I think SH5 has an awesome potential in the realism department namely:

To actually make you a captain of a crew, and not just the "do it all yourself" monkey we are in SH3 and SH4.

I like the notepad-style input for my TDC values in SH4 on the IXD2. But in reality, the captain would not "input" this data anywhere, nor would you push a button to flood the tube and fire an eel.

Realism in SH5 could mean that you as captain (for the first time actually seeing "trough your eyes") mostly do the brainwork, and the crew does the craft.

I'm actually surprised this was shipped without speech recognition. "Set torpedo running depth to 4 meters" makes more sense than going from periscope to attack map view and doing it there by hand on a dial.

Like Fish said, data presentation should move away from on-screen dials and symbols to the real 3d environment of the sub, or visual/audio cues from the crew.

Less button pushing, more interaction with crewmembers who do the button pushing, that would be a "captain sim" and in many ways more realistic than the captain doing everything himself.

The question is - can the AI crew be made intelligent and useful enough?

You can have both with a sub (or ship) simulator.

The goal is realistic outcomes. IMO, the model for how the ships and sub behave, and what control the CAPTAIN has over the sub should be impeccable. That means control of each screw (and engine, and motor, if appropriate for the sub). That means independent control of dive planes. It means a model that can broach, etc. From a UI standpoint, OTOH, there is no reason for me to have to do anything more complicated than give an order. I don't need to have to find the right control to manually change the diveplanes, I need to just say "bow planes 5° down" whatever the entirely "UI" control is for that.

I want plotting to be realistic. Meaning I take observations, and my plotter plots them on the map. As pencil marks (with a time). When I have 2 observations for one target (I need to have to tell them which target I am observing, it should NOT be automatic), the plotted draws a line, and writes the speed down. No magical pencl marks that move in real time, and no requirement that I, the skipper, do that work unless I chose to push my crew out of the way.

AI behaviors need to be grossly improved. The engine needs to deal organically with REAL zig zag patterns. The lack of realistic zig zag behavior (NOT constant helming, but routine ZZs) is a stunning, fundamental failure. All the eye candy in SH5 doesn't offset this single missing feature.

Proper weather. Want eye candy that is USEFUL (unlike, say, a cook, or canned torpedo loading animations)? Model realistic weather. Not always to the horizon, but squalls, weather that you can steam into and out of. Contacts that are in the clear blue sky one minute (as you yourself are), then disappear into a squall.

In terms of crews, instead of magical special abilities to powerup your torpedoes (LOL), how about just skill levels represent a % chance to do their jobs right any given attempt? Then if your planesman is less skilled, he might broach your boat in front of an escort. THAT is what a skill level should do. Or each member on watch has his zone, and their skill represents their ability to spot—not just range, but the % chance within that range every XX seconds. All that makes more sense than "morale." I can only assume that's in SH5 because that one guy loses it in das Boot? :rolleyes:

The DM also needs to be as good as possible. Progressive fires, damage control, etc. Doing this right would also allow for a proper follow-on with surface units that actually work properly.

So under the hood, as exacting as possible, but the UI can be VERY accessible since as captain, your crew can do a lot of the work.

This is an example of a bad UI, IMO.

You should hit a hotkey to go to the attack scope, then the game should walk/climb you up there as fast as a real skipper could do it. Ditto sliding down a ladder, etc.

I think simulations are mistaken for games which in turn drives devolopment in the wrong direction. I understand the economic factors are there as well. If a company wants to make a game, fine. If they want to make a simulation, they need to follow a different set of rules because they are two different animals despite the fact they are both software.

For one thing, a company should make an announcement that they are going to produce a simulation and get feedback from the audience on what needs to be included before starting the project. As it is, they keep taking pot shots at what they think everyone will like and get mixed results with what they produce. Economically this is like playing Russian Roulette with their finances. No wonder there are problems.

Heretic is right. The technology is out there to produce some incredible simulations but the market is too small to support it financially. In essence, a good simulation today would only happen if a company wanted to volunteer the effort without expecting payment other than the satisfaction of having done the job.

I'm glad you made this post because after having played SH5 for a little now i can see that SH5 actually has the most potential to be the best subsim of all time.

and i think this exaclty due to loving games like Falcon 4.0 and Blackshark.

As I was playing SH5 i realized that one of the things that everyone loves about blackshark and FreeFalcon (Falcon 4.0 free mod look it up) and those kinds of games are attention to detail where you are put in the "pit".

Blackshark is the most complex game where the cockpit is concerned (at least in IMO), I actually got all excited to think if SH5 has the ability to be modded to the detail that blackshark has in its cockpit.

Imagine every knob, every switch,every lever on your submarine being operable? dang that just sounds awesome. IMO that is the awesome direction that SH5 has gone in..

if you play BS you know that the actual combat is nothing to write home about, its sevierly scripted, there is no enemy AI to speak of, there is no type of campaign besides the stringing together of missions etc.. but its study style sim of the blacksharks cockpit is somethign that IMO would translate over to Sh5 and be a huge hit. Its one of those things that would make Sh5 the subsim for the next decade.

and then that brings me to answer your real question, which IMO is the most important question.

What makes a good sim? (the members of the DCS forum are probalby tired of me spewing this same thing over and over)

If you have your falcon 4.0 manual goto the Appendix and read Appendix A by Gilman "Chopstick" Louie.

The same philosphy can be applied here, the goal shouldn't just be to make every single little detail 100% accurate and in the end do as blackshark did where you have the most detailed and accurate cockpit