SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - i have to ask.

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- Silent Hunter III (https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/forumdisplay.php?f=182)

- - i have to ask. (https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=116813)

Quote:

Originally Posted by fredbass

Good one RDP. :lol:

Couldn't resist :yep:

RDP

And again, lest we forget what SHIII was like early on... :p

(I consider SHIV to, on the whole, be in better state 3 months into its service life than SHIII was. I believe SHIII at the same time had patch 1.3 which even had the sonarman totally broken - still think it's had a better run? :hmm: )

Nice Post Sharkbait.:up:

Quote:

Originally Posted by MENTAT

You asked for it steed! :stare:

The new interface in SHIV has fewer options for stations, but the interface is more cumbersome. You can still select a specific station by pressing a function key or by mouse clicking (you can no longer get to most stations by walking around the virtual sub as you could in SHIII) but the sub menus are no longer mapped to keys. In fact, should you select a station via function key rather than by mouse click, the sub menu does not even update so you cannot choose any of the station specific commands as the on screen menu does not refresh.

Graphically, the game looks much, much worse than SHIII. The resolution is still locked at 1024 x 768 but anti-aliasing is not available. Ubi decided it was more important to add utterly useless bells and whistles such as weeds on the sea floor or shafts of light refracting in the water. All very nice, but the jaggies are so bad that any ship you try to look at through your periscope appears to be a pixellated mess. It's impossible to even discern the shape of a ship in the mess, let alone try to ID a specific ship type. Further, for whatever reason, the graphics engine is very poorly optimized. The minimum requirements listed on the box are only slightly higher than those of SHIII, but the game runs like stuttering molasses on any but the most powerful of machines, even with the extra graphics features turned off.

Almost all sounds have been copied directly from SHIII and they often cut out before they've finished playing.

The game still offers up a dynamic campaign, much like in SHIII but throws a lot of time specific scripted events at you in an attempt to make it feel more historic. That's a nice idea, but it feels more like an over the top Hollywood action movie. Zeros and Bettys appear out of nowhere with far too much frequency and spot you automatically, no matter what the time of day or the weather. Getting strafed 40+ per patrol is not fun, it's annoying. Also I have found is the enemy's un-nerving ability to find my sub when I'm outside of their field of view/sensors/sound sensing equipment, it just doesn't make sense.

The AI seems inept, with merchants and destroyers ploughing into each other with alarming frequency. There are also some serious bugs and features which were not implemented upon release which should be mandatory. The chronometer doesn't work, nor does the estimate speed function. This means it's effectively impossible to manually plot your torpedo attacks. You either have to scale back the realism and use the cheat which means the game automatically plots a perfect firing solution for you every time, or you have to "guestimate" the approximate speed and fire a spread, hoping for a hit.

Radar is also broken. The station is entirely unusable. SONAR doesn't work unless you man the station yourself. The AI operator is incapable of hearing anything. Should a sub compartment get damaged and later repaired, it's still unusable as any crew put into that compartment become wounded. Should your home base fall to the enemy while you are out on patrol, you're not informed of this and will end up sailing into a hostile port and get sunk. Not the most satisfying way to end a patrol. I could go on. There are literally dozens of game killing bugs.

Couple this with the frustration of having to infiltrate Yokohama harbour about four times in a row for photo recon and being told to patrol and sink shipping in a certain area only to find no time period defined for the length of patrol and no response when shipping has been sunk in the area, the game can get very annoying very quickly.

Moreover,
Whilst diving, gunners stay at their posts and get drowned

the deck gun stops for no apparent reason

STUPID pop up tools get in the way of everything, orders you need to give are hidden away behind these bloody things so that you have to close one or manually move it to get to the underlying control

STUPID STOPWATCH, insist on popping up every time you accelerate time above 256 X ? It then takes up space and gets in the way of everything

scrolling with the mouse happens only when the program bothers to let you. Sometimes ok, mostly not

The automatic Zooming function gets in the way of speedy control. Lets say a 10 degree port turn, you point to the turn you want, then because the bloody thing automatically zooms in, your 10 degree turn becomes a 20 degree turn

I watched in amazement when I sank a destroyer, watched it sink only to pop up out of the sea again some seconds later. it must have leapt 30 ft out of the sea. (just like those fishy type submarines in the old Stingray movies!)

You keep getting told that oxygen level is low and must surface when it isnt the case?

I have an Alienware Aurora with 2 megs of mem and and yet I wait ages to access any messages that have been drawn to my attention.

The warnings of ship sightings given in Lat/Long. I cant see which sighting they are referring to? Why not just have a simple grid/letter index like they did in SH 3? You can only take realism so far without screwing up the gameplay.

Don't even get me started on the lack of help in the manual or the repetitive sound effects or the fact you can spend hours stalking into a harbour only to take one mild hit on the casing and promptly sink to the bottom of the sea.

The game is bug ridden, missing features, and so poorly optimized that it runs like a slide show with no AA. Steer well clear. It's a big disappointment.

dont like it? dont play it!

Quote:

Originally Posted by MENTAT

Why do you act as if offended and felt responsible anyway?

I am not offended. :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morts

dont like it? dont play it!

