age of gaming has ended.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to post-creative corporatism.

And the worst thing about this whole tragedy? The board members who give the nod to publish this trash are all patting themselves on the back saying, "Good job guys. Our customers will be really excited about this..." They really believe that they care more for customers than for money.

Excuse me, I'm going to be ill.

[Ducimus]

Just want to say, for a future SH title, i really wanted something like this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV35B-vfT4U), except for submarines instead of planes.

This "SH online" is way off the mark. In fact, its a circle runner. :har:

[u crank]

Just want to say, for a future SH title, i really wanted something like this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV35B-vfT4U), except for submarines instead of planes.

This "SH online" is way off the mark. In fact, its a circle runner. :har:

Exactly! Agree 100%. They got the dang thing in reverse.:nope:

[Hitman]

Just want to say, for a future SH title, i really wanted something like this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV35B-vfT4U), except for submarines instead of planes.

Oh no Ducimus, on the contrary: That one despite being about airplanes is still probably more accurate as a subsim than SHO :har:

[Herr-Berbunch]

Oh no Ducimus, on the contrary: That one despite being about airplanes is still probably more accurate as a subsim than SHO :har:


:har: Indeed :rotfl2:

[Ducimus]

Oh no Ducimus, on the contrary: That one despite being about airplanes is still probably more accurate as a subsim than SHO :har:

I cannot refute the validity of your statement good sir . :O:

[Steed007]

I got a million things to say about sh5 so yea sh6 I not even gonna waste my time trying I wont even bother downloading it as a beta.

I refuse to play it based on the companys previouse attempts and I know its gonna be buggy and far from completed so yea my answer to UBI is NO
I have paid lots of money for games in the past and they just end up crap so I am peed off its always the same far from complete lots of cool grafix and poor game play.

a lost customer my rating for sh6 is 1 out of 10

[rascal101]

I HAV'NT BEEN ON Subsim for months so not sure what’s what, whose who or where's where - any way - while I AGREE SH5 was a total disappointment - lets just give this a bit of space instead of just automatically condemning it - for god sake

Surely the development team, and more importantly UBI Management are aware of the disappointment SH5 caused; surly they wouldn’t want to repeat that all over again

Having said that - if they do a US/Pacific SUB SIM instead of Atlantic then all bets are off, they can shove it...............

I thought that was a very measured response

Rascal

[P_Funk]

...while I AGREE SH5 was a total disappointment - lets just give this a bit of space instead of just automatically condemning it - for god sake

Surely the development team, and more importantly UBI Management are aware of the disappointment SH5 caused; surly they wouldn’t want to repeat that all over again
Someone probably said the same thing about the quality of SH4 in the discussion of the pending release of SH5.

I want to know where the faith we're supposed to be putting into this forthcoming product is supposed to meterialize from? The experience we've had over the last 3 Silent Hunter products has been a pattern of declining quality. The faith of the sim community has been steadily abused and taken for granted. Publishers have taken talented developers and quashed their creative potential by placing unrealistic development timelines on them, steadily reducing the overall quality of the released product. Past that they've also through this policy of rapid development turnover left us with steadily less and less polished final products becuase of more and more limited patching. The product we buy isn't getting better, and when they make a new one its not getting better either. They sell us a more bitter lemon with every new release.

If you bought apples from a grocer and every time the apples got mushier and tasted more bland and got more bruised, why should you have any faith that the next batch is going to be worth your money?

Now, we're not only seeing yet another hurried develoment title but we're seeing it gutted of its inherent credibility as a sim because of this MMO F2P nonsense. These games are rarely in any sense of the term "Realistic" nor are they particularly cerebral. They also afford the end user absolutely ZERO ability to modify the game whatsoever. On top of that the pricing scale is designed to force us to pay even more money than a flat purchase gives us.

Where in this entire scheme of the ongoing development of the Silent Hunter brand are we supposed to see the light at the end of the tunnel? The only shred of optimism one can pray before in this bitter recounting of my favourite sim's recent history is one of pure delusion and wishful thinking.

This is all about simple deductive reasoning. The entire business strategy of Ubisoft of late has shown itself to be against the better interests of this kind of community. Their strategy is all about money. Myself, as a consumer, my strategy is all about getting for my money the value I seek. I see a diametrically opposed set of intersts at play here. Why do we have to give the people trying to find the fastest way to the bottom our pocket the benefit of the doubt?

Given their recent track record if anything THEY have to prove to us that its worth anything, that is if they still care about us which I don't think they do. They went MMO because they want the cash from mainstream buyers. If thats the case, which it very likely is, then basically the product is now outside the parameters that attracts most of us to the brand in the first place.

There are so many reasons to be skeptical of SHO that I don't know which one to even put on the top of the list.

[Sailor Steve]

Thank you, P_Funk. An excellent summation of the way most of us feel, and probably the best post on the subject to date.

[ReallyDedPoet]

There are so many reasons to be skeptical of SHO that I don't know which one to even put on the top of the list.

:sign_yeah:

Won't be rushing to SHO. Ubisoft simply does not listen to it's customers-core base. I am long past tired of it.

[TheDarkWraith]

If I was a developer of software I would research the company giving me an offer to develop something for them first before committing to it. Maybe this developer will learn a hard lesson :-? When all you see is $ and greed takes over common sense goes out the window...

[7thSeal]

When all you see is $ and greed takes over common sense goes out the window...

That is gaming and those developing it as of now, anyone developing outside this 'rule' is quickly bought up which again points to greed. Its not going to change anytime soon because it has become the normal and business. Long run for corporate is quick profit....

[mcdamoose]

This is going to fail harder than the fourth crusade. Ubisoft has alienated the core SH fanbase to the point where most have given up hope for the franchise and just play GWX or SH4 with one of the supermods. Meanwhile the casual gamers are going to walk the other way as soon as they hear "submarine simulation". There is no way in hell this is going to take off.

[U-395]

Not to pre-judge the new online game, it hasn't been released yet and no one has tried it out yet to the best of my knowledge. Personally I'm not thrilled about it from what I read, and if UBIsoft doesn't listen to us gamers then I'm afraid all might be lost.

I've been playing SHII and miss the days of playing against Destroyer command. Those days were fun, SHIII was better and even though SH5 has all those bugs, I still enjoy playing it with a little help from the Mod developers. GWX improved SHIII 100% and it's too bad that GWX disbanded because I would have loved to see what they could have produced for SH5.

It is my opinion that if UBIsoft wishes to win our hearts and minds once again, they need to fix all the bugs in SH5 completely and make a new Destroyer Command and make it workable online with SH5.

Just a thought- and my 2 cents worth if anyone cares. :salute:

Pete

[Ilki]

Subsims aren't exactly your mass market products. Big players like Ubisoft are indeed out there to make the most for their shareholders. They do care what you think of their game. However they would care a lot more if you held their stock. It's the market economy lads, and games are bigger than movies these days. This was not the case in the 90's when sim games could actually be profitable.

[TorpX]

It's the market economy lads, and games are bigger than movies these days. This was not the case in the 90's when sim games could actually be profitable.
If they were profitable in the 90's, shouldn't they still be profitable today?

I would be happy to pay for a fixed/updated version of SH 4.

[Ilki]

If they were profitable in the 90's, shouldn't they still be profitable today?

Games cost tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands for big games to develop in the 90's.

These days they cost millions or tens of millions. Of course you could just develop a simple DOS game but who would buy it? Sure the market is bigger now too, but I think the increase can be tributed more to FPS enthusiasts than subsimmers.

[badaboom]

BUMMER:damn:

[AndreOliveira]

Looking forward.

[7thSeal]

Looking forward.

To what exactly?

[Gangrel38]

not sure if this would be a good thing or not. but it looks to be killing the SH franchise

[Julhelm]

I thought the franchise was dead when SH5 flopped?

[Ducimus]

I thought the franchise was dead when SH5 flopped?

If i was to pull numbers out of a hat, i'd say that the majority (50 percent?) of the sub sim community never left Sh3. As activity goes, From Sh4, onward, there has been a downward spiral for many reasons.

[Julhelm]

That's probably true. IMO tho, I'd rather have a new 'different' subsim than no new subsim at all. It's a crying shame they can't just do SH1 with better graphics but have to change everything with each new iteration.

[Sailor Steve]

Back when SH3 was under development we said exactly the same thing. We just wanted Aces Of The Deep with modern graphics.

[Onkel Neal]

That's probably true. IMO tho, I'd rather have a new 'different' subsim than no new subsim at all. It's a crying shame they can't just do SH1 with better graphics but have to change everything with each new iteration.

I agree, I've always welcomed new subsims, they are too rare as it is.

[Kevin123]

Wondering how this game will end

[SilentOtto]

This game will be nothing but a money-time sink, which is what all the new "F2P" games are. I played World of Tanks for a while, quit a couple months ago, when I realised I had spent more money on that game than I had ever spent on any other game. The objective is pushing you to spend countless hours grinding new equipment or spending $$$ so you unlock it. In Ubisoft's case, well I think it's something similar to give sharks appetite pills. If they were hungry sharks before, now they will be bloodthirsty!

[Onkel Neal]

No, I don't think that's accurate. The F2P games are designed to be engaging and fun. If that happens to be the case for you, then you get your money's worth. A traditional subsim could be called a "time-sink" as easily, after all, you spend hours when you play it grinding our convoy attacks. :) Did you enjoy World of Tanks? I had not really paid much attention to it before now. I hear it is very successful.

[habib911]

Maybe they should focus on making their releases as polished as can be before they go and publish new, half baked products. just my opinion:03:

[RAM]

Neal, to answer your questions. Yes, World of tanks is succesful. Sorta. Has some huge gameplay issues (artillery implementation, for one), and balancing issues (most tech tree, notably the heavy lines, are really unbalanced amongs themselves, some tanks being clearly much better than others). It's suffered some major problems with highly questionable developer decisions that has led to some huge balancing crysis (such as putting the Type 59, 1957 tank, into a game with 80% WW2 tanks)

And on top of it it's got an atrocious matchmaking system.


However overall, globally considered, yes, it works, and yes, it's fun and quite addictive. And the F2P label attached to it holds at least some (not much, but still some, which nowadays is something) credibility to it.

It's got its issues anyway. Grave case of developer just skipping by any community requirement based on real, practical and reasonable grounds, for one. Draconian EULA, for other.

The game on itself is enjoyable and fun, but has HUGE weakspots and the developer's attitude is far from the best. I played it quite a lot, still do now and then, but once the flaws really got to me (artillery, horrendous matchmaking, unresponsive developers, atrocious cases of moderator/sanction unfairness greelighted by an abusive EULA), I simply dropped it as an usual gaming experience.

[SilentOtto]

No, I don't think that's accurate. The F2P games are designed to be engaging and fun. If that happens to be the case for you, then you get your money's worth. A traditional subsim could be called a "time-sink" as easily, after all, you spend hours when you play it grinding our convoy attacks. :) Did you enjoy World of Tanks? I had not really paid much attention to it before now. I hear it is very successful.


Yea I have to agree that any good game is a time sink too :D but not in the way this grinding games are... I mean, you can play a career in SHIV but it's not like you will spend your time just to get a better weapon, or other piece of equipment... Sims are good to play with what you have, and I love doing some patrols on S-boats or Type-II from time to time.

The issue I raised is because for all I have known, these F2P games are really a money sink in that if you want to be competitive on them you have to spend a lot of money (or what to me, with three kids and in these times of crisis, is a lot of money for a game... like, 20 or 30 euros a month). And if you want to be in the top players, even more.

Of course they'll say that most of the stuff can be grinded for, yea if you have unlimited supplies of time, and no life at all. So they tickle your weaknesses and you end up paying, paying and paying some more.

About WoT, I mostly agree with what RAM says, it is a fun and exciting game with awesome flaws. Was fun for me until I got quite good at it, and joined a clan, and then is when the fun went away... you try to be good, you have to grind grind grind and pay pay pay. I quit the game because of that, it felt like a crack addiction. Maybe its just my personality! :hmm2: But when I took a look at my paypal logs, I saw I had spent in a year more than 300eur in that game!!! I was so shocked you wouldnt believe it. That's not my idea of what you should pay for a game, but hey, microtransactions are like that, you don't feel the 10eur now, 10eur next week, oh I don't want to spend another week grinding just to get the new tracks for this tank, without the tracks I can't use the gun I already unlocked... without the gun I am not effective at all at this level... oh ok I can afford 10 more euros, can't I? Oh, cool now I have the new gun! But next week it will be the same... and the next after. And when you get to level 10 and have the greatest tanks, oh well they introduce a new system which "freezes" your tanks when you are destroyed in battle... so you have to wait another week before you can help your clanmates. Oh, but there is a solution, yea, start the grind all over again with another nation... Hateful.

So imagine my thoughts, when I come back to sub sims, my ever beloved games, only to find that Ubi's next move is not a sequel (should we call it fix?) for SHV, oh no, it's a new F2P online game. That felt so bad, after my WoT experience, that I can't explain. Of course it's just the way I feel, they are a company, want to make money, and you run a website and have to try your best to manage this old farts community. :up: But I know I won't be touching that thing with a 10 foot pole. I still hope we can get something else running as I have been saying around. And I understand I shouldnt be ranting and spilling my anger and pain in this part of the forum, which should be to praise the new online sensation... :O:

But now I let it all out, won't happen again, I'll stay in the old farts section from now on! :salute:

[Gezoes]

If you put 300+ euro's in WoT, and reading the rest of your post, I think that would be best yes. No offence, but I do think you have a slight problem there.

[SilentOtto]

Thanks for caring... :P

As I said above, I've been clean for a couple of months. But I tell you, among the people who were top-ish in that game, I wasn't one of the big spenders at all. Their target is guys on their 30s, with some good job of work, who spend between 500-1200 eur a year on the game. You can buy the so-called "gold ammo" which gives you a totally unfair advantage since it's able to penetrate most tanks' armor even if your vehicle is inferior.

My problem there was that I'm a stat whore (can I say this uncle Steve? pretty please?) and the only way to improve your stats is play well and PAY.

And now, you've made me post again in this thread where I promised uncle Neal I wouldn't post again! :haha:

[Iron Budokan]

Back when SH3 was under development we said exactly the same thing. We just wanted Aces Of The Deep with modern graphics.

Heh, yeah. Very true. I remember telling my little boy when SH3 was about to come out, "Okay, we will buy it, but no way it'll be better than Aces of the Deep."

I've never been happier to be proven wrong in my life. :O:

EDIT: Oh, and what P_Funk said. He nailed it perfectly for me as well.

[cfc3612]

when does the beta come out any one knows :yeah:

[Munster]

Looks like the model is free to play, flash based. How realistic will it be? How will the game manage time compression, transit to base, 3D crew, role-playing options, game saves, upgrades for pay, and many other elements?

Stay tuned.

One thing is for sure; as the trailer reveals: the german sychronisation is as bad as in SH5 and since it looks like the whole gameplay is based upon SH5 I don't expect very much.

[kiwi_2005]

Welcome to Silent Hunter online!