Good Advice.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morts

dont like it? dont play it!

You dont get it do you? I am not playing already!

But as the topic is all about, I dont recommend it for if my opinion is asked. And the reasons i stated are clear.

Case closed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by STEED

Quote:

Originally Posted by MENTAT

Why do you act as if offended and felt responsible anyway?

I am not offended. :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morts

dont like it? dont play it!

Good Advice.

SH4 is great!

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

Quote:

Originally Posted by clayton

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

I have to ask: what is unrealistic / unhistorical about GWX in that period? This is not a challenge, as I've never played with GWX and haven't been able to play SH4 yet. I'm just curious about different attitudes and ideas concerning what's realistic or historical and what's not.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Quote:

Originally Posted by clayton

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

I think he's referring to the British ASW being highly effective even early in the war in GWX.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MENTAT

You asked for it steed! :stare:

The new interface in SHIV has fewer options for stations, but the interface is more cumbersome. You can still select a specific station by pressing a function key or by mouse clicking (you can no longer get to most stations by walking around the virtual sub as you could in SHIII) but the sub menus are no longer mapped to keys. In fact, should you select a station via function key rather than by mouse click, the sub menu does not even update so you cannot choose any of the station specific commands as the on screen menu does not refresh.

Never been a problem for me, just need to learn the new commands

Graphically, the game looks much, much worse than SHIII. The resolution is still locked at 1024 x 768 but anti-aliasing is not available. Ubi decided it was more important to add utterly useless bells and whistles such as weeds on the sea floor or shafts of light refracting in the water. All very nice, but the jaggies are so bad that any ship you try to look at through your periscope appears to be a pixellated mess. It's impossible to even discern the shape of a ship in the mess, let alone try to ID a specific ship type. Further, for whatever reason, the graphics engine is very poorly optimized. The minimum requirements listed on the box are only slightly higher than those of SHIII, but the game runs like stuttering molasses on any but the most powerful of machines, even with the extra graphics features turned off.

Anti aliasing and increased resolutions were implemented in patch 1.2

Almost all sounds have been copied directly from SHIII and they often cut out before they've finished playing.

Fixed by Mods

The game still offers up a dynamic campaign, much like in SHIII but throws a lot of time specific scripted events at you in an attempt to make it feel more historic. That's a nice idea, but it feels more like an over the top Hollywood action movie. Zeros and Bettys appear out of nowhere with far too much frequency and spot you automatically, no matter what the time of day or the weather. Getting strafed 40+ per patrol is not fun, it's annoying. Also I have found is the enemy's un-nerving ability to find my sub when I'm outside of their field of view/sensors/sound sensing equipment, it just doesn't make sense.

The AI seems inept, with merchants and destroyers ploughing into each other with alarming frequency. There are also some serious bugs and features which were not implemented upon release which should be mandatory. The chronometer doesn't work, nor does the estimate speed function. This means it's effectively impossible to manually plot your torpedo attacks. You either have to scale back the realism and use the cheat which means the game automatically plots a perfect firing solution for you every time, or you have to "guestimate" the approximate speed and fire a spread, hoping for a hit.

fixed by patch 1.2 and various mods

Radar is also broken. The station is entirely unusable. SONAR doesn't work unless you man the station yourself. The AI operator is incapable of hearing anything. Should a sub compartment get damaged and later repaired, it's still unusable as any crew put into that compartment become wounded. Should your home base fall to the enemy while you are out on patrol, you're not informed of this and will end up sailing into a hostile port and get sunk. Not the most satisfying way to end a patrol. I could go on. There are literally dozens of game killing bugs.

fixed by mods

Couple this with the frustration of having to infiltrate Yokohama harbour about four times in a row for photo recon and being told to patrol and sink shipping in a certain area only to find no time period defined for the length of patrol and no response when shipping has been sunk in the area, the game can get very annoying very quickly.

fixed by mods

Moreover,
Whilst diving, gunners stay at their posts and get drowned
the deck gun stops for no apparent reason
STUPID pop up tools get in the way of everything, orders you need to give are hidden away behind these bloody things so that you have to close one or manually move it to get to the underlying control
STUPID STOPWATCH, insist on popping up every time you accelerate time above 256 X ? It then takes up space and gets in the way of everything
scrolling with the mouse happens only when the program bothers to let you. Sometimes ok, mostly not
never seen that problem

The automatic Zooming function gets in the way of speedy control. Lets say a 10 degree port turn, you point to the turn you want, then because the bloody thing automatically zooms in, your 10 degree turn becomes a 20 degree turn
If your a dumbass

I watched in amazement when I sank a destroyer, watched it sink only to pop up out of the sea again some seconds later. it must have leapt 30 ft out of the sea. (just like those fishy type submarines in the old Stingray movies!)

Never seen that either

You keep getting told that oxygen level is low and must surface when it isnt the case?

fixed by mods

I have an Alienware Aurora with 2 megs of mem and and yet I wait ages to access any messages that have been drawn to my attention.

fixed by mods

The warnings of ship sightings given in Lat/Long. I cant see which sighting they are referring to? Why not just have a simple grid/letter index like they did in SH 3? You can only take realism so far without screwing up the gameplay.

Don't even get me started on the lack of help in the manual or the repetitive sound effects or the fact you can spend hours stalking into a harbour only to take one mild hit on the casing and promptly sink to the bottom of the sea.

The game is bug ridden, missing features, and so poorly optimized that it runs like a slide show with no AA. Steer well clear. It's a big disappointment.

The manual is poor, I will give you that one but any information you require can be found here at subsim

I have been playing since launch and love it, it just takes a bit of care and attention to get it running how you want it too

Quote:

Originally Posted by CCIP

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Quote:

Originally Posted by clayton

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

I think he's referring to the British ASW being highly effective even early in the war in GWX.

i wouldn say its highly effective
some ppl just dont know how to get away

We're going to have to accept that there's differing levels of opinion. SHIII has had A LOT of time to be worked on by the mod community, and clearly, a lot of that experience is/will further be applied to SHIV. Some guys love the Atlantic, others the Pacific. GWX has presented a challenge to a lot of guys, especially in the early war years. Inaccurate? Hell if I know; I wasn't there.

Truth is, both games are customisable to taste, if you're willing to look or do the work yourself. Me, I'm a tinkerer. I love messing with stuff... probably spend more time doing that then playing the games themselves. I tweaked the heck out of SHIII, then d/led GWX for a try.

SHIV needs its own GWX-type treatment; I also understand that a WHOLE LOT of people have put in a WHOLE LOT of time, and have given up a lot as well, to make GWX a reality that has satisfied many players of SHIII. They didn't get paid, they chose to do so, and chose to sacrifice what they had to to do it. So perhaps another group of interested parties will have to step up for the same commitment to SHIV. Or perhaps, after a rest, some of the GWX guys will choose to help out SHIV. Who knows?

But fostering animosity between two factions is not going to help any of us, and it certainly will NOT encourage others to step up and help fix whichever game it is we're hotter about.

My last word on this subject is this I really enjoy SH3/GWX and I enjoy SH4. :D

Have a nice day everyone and keep smiling. :) :D ;)

STEED starts to sing "Old man river, he keeps on rolling" :sunny:

Quote:

Originally Posted by clayton

SH4 is great!

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

Says you
Proof ?

You wouldnt know the half of it :roll:
Now bugger off back to your own forum

Quote:

Originally Posted by CCIP

Mind you, you're asking in the SHIII forum. There's quite a few people with grudges against SHIV in the SHIII forum :dead:

.

Works both ways

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigboywooly

Quote:

Originally Posted by clayton

SH4 is great!

May not be great to those who enjoy unrealistic / unhistorical campaigning i.e. GWX 39 - 41

Says you
Proof ?

You wouldnt know the half of it :roll:
Now bugger off back to your own forum

Quote:

Originally Posted by CCIP

Mind you, you're asking in the SHIII forum. There's quite a few people with grudges against SHIV in the SHIII forum :dead:

.

Works both ways

Alright, chill out, I think you're being unneccesarily bitter here. And I'd like to remind you that this is, after all, everyone's forum and that's not a nice thing to say. Please keep a friendly tone.

I was merely responding to balance some of the earlier negativity in the thread. Whatever complaints there are about SHIII from the SHIV, they are generally of a different nature. Here we mostly have the whole "game is broken" thing, and yet we've got a lot of people enjoying it. It only makes sense that some of the people more disgruntled with the new title would move back to SHIII. It's not that I'm pointing any fingers, either - I'm just reminding that the answers to the original question may have certain attitudes behind them, whichever 'side' they come from. Sorry if I sounded a little extreme.

Personally, I'm saddened there's so many people that can't just choose both and be happy with both in their own ways :hmm:

Wasnt directed at you CCIP but Clayton
The only time he posts over here is to rubbish SH3 and GWX inparticular

If he dont like either no need to keep coming in here and bleating
Especially his " unrealistic campaigns " bs

Meh

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigboywooly

I do enjoy SH3 and SH4 quite a bit. I've been playing both for quite a long time.

I don't see the how silent speed at periscope depth during nightime dead ahead of a convoy in 1940 is all that realistic. But, it's been awhile and it may have been fixed. (GWX)

I'm not ashamed to stand up for SH4 nor should feel like I have to hide because my dislike of GWX.

Its how you play then or just unlucky
There are more than enough ppl managing it
Even carrying out surface attacks with no problem

If the Br escorts were really as inept as everyone thinks then the Germans wouldnt have lost 9 out of a total of 57 boats in the 3 months of 39
Not to mention the 24 boats in 40 and 35 in 41

Its not an arcade game where you are invisible and invincible ( stock )
You have to use cunning
If it was as simple early war as everyone thinks them the ubootwaffe losses would have been 0

If you get picked up and sunk in 40 then its realistic
If you dont then so is that
If everybody was having real problems getting out of 1940 then it may be a problem but as ppl are making it through to 44\45 and coming home with large ( unrealistic - but its only a game ) tonnages then its obviously do able

And according to your earlier posts you play WAC
So stop bashing GWX if you dont use it
The ppl having a go at SH4 ARE playing it