Mission lvls 1-5

Quest: Hans the fishermen has asked you to bring back 200 shark skins: You must use your deck gun to kiil 200 sharks and turn in their skins to Hans.

Tip 1: Sharks will not always drop their skins
Tip 2: just keep grinding

Mission lvls 5-10

Quest: Hans the fishermen has ask you to kill 200 seagulls: You must shoot down 200 seagulls with your Flak guns and turn in the skins to Hans

Tip 1: Seagulls do not always drop their skins
Tip 2: Just keep grinding

Welcome to MMO's

:D

[Herr-Berbunch]

:har:

But so true (hopefully not in this case) :o

[Onkel Neal]

Welcome to Silent Hunter online!

Mission lvls 1-5

Quest: Hans the fishermen has asked you to bring back 200 shark skins: You must use your deck gun to kiil 200 sharks and turn in their skins to Hans.

Tip 1: Sharks will not always drop their skins
Tip 2: just keep grinding

Mission lvls 5-10

Quest: Hans the fishermen has ask you to kill 200 seagulls: You must shoot down 200 seagulls with your Flak guns and turn in the skins to Hans

Tip 1: Seagulls do not always drop their skins
Tip 2: Just keep grinding

Welcome to MMO's

:D

Seriously? :huh:

It's not like that.

[Onkel Neal]

Yea I have to agree that any good game is a time sink too :D but not in the way this grinding games are... I mean, you can play a career in SHIV but it's not like you will spend your time just to get a better weapon, or other piece of equipment... Sims are good to play with what you have, and I love doing some patrols on S-boats or Type-II from time to time.

The issue I raised is because for all I have known, these F2P games are really a money sink in that if you want to be competitive on them you have to spend a lot of money (or what to me, with three kids and in these times of crisis, is a lot of money for a game... like, 20 or 30 euros a month). And if you want to be in the top players, even more.

Of course they'll say that most of the stuff can be grinded for, yea if you have unlimited supplies of time, and no life at all. So they tickle your weaknesses and you end up paying, paying and paying some more.

About WoT, I mostly agree with what RAM says, it is a fun and exciting game with awesome flaws. Was fun for me until I got quite good at it, and joined a clan, and then is when the fun went away... you try to be good, you have to grind grind grind and pay pay pay. I quit the game because of that, it felt like a crack addiction. Maybe its just my personality! :hmm2: But when I took a look at my paypal logs, I saw I had spent in a year more than 300eur in that game!!! I was so shocked you wouldnt believe it. That's not my idea of what you should pay for a game, but hey, microtransactions are like that, you don't feel the 10eur now, 10eur next week, oh I don't want to spend another week grinding just to get the new tracks for this tank, without the tracks I can't use the gun I already unlocked... without the gun I am not effective at all at this level... oh ok I can afford 10 more euros, can't I? Oh, cool now I have the new gun! But next week it will be the same... and the next after. And when you get to level 10 and have the greatest tanks, oh well they introduce a new system which "freezes" your tanks when you are destroyed in battle... so you have to wait another week before you can help your clanmates. Oh, but there is a solution, yea, start the grind all over again with another nation... Hateful.

So imagine my thoughts, when I come back to sub sims, my ever beloved games, only to find that Ubi's next move is not a sequel (should we call it fix?) for SHV, oh no, it's a new F2P online game. That felt so bad, after my WoT experience, that I can't explain. Of course it's just the way I feel, they are a company, want to make money, and you run a website and have to try your best to manage this old farts community. :up: But I know I won't be touching that thing with a 10 foot pole. I still hope we can get something else running as I have been saying around. And I understand I shouldnt be ranting and spilling my anger and pain in this part of the forum, which should be to praise the new online sensation... :O:

But now I let it all out, won't happen again, I'll stay in the old farts section from now on! :salute:

Hey, Otto, I think your statement is a fair analysis of F2P games, and incremental costs. :yep: I really like it when someone makes a point in a reasonable fashion, pointing things out like you have done.

Yes, they are a company and all companies strive to make money, people need to eat. I think what you said is fair; I also have to say, if someone enjoys the game, they make the decision how much to spend on it. 300 Euros is too much for me, no doubt. Depending on how much I play and if I can get into it, I could see spending as much or more than a boxed game. But I would shy away from continuing to pay unless this was a new game sensation I could not live without. Even then, it's all up to me to turn loose any $$$.

[Gezoes]

Thanks for caring... :P

As I said above, I've been clean for a couple of months. But I tell you, among the people who were top-ish in that game, I wasn't one of the big spenders at all. Their target is guys on their 30s, with some good job of work, who spend between 500-1200 eur a year on the game. You can buy the so-called "gold ammo" which gives you a totally unfair advantage since it's able to penetrate most tanks' armor even if your vehicle is inferior.

My problem there was that I'm a stat whore (can I say this uncle Steve? pretty please?) and the only way to improve your stats is play well and PAY.

And now, you've made me post again in this thread where I promised uncle Neal I wouldn't post again! :haha:

Sorry 'bout that. Don't worry, I called Neal 'Neil' recently, which undoubtedly delayed his review. So I will be keelhauled a wee bit sooner than you :arrgh!:

I guess I'm an oldfashioned guy with a rabid sense of people trying to get me to buy things. I spent about 31 euro's on a Type and 10 euro's for some gold change. Games used to cost about 40 euro's, today 60 at least, so that would be the absolute limit. I've played WoT since the closed beta.

My stats are good, and I have a garage ranging from 2 - tier 9. The one thing compensates the other. I never use gold ammo. Also, I have a few vehicles where I win about 65% of my games. I have won 54% overall, which doesn't make me among the best, far from it. But maintaining 54% in random games, with some medals that will raise an eyebrow or two, is pretty good.

I often get invites, but I always decline. I hate clans. Always something. Given, a new tank takes a lot longer with me, but in the meantime I gather free XP which goes towards the best gun on purchase of the tank.

You don't need gold at all. But you're right, above the 60% overall people tend to throw one bucket after the other into the game, and expect others to do the same. Sorry to hear you got dragged into that, but hey, you came out of it :yep:

[SurfnSea]

I look forward to trying this. If it was hardcore sim I'm fine with that. If it is leaning more toward arcade I'm ok with that too. I just love sub sims and I like the idea of the online play as mentioned by Neal in his article. Good luck to the team developing this I wish you success.

[TwoGamers]

This is going to have micro payments and its most likely going to let you buy power waht i would have rather seen was a game were you can play as a submarine or as a british unit like a destroyer or plane.:cool:

[Hinrich Schwab]

This is going to have micro payments...

Of course. It is what Ubi$oft wants.:D

[Sartoris]

I'm surprised to see so many people here supporting this product. Seeing how Ubisoft mangled SH5, it's baffling to me that there are some consumers who are prepared to simply forgive Ubisoft for singlehandedly killing off a beloved sim franchise, only to turn it into what seems to be nothing more than a simplistic Facebook-like game.

[Onkel Neal]

I can only speak for myself, but I never said I forgave Ubisoft for anything. I can't really see where it's my role to forgive them for a product, no one put a gun to my head to buy it. I reviewed it and gave it the lowest score of all Silent Hunter games (and just about every A title game since Fast Attack). I certainly expressed my dissatisfaction with how they handled the run up to the game, how they were closed off to input, closed off to the community, and basically held back review copies of the game until 2 weeks after it was released. Just as with movie reviews, when a company does that, it signals problems. And SH5 had loads of problems. It had great potential but Ubisoft declined to support it. But am I going to close myself off to new possibilities? Heck no. This is a new game, new dev team, and new direction. I try not to pre-judge too much, I have been wrong in the past. :) If SHO stinks, it won't cost me anything, I won't be playing it, and I won't waste any energy posting about it.

[desertstriker]

whens the beta test coming out????

as for if it sucks i hope that with all the people here someone will be able to do the beta test and alert us to if it stinks or is good

[BigBANGtheory]

Gamescon 2012 starts tomorrow and SHO will be there, so I should think new information will surface over the next few days. It will be interesting to see what impact they make with the gaming press, there seems to be an impressive line up of titles this year.

[The_Pharoah]

one thing I didn't like about SHO is the fact that its not an open sandbox type game. What I would have done is:

1. set up a specific time period (say 1942/43)
2. have ONE massive environment through linked servers or something (similar to how VATSIM works) which simulates the whole world eg. Atlantic/Med/Pacific
3. have a Ubisoft-controlled world that:
i. schedules convoys everywhere
ii. adjusts based on success of convoys (they're doing this I believe) eg. more sinkings = more escorts, etc.
iii. scheduling military convoys eg. US-UK, battle groups, etc
iv. aircraft
v. recon flights, etc
vi. BdU messages
4. Then give start everyone out in a Type II with the ability to purchase a Type VII for say $20 or Type IX for $35 or something ($10 upgrade from Type VII to Type IX) however they are still able to accumulate points and upgrade (albeit taking a much longer time) through tonnnage scored, length of service, etc.
5. Everyone then is able to operate as a wolfpack or lone wolf as needed with the ability to call for other boats or BdU for replenishment. This gives you the ability to make your own story as a submariner and/or play with friends attacking a convoy.

Now THAT would be awesome. I'm sure SHOL works on the above but not fully from what I understand.

[LMD]

one thing I didn't like about SHO is the fact that its not an open sandbox type game. What I would have done is:

1. set up a specific time period (say 1942/43)
2. have ONE massive environment through linked servers or something (similar to how VATSIM works) which simulates the whole world eg. Atlantic/Med/Pacific
3. have a Ubisoft-controlled world that:
i. schedules convoys everywhere
ii. adjusts based on success of convoys (they're doing this I believe) eg. more sinkings = more escorts, etc.
iii. scheduling military convoys eg. US-UK, battle groups, etc
iv. aircraft
v. recon flights, etc
vi. BdU messages
4. Then give start everyone out in a Type II with the ability to purchase a Type VII for say $20 or Type IX for $35 or something ($10 upgrade from Type VII to Type IX) however they are still able to accumulate points and upgrade (albeit taking a much longer time) through tonnnage scored, length of service, etc.
5. Everyone then is able to operate as a wolfpack or lone wolf as needed with the ability to call for other boats or BdU for replenishment. This gives you the ability to make your own story as a submariner and/or play with friends attacking a convoy.

Fully agree:up:

[vanjast]

You know of course that UBI loss will be somebody else's gain. They simply have changed target markets... and 'dropped the ball'. I think they will continue dropping the ball
:)

[CaptainCruise]

Since this is gonna be a MMO game, is it possible to have one variation of the game be sub vs. DD? Make destroyers playable units and add a feature to the game similiar to what we had back in the SH2/DC co-op days? Maybe develop a added feature to the game as a MMO team "subs" vs. team "DD's"?

I may be missing something since I don't understand completely everything about SHO and how it works, and I may be embarrassing myself right now bringing those days up again...ack...who knows! :oops: Regardless.....is what I mentioned possible or desirable?

"CC"

[andwii]

Its very possible, but from what ive heard they arnt going to be doing that. At least not for a while. They want to basically clone the SH3 MP and add a bunch to it. Thats at least what ive seen.

You know of course that UBI loss will be somebody else's gain. They simply have changed target markets... and 'dropped the ball'. I think they will continue dropping the ball
:)

ubi seems to be dropping the ball a lot latley, it started with splinter cell double agent IMO. Now with black list, its not even the same voice actor for the most stupid reason ever.

[Nexus7]

SHO goes in the direction of my vision witch is:

log into an ever running multiplayer game where the scenario is the world. With for example 100 nations (teams). You pick one and stay in there.

You can interact with the world with different simulators depending on what you want to do:
- conduct politics (like civ)
- conduct economy (industry)
- be infantry somewhere (inf sim)
- drive a tank somewhere (tank sim)
- drive aircraft somewhere (flight sim)
- drive a submarine somewhere (SH/SC/DW...)
- ecc ecc

This could become real in 10? 20 years ? who knows.

[John Channing]

SHO goes in the direction of my vision witch is:

log into an ever running multiplayer game where the scenario is the world. With for example 100 nations (teams). You pick one and stay in there.

You can interact with the world with different simulators depending on what you want to do:
- conduct politics (like civ)
- conduct economy (industry)
- be infantry somewhere (inf sim)
- drive a tank somewhere (tank sim)
- drive aircraft somewhere (flight sim)
- drive a submarine somewhere (SH/SC/DW...)
- ecc ecc

This could become real in 10? 20 years ? who knows.

Or you could, and I'm just thinkin' out loud here, interact with the real world depending on what you want to do right now:

- Get involved politically and make the world better (for real)
- Get involved economically (with a job)
- Join the real infantry
- Join the army and drive a real tank (29 Palms is lovely this time of year)
- Join the airforce and fly a real plane (So is Tucson)
- Join the Navy and drive a real submarine
- Etc, etc.

:D

JCC

[PL_Andrev]

Or you could, and I'm just thinkin' out loud here, interact with the real world depending on what you want to do right now:

- Get involved politically and make the world better (for real)
- Get involved economically (with a job)
- Join the real infantry
- Join the army and drive a real tank (29 Palms is lovely this time of year)
- Join the airforce and fly a real plane (So is Tucson)
- Join the Navy and drive a real submarine
- Etc, etc.

:D

JCC

Remember - join to CORRECT SIDE !
:har:

[Nexus7]

Or you could, and I'm just thinkin' out loud here, interact with the real world depending on what you want to do right now:
(...)
- Join the Navy and drive a real submarine
(...)

JCC

Yeah, maybe I'll move to some nations that has a navy and i start the training :hmmm:

:rotfl2: :down:

[Nexus7]

Remember - join to CORRECT SIDE !
:har:

That about joining the right (virtual) nation (or whatever) is not an obvious issue, like 1000 other aspects.

Maybe the whole is a real bad idea (virtualize the life), but doesnt it already go that way ?

But it is a tempting idea to me to get to the puter, log in to the virtual thing and choose what i want to do... for example:
- join Seawolf on patrol in the ??? Sea as a TMA officer
or
- join infantry squad XY in nation XXX with the mission XZ as a flamethrower :rotfl2:

[ON EDIT]
Basically it's all about not killing the idea of going online with a sub simulator (even on a large scale) but to sustain it (I am talking about SH5 online here, but coming from Sub Command and Dangerous Waters).
I don't like what has happened to Dangerous Waters, witch was/is in my opinion a path with very interesting potential, but on a dead point.

[Kloef]

They build a browser game with adds, doesnt matter who's playing, the adds are running and money is made( big finger to all of us, really deep), once the game is in Beta there will be no modding, no big changes, but the worst is there is a forum and they WILL delete 'bad' posts!

Just imagine sailing on the sea and seeing an add for 100m2 bricks or toiletpaper, there goes the 'intense experience', getting into the patrol area will be slow but the higher level you are the faster you can get there, you are going to pay them to travel faster! You are going to pay them to see further, to shoot better to do basically everything..you WILL pay!

It works both ways, either you buy your credits or whatever they will call it, or you have to spend enourmous amounts of time to generate credits and they can show you more adds, works out the same for them..not for me or you or us.

No influence from subsim just a bigger group of players with different interests, not people who just want a good sub game or simulator ( and give a part of their live for it to give us all a better experience, at NO costs) and the SHO forum fanboys/girls will love to jump at our throats when we complain about sonar not working properly or some other technical thing they screwed up because it works so well in the game, they won't care about realism.

For example i play WGT Golf, a 'free' browsergame. In 3 months i bought about 70 euro's of virtual clubs and balls to improve my game ( yes i caught the bait) to be able to get to a higher level. I gave them the benefit of the doubt as the clubs really are better (same as an enhanced tool in your sub, earn it with grinding or buy it) but now i got to a new Tier and my clubs are now useless because i didn't buy new ones when i levelled and the game is mad at me and wants me to buy even better clubs for more money, i drew the line right there and then. Also you can earn free credits by watching adds, now they increased the amount of views from 50 to 100(!) to get a lousy 75 Credits and 100 views is something like watching 7 adds a day for 14 days before you get the credits, but i'm drifitng off the subject..

All the browsergames work like this, it's all about generating money.

Is this worrying? Yes it is! It's the end of the line, it's a developer saying screw you we build this game and people will play because our marketing department says so,and they build in things to reward you so you develope a addiction in time ( that's the big picture) and the worst is they are right they will get their players. They will advertise with things like '2 million players on patrol' while they have 2 million subscribers, maybe 100.000 will play the game for a few days but they will try to lure us into it..

I'd rather have Ubi ask me to give them 100 Euro 's for a budget to build a good sub sim and let them do their stuff properly for a change for the next 5 years and give us SH6 with German ánd U.S subs and maybe some Japanese, British, Russian and Dutch subs too, especially Dutch:sunny:

I just hope this game won't devide the people on this forum and get us into a fit about it, while THEY make money and people will succomb to the attractive pictures and screenshots on the website.

I've played loads of browser games, some where good others were less good but they never give you that total game experience, they never deliver the goods. I tried C&C Alliances, Battlestar Galactica and a few others but they don't come close to an installed game.

Just don't expect too much of the game..it's free, unless you pay.

[desertstriker]

any word on the beta testing?

i hope at least one of us is chosen to beta test so they tell the others if it is a good or bad game...

[Nexus7]

Sorry but it looks like you people fear to face an intelligent opponent.
Cuz that's what you get on going online.

To easy to shot down AI cargos, you get used to the algorythm. Humans are different.

[Nemesis1024]

I have no problem at all putting my skills up against others as I play MMO's all the time now don't get me wrong I'm not saying that I'm the best thing since sliced bread in fact I'm more the usual average player. What I'm pissed about is the fact that Ubi are now just as bad as EA as in a bunch of money grabbers that couldn't care less about their customers. Personally I won't play the game...I mean I love silent hunter though reducing it to a browser game? Now that's just insulting.

Love the youtube link btw really funny xD

[Nexus7]

Well at the cost of resulting arrogant, I cant compare winning a 1 vs 1 multiplayer game in Sub Command with sinking a whole convoy in Silent Hunter.

Both require a lot of skill, but what i love in SC/DW is when I have the feeling to read the opponent's mind :D

[Nexus7]

Just imagine sailing on the sea and seeing an add for 100m2 bricks or toiletpaper, there goes the 'intense experience', getting into the patrol area will be slow but the higher level you are the faster you can get there, you are going to pay them to travel faster! You are going to pay them to see further, to shoot better to do basically everything..you WILL pay!



I play World of Tanks since months and didnt spend a cent. It's not a browser game, allowing much more detail than a browser game, but its totally free and only multiplayer. There are no "in game" ads.
In WoT, you can pay to buy better tanks, to buy better ammo, to buy tank equipment, to buy better crew etc. :yep:

I like to go the "basic" (and slow) way and I am running a Tiger fully equipped, without to spend a cent.

What i notice sometimes, people that buy (cash) better tanks or better ammo will immediately "show up" as noobs because they didnt learn enough to go to that level and it is usually clear to see for the other players. (and i personally tend to belive they wont even enjoy the experience).

Still, some ppl WILL spend a lot.

I think this formula is plainly very rentable, if properly implemented, and yes, money matters a lot for that industry...

[Cybermat47]

Hey, I've got an idea! Why don't we all Just wait for it to come out!!!!!!

[Iunoi]

I think the online game is fun

[Sonarman]

Sorry but it looks like you people fear to face an intelligent opponent.
Cuz that's what you get on going online.

To easy to shot down AI cargos, you get used to the algorythm. Humans are different.

They will still be AI opponents as far as combat goes, users do not get to be the allies we are all u-boats! The only competition between humans will therefore be in climbing the aces leaderboard.

[dancerdolphin]

i have played it. I suggest you do as I have and apply to beta test it and experience the game. I applied at the beginning of this week and wait to hear back.:ping:

[Silent Ace]

one thing I didn't like about SHO is the fact that its not an open sandbox type game. What I would have done is:

1. set up a specific time period (say 1942/43)
2. have ONE massive environment through linked servers or something (similar to how VATSIM works) which simulates the whole world eg. Atlantic/Med/Pacific
3. have a Ubisoft-controlled world that:
i. schedules convoys everywhere
ii. adjusts based on success of convoys (they're doing this I believe) eg. more sinkings = more escorts, etc.
iii. scheduling military convoys eg. US-UK, battle groups, etc
iv. aircraft
v. recon flights, etc
vi. BdU messages
4. Then give start everyone out in a Type II with the ability to purchase a Type VII for say $20 or Type IX for $35 or something ($10 upgrade from Type VII to Type IX) however they are still able to accumulate points and upgrade (albeit taking a much longer time) through tonnnage scored, length of service, etc.
5. Everyone then is able to operate as a wolfpack or lone wolf as needed with the ability to call for other boats or BdU for replenishment. This gives you the ability to make your own story as a submariner and/or play with friends attacking a convoy.

Now THAT would be awesome. I'm sure SHOL works on the above but not fully from what I understand.

Agree 100% :up:

[griff4]

Way to go, Beta test it first

[Philipp_Thomsen]

I decided to login back to subsim to see what was going on... maybe some new game.

Tired of playing wow.

So I saw SHO, watched a bunch of videos on youtube.

LOL!

You know, I thought I'd be angrier, what with the utter fail that SH5 was,
and waiting that maybe the next one would be a bit better...
or maybe I'm just so unbelievably enraged that I have come full circle.

Browser game... for simulator fans... What the hell is the gaming company thinking.
Other than money.

Actually I'm not that impressed... I'm now working for the gaming industry (SGI, Cross Fire, quality control)
And I gotta tell you... if they have to choose between quality or profit, it's profit every time.

I used to get pissed at first... now days I'm just used to. Its a 2-month-long fight over email to fix an in-game typo.

[longam]

I here ya man, but at least I never have to upgrade my PC ever again because I don't see using it for gaming much anymore other than what I have.

[Steeltrap]

Haven't been here for a while.

Watched Onkel's video. After all these years I now know what he looks like.

Otherwise? I'm amused to see a lot of "What is Ubi thinking?" questions.

Seriously? Ubisoft and rational thought went their separate ways with SH5 being 'constant online'. I said I'd not buy it for that reason and I've not (even when it's in bargain bin).
Anyone expecting anything other than utter arsehattery from Ubi is bound to be disappointed, IMO.

As an aside; WoT? Yes, I've played that extensively. You don't need to spend money up to about tier 8. Beyond that it will take an ABSURD number of games to make sufficient CR to pay for anything. A premium tank is a minimum. I no longer have a premium account, have a premium tier 8 (JT-88), and run several tier 8s and a tier 9.

Hope everyone's well.
Cheers

[Nordmann]

Looks interesting, particularly the strategy elements. Still not sure why they have elected not to have player operated escort vessels, as that would have made the online aspect far more appealing in my opinion.

As for all the usual doom and gloom, well what did you honestly expect? Ubi haven't exactly had much in the way of positive feedback over the past few years, and this came to a real head when SH5 was released (the rage meter was off the scale), so it's amazing that they are prepared to make even a browser based SH game!

[shark11]

haha i had a look at that youtube about sh online lol how true it is, playing on line ha, its as back as SH5 crap,
SH over the years are going the wrong way, instend of getting better there getting worst
must be why i keep going back to my old friend SH3 with GWX and a few mods.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQgtSgtey5w

[shark11]

I got a million things to say about sh5 so yea sh6 I not even gonna waste my time trying I wont even bother downloading it as a beta.

I refuse to play it based on the companys previouse attempts and I know its gonna be buggy and far from completed so yea my answer to UBI is NO
I have paid lots of money for games in the past and they just end up crap so I am peed off its always the same far from complete lots of cool grafix and poor game play.

a lost customer my rating for sh6 is 1 out of 10
how true am with you on this

[Wolferz]

First impression on learning this news......:k_rofl:

First reaction to what SHO is...:Kaleun_Mad:
What I think they can do with it when finished...:/\\x:

[THE_MASK]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jc8LQ6mQoCs

[0rpheus]

http://www.pcgamer.com/previews/silent-hunter-online-preview-everything-looking-ship-shaped/

:salute:

[Karl Heinrich]

http://www.pcgamer.com/previews/silent-hunter-online-preview-everything-looking-ship-shaped/



"There’s little doubt that Silent Hunter Online is for dedicated sim fans only. It’s painfully niche..."

Hmmm, if this is what PC Gamer thinks then Ubi are possibly somewhat off the mark for their target audience with this. Similarly, it's far from being "niche" enough for most of us. Sorry, just stating the obvious again in case someone had missed it...

[Sailor Steve]

Yeah, I saw that too. It's painfully obvious that reviewer doesn't have a clue what sims are about. Also, if it's too much a sim for the casual reviewer, and not enough for the actual simmer, where does that leave it?

[Onkel Neal]

http://www.pcgamer.com/previews/silent-hunter-online-preview-everything-looking-ship-shaped/

:salute:

Hmmm. Nice first look and summary. I take it from the reviewer's tone, he found the game interesting and somewhat complex. That bodes well for Subsim players--at least he didn't compare SHO to Farmville. :cool:

Haven't been here for a while.

Watched Onkel's video. After all these years I now know what he looks like.



Lol, then you must have missed all the Subsim meeting threads ;)

[Alexio]

:rock:Hmmm. Nice first look and summary. I take it from the reviewer's tone, he found the game interesting and somewhat complex. That bodes well for Subsim players--at least he didn't compare SHO to Farmville. :cool:



Lol, then you must have missed all the Subsim meeting threads ;)

[Flick]

I'm going to go ahead and just side with Jefmajor on his opinion on this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQgtSgtey5w (Be warned language!)

My thoughts:

WHY UBISOFT, WHY GODS WHY WHHHHYYY WOULD YOU DO THIS?!?!?!

Oh right, Money.

Because UBISOFT now the name itself in other terms means (there not a hard company) and what does that remind you off? Exaclty they need some substance to get hard and get back into action.

As of now Rilder they have there head up so far up you know where the sun dont shine.:har:

Enough said after playing SH 2, 3, and 4 which was the last
I had enough of Silent Hunter UBIHard oh sorry it's UBSOFT.

[Steed007]

Hi guys I don't Normally like ranting well only a little but here we go I see The first post for this Game was in 2012 about feb time now its June 2013 as of Today and this SH online is nowhere to be seen actually online.

In my View this game is like 9 steps back after SH5 I wont be downloading it even if it is free its a complete waste of time.

got say I know sh5 has lush grafix but Still I find myself miss'in the old days of sh2 and stats and people coming together to play Subs vs dd's in a competitive role to show what Captains got what Glory under there Name.
and Sending many a Merchy to Davey Jones Locker by our Wolfpacks :P:rock:

BIg Shout out to the Stat Writers for making the days of past fun :rock::rock:

[Jiva]

Steed I also miss the SH/DC days when the play was between real man/woman and keeping the stats. I can't reason why they never made updated version of that SH/DC combination. They where the best and most memorable days of playing. I bet if the SH online had the Dc compnent it would be very successful.

Jiva

[Gryffon300]

Someone probably said the same thing about the quality of SH4 in the discussion of the pending release of SH5.

I want to know where the faith we're supposed to be putting into this forthcoming product is supposed to meterialize from? The experience we've had over the last 3 Silent Hunter products has been a pattern of declining quality. The faith of the sim community has been steadily abused and taken for granted. Publishers have taken talented developers and quashed their creative potential by placing unrealistic development timelines on them, steadily reducing the overall quality of the released product. Past that they've also through this policy of rapid development turnover left us with steadily less and less polished final products becuase of more and more limited patching. The product we buy isn't getting better, and when they make a new one its not getting better either. They sell us a more bitter lemon with every new release.

If you bought apples from a grocer and every time the apples got mushier and tasted more bland and got more bruised, why should you have any faith that the next batch is going to be worth your money?

Now, we're not only seeing yet another hurried develoment title but we're seeing it gutted of its inherent credibility as a sim because of this MMO F2P nonsense. These games are rarely in any sense of the term "Realistic" nor are they particularly cerebral. They also afford the end user absolutely ZERO ability to modify the game whatsoever. On top of that the pricing scale is designed to force us to pay even more money than a flat purchase gives us.

Where in this entire scheme of the ongoing development of the Silent Hunter brand are we supposed to see the light at the end of the tunnel? The only shred of optimism one can pray before in this bitter recounting of my favourite sim's recent history is one of pure delusion and wishful thinking.

This is all about simple deductive reasoning. The entire business strategy of Ubisoft of late has shown itself to be against the better interests of this kind of community. Their strategy is all about money. Myself, as a consumer, my strategy is all about getting for my money the value I seek. I see a diametrically opposed set of intersts at play here. Why do we have to give the people trying to find the fastest way to the bottom our pocket the benefit of the doubt?

Given their recent track record if anything THEY have to prove to us that its worth anything, that is if they still care about us which I don't think they do. They went MMO because they want the cash from mainstream buyers. If thats the case, which it very likely is, then basically the product is now outside the parameters that attracts most of us to the brand in the first place.

There are so many reasons to be skeptical of SHO that I don't know which one to even put on the top of the list.

This is a great piece, but there are some realities that need to be considered. As an only occasional gamer, and rarely online. My wife & kids play Runescape and Minecraft etc, I have been into the Homeworld-based and Descent: Freespace-based games (where modders were given access to the original game codes and so could "skin" it to a Babylon 5-based experience), I want to explore one strong commercial reality that gets buried under the easy and obvious accusation that UBI and others are only interested in 'money'.

Partly due to the Ubiquitous uptake of personal technology (see what I did there? Wasn't that good? Nah, your right. Sorry. Won't do it again.), the MARKET has shifted to one of smorgasbord grazing and nanno-second attention spans Angry Birds today, Virus Boy tomorrow (OMG. I just made that up, relax. You haven't missed the Next Big Thing.)

So, here is what I know about modern media - movies, music and gaming. ALL of these 'industries' have moved to a model where the profitability and return on investment is essentially calculated to be made WITHIN 2 WEEKS OF RELEASE!

The market now buys music one song at a time, and there is a 3 second loyalty factor. Have a look at free-to-air TV. Sport, News and reality shows (cheap and quick to produce). And check the demise of Newspapers and Magazines. Maybe what I am suggesting is a bit of a black-armband view of 'culture', but can I suggest that maybe the reason that quality games are a dying breed is because WE are a dying breed.

Companies everywhere are casting around desperately looking for a way to 'Monetise' us (how I LOATHE that term!). We got used to free stuff on line, including news, but now they discover they can't pay for decent journalists to report or uncover it, so now we live in the world of press-release and propaganda.

So, if you look at the squillions of on-line Apps that are churned out by pimple-faced kids in their mom's basement, some of which become mega-hits and make a bomb for them, no wonder that looks tempting. The problem for the Boards and Committees making decisions on what to fund and how much to invest, no-one can ever tell you exactly WHY one app or movie or game will have that X-factor that takes it on to be massively profitable.

In such a market, especially if you have a short-term view and no longer care about building and protecting a brand, churn something (anything) out and cross your fingers that enough gullible types will pay for a download before the word gets out and, who knows, maybe we will have a hit on our hands for no apparent rational reason?

But, so as not to seem totally negative and cynical, have you noticed that LP records are making a come-back? Sales are growing (whereas CD sales are crashing). In 10 years there will be NO Video stores it will all be online. So, how does a company manage this transition and retain quality and interactivity? What role for the modder in the MMO universe?:hmmm:

Gryff

[Red October1984]

I haven't even bothered to follow the SHO Disaster after the first gameplay video was posted of the German Beta.

Even before that I didn't care.

But....I do have one question. When is the predicted/actual release date? :hmmm: ...or do they even know yet?

[desertstriker]

probably late august early September.

[Red October1984]

probably late august early September.

Ah... I don't care. :O: I won't play it. Can't with this bad internet anyway.

The one thing that I see happening though... :hmmm:

Everybody says "Oh. I won't play it. I hate Ubi. I won't have any part of it" but do you know what you guys are going to do when it releases?

"Oh. I'll try it out I guess. Might as well see how bad it is" and then some of you will want to play more...

And you'll just be giving Ubi what it wants. :timeout: A Drone Army of Arcade "Simmers" who will pay 2$ everytime they refit their boat.



----

End of my not so well informed rant. Micropayments might not even be part of the game for all I know even though I have a strong suspicion that they will be.

:sunny:

[Sailor Steve]

End of my not so well informed rant. Micropayments might not even be part of the game for all I know even though I have a strong suspicion that they will be.
I'm glad you tacked that caveat on the end. I've already said I would give it a try. I've also already said there's no way they'll get a penny out of me.

As for micropayments, they've already said they will be there, at least to purchase new stuff faster, so your suspicions were acknowledged before you ever had them. That's the whole purpose of a game like this.

[Red October1984]

I'm glad you tacked that caveat on the end. I've already said I would give it a try. I've also already said there's no way they'll get a penny out of me.

I remember you saying that now. :hmmm:

As for micropayments, they've already said they will be there, at least to purchase new stuff faster, so your suspicions were acknowledged before you ever had them. That's the whole purpose of a game like this.

Every single F2P game has micropayments. :dead: In some way, they do.

[johan_d]

Looked at some vids, but I saw absolutley no immersion. Nothing. Where is the hours of looking for prey, and suddenly become one ? Maybe SHO is nice for kiddies, but only for a day or two.

[Nexus7]

The thing I dislike in games where you can pay for better instrumentation or faster growth is if the statistics dont take that into account.
I like to have a comparison with other players, that shows me how I am doing.

But a good player that spends money will perform better than one that doesnt (here ppl start to spend a lot to climb the ladder).
Not showing separated statistics is another way to push ppl to spend. (Be clear that I dont know how thats implemented in SHO).

On the other hand the company cant live of our applauses, and it cant publish how much players spend.

What a balance :timeout:

Gotta get used to it i guess.

[merc4ulfate]

There is nothing like a 15 day login que ... the beta login server must be run on windows 3.1

I can not see how a web based program could ever be better than one driven on your computer. Hell at least you can play SH without an internet connection plus it is performance based and the mod community is second to none in my book.

Tried the online game today that ubi made. OMG I wanted to rip my hair out. I'm sorry some might like it but there is no way in hell that will ever be as good as Silent Hunter 3-4-5 with all the great mods and community that is here. Dear god it was mind numbing to go through a forced tutorial and lack of manual anything. No TDC, No manual targeting, no realism. No keyboard tfor anything except that big red x at the top of the screen to kill the window.

There was no fun in that at all.

[biosthetique]

Wow!...A bunch of open minded remarks!...That feels like a warm subsim community encouraging and supporting!...

I played that game yesterday and my experience was, that SHO is not fully cooked yet, it is still a beta.

However, I noticed some interesting innovations that I have never seen before in any subsims games or Arcade sub related games.

I could critic to death DW or any SH's. But focusing on the negative does not lead anywhere interesting.

SHO is a game designed not for the hard core subsimers, but for the public at large that might have never been interested by submarines before. Some of that public after an encounter with SHO might turn into a hardcore subsimers wanna be, and might come to subsim/radioroom to know more. And what do you think they will feel when they read some of your remarks?....Do you feel that they will come back!....

Any MOD, Any Game has a humble beginning.

How do you think you spoke, wrote and walked when you were 2 years old?...Do you remember?...Did you get the boot for not being mature yet?

That game is in beta and not fully developed. It will be one day!

I enjoy talking about what I play, and don't waste my time talking about what I don't know, don't play or don't want to play!....

Make a list of innovations you saw in that game you would like to see i.e. in SHIII, IV, V or VI to make that game useful today, because innovations are there, I have seen them.

Tom Clancy SSN was Booed by the critics for being too Arcadish and not subsim enough. Of all the games out there, this is the only one I know that offers "Command Detonate" which is one of the real way a torpedo can be used. Of course, no Hollywood movies ever illustrated that usage, and no one in Subsim ever noticed that it was absent from DW!...How interesting?

[pstein]

I waited about 2 hours to get in. I stayed all of five minutes. The game is awful. It's not even worthy of the title "Silent Hunter." It's basically a submarine shooter, just a little tougher.

[Nordmann]

I waited about 2 hours to get in. I stayed all of five minutes. The game is awful. It's not even worthy of the title "Silent Hunter." It's basically a submarine shooter, just a little tougher.

I think we must be playing different games. Yes the queues are very long at the moment, but a submarine shooter? Uh, no. Complete the tutorial, which takes around 15 minutes, and then play the campaign for at least a couple of hours before coming to a conclusion. 5 minutes? Nowhere near enough.

There is quite a bit of complexity for a browser based game, and it does a decent enough job of simulating submarine warfare, just without all the bells and whistles of SH5. Finding and engaging convoys is by no means as easy as it first appears, and getting kills still requires a bit of skill. It's not without its faults, especially with regards to the rather intrusive payment system, which seems to monetise virtually everything.

[CrysisGam3r]

Looks like the quality of a mobile game - beta or not.
Please just start making a AAA standard Silent Hunter 6 World at War and I'll be happy. Why not ask for modders to help create assets to keep costs down? They did better than UBI paid staff.
A free to play online game is a step back if you ask me.

[marius]

For a browser subsim game its fantastic! Has a good feel and if I can get most of the aids turned off it will be heaps of fun.

..love reading all these flame posts. Especially all the immature sarcastic below the belt remarks about a beta that doesn't stack up to our beloved SH3. Keep it up champs. Keep hammering those nails.

[Shub]

The new graphic engine looks very promising, the game is quite funny to me to play, it is not ok for people who calculated themselves torpedo solutions, cause it is completely automated in this compart. But you still have to approach the convoy the right way, and this takes time... and some skill. It is easier on one side, but require patience on the other, and just few players can stand a hour to approach and sink max 3 ships with a IIA.

Another good point is the wolfpacks: you can invite other players to attack a convoy, and you can find let's say 6 subs / 3 players attacking. This is real funny.

But, on the other side, the login queue simple prevents me to play, right now there are 526 people before me. Beside the ETA reported in the queue window is completely wrong, as UBI said, I can forecast between 2 and 3 hours waiting lo login.

I can follow a convoy for hours, but I can not wait hours to login... in 3 hours I will be at my parents' home for dinner :)

So right now I think this game is enjoyable, but until they fix this queue problem, it will be impossible to play on regular bases, for me at least.

Another good point is the chat: in 5 mins you realize that 99% of the players are not 14 years old trolls (nothing against young men, of course :) ) but kind people answering questions of newbies (as I am :) ) and so on.

I do hope they will fix this queue madness soon.

Bye!

[mikka]

I haven't been able to play because of the queue problem, but even if i don't like it, or even if i don't ever get to play it I hope it does great. I hope it kills, I hope it becomes the next WoW.

Why? because it will broaden the base.

Imagine the distribution of sim players along an axis of difficulty/realism. I'll bet that like many other things it has a roughly bell-shaped curve, with a looong tail towards high realism/difficulty. The bulk of the potential players will be in the middle, because they enjoy or tolerate a moderate difficulty. But they are the majority so they will be targeted by developers. Hard core realistic sims are a fringe. They are marginal, meaning they exist in the margin. The long tail of the distribution. For the margin to be substantial, read economically profitable, the base has to be big.

Take flight sims. If we consider every flight sim, combat or no combat, including the utterly unrealistic space sims, the base is humongous. A minority of players will enjoy the hyperrealistic sims. But this minority, because of the huge base, is sizable enough to attract some developers. So we have great flight sims.

If you've ever wondered why Silent Hunter was the only game in town, and Dangerous waters was left on the side of the road (except for the modders), it's because the subsim base is not big enough to sustain development.

So the best thing that can happen is that everybody and his brother plays silent hunter online. When I see the ridiculous 630 people/ 2 months and a half queue, I don't think "damn ubisoft is screwing the pooch again". I look forward to all those people hungering for more realism, and other companies, or ubisoft itself, noticing.

And I close my browser and smile, waiting patiently for a cold-war nuke sim.

[mikka]

tl;dr : A rising tide lifts all boats

[Shub]

Yes, I think you are right, Mikka. This online free sub game can drive a lot of people to the sub simulator world, and this is anyway good. A queue of 600 as the one I am climbing right now (283 in queue now, after 2 hours...) means that many people is trying it, and reading the in-game chat, I get the sensation many players never tried a SH title before... I hope UBI get rid of the queue ASAP, since the "casual player" will never wait 3 hours to play, not even as an option... well, neither do I lol

But I did... want to buy that damn Flak for my II C :)

Anyway, since there are things like this, out there:

Euro Truck Simulator 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlTuC18xVII

I believe a new sub sim is not impossibile to be seen in the future... :sunny:
Don't get me wrong... trucks are... uhm... well... :)

[biosthetique]

Some pics!

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-1913-12-06-68_zpsee21de36.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-1913-12-06-68_zpsee21de36.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-1819-35-17-57_zps1efc5c8f.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-1819-35-17-57_zps1efc5c8f.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-1913-12-14-30_zps22a5a35c.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-1913-12-14-30_zps22a5a35c.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-1819-30-44-57_zps49ed4735.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-1819-30-44-57_zps49ed4735.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-1919-23-26-42_zpsbcebb513.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-1919-23-26-42_zpsbcebb513.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-2213-39-47-51_zps90d9642e.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-2213-39-47-51_zps90d9642e.jpg.html)

Paid in gold!

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-2213-45-51-86_zps0c7393df.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-2213-45-51-86_zps0c7393df.jpg.html)

Paid in Gold!


http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/9c5b62ba-6766-419d-9db8-54a2a24bc130_zps86525dd0.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/9c5b62ba-6766-419d-9db8-54a2a24bc130_zps86525dd0.jpg.html)

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k566/gunny_highway1/IEXPLORE2013-09-2016-09-13-42_zps88b10d74.jpg (http://s1116.photobucket.com/user/gunny_highway1/media/IEXPLORE2013-09-2016-09-13-42_zps88b10d74.jpg.html)

The Torpedo clearly explodes under the ship!


It is a nice and pretty introduction for the new generations to the world of Subsims!...I see the questions new gamers ask in game in the public chat window, and I can see they get the right technical answers.

I remember asking questions about sonar in relation to wrecks and sea bed and all I got were short erroneous answers as you can't hide by a wreck, the DD will see you, or the sonar is not disturbed by the closeness of the sea bed, or U-boot never ran deck awashed!...Until someone showed a picture!

After all we are not narcissist, are we?...

SHO is not for or about us, but for and about the generations that were born after us, and where do they start sub simulator gaming.
Will they start with DW or SH III(if they can make it work), SHIV, SHV, SHVI, or SHO?....
We started at level entry with simple game with poor graphics, and they start with SHO. And some guys just don't like that. Some people believe that because it was hard for them it is suppose to be hard for the next one in line. Someone's perception of the world is not the world, but just a tiny perception of it!....The map is not the territory!

Because of us, they can get better and more accurate answers, and they don't have to go through what we went through. It is called progress, civilization!....In the absence of acceptance, and of that transmission of experience, they will become like a lot of us, just plain old narcissists begging for attention in relation to the ordeals we endured at the hands of the generation before us which were just full of their own accomplishments, and believed that to appreciate something you had to earn it the hard way, like it was for them!

SHO is not SHIII GWX. I played both today and I felt the difference, but you wont get people interested in SHIII and the likes, without a first step. SHO is a nice first step.

So, a game like SHO makes a lot of sense to me as a welcome door to a world, and the flak it is getting makes also sense to me, but I know it does not have to be!...Ignorance does not have to lead the way!...Understanding, acceptance and support should!

[Rick73]

I'm glad you tacked that caveat on the end. I've already said I would give it a try. I've also already said there's no way they'll get a penny out of me.

As for micropayments, they've already said they will be there, at least to purchase new stuff faster, so your suspicions were acknowledged before you ever had them. That's the whole purpose of a game like this.


Way off topic. I just wanted to complement you on that Kitty that comes up and takes the close button away. Hahahaha that's great! :haha:

[THE_MASK]

Are there any realism options , or planned ones ?

[Oleander]

I've tried to play it but I have no patience for games that make you wait and want you to pay for items that make the game playable. Sadly more and more game companies are going that route. I really wish they'd do like Valve and release a game that's playable stock with uninterrupted play but getting access to the cool stuff with one time transactions, not recurring ones.

[greensleves]

Just to get back to this topic.

I just started playing this game and I have to say that I dont like the whole concept of it.
Why would you make a FTP online browser game when you could release a "Silent Hunter 6" with all the money you make from games like "Assassin's Creed".
To me this is just the "we want to make even more money to create more ****ty content" way of discontinuing a great series.
Gaming what have you come to.....:down:

Yours
greensleves

P.S. sorry for the "****"

[Snacko]

Does this use flash? Will it work on my Galaxy Tab 4 10.1. I have flash installed on it.

When I click Play it does nothing... :hmmm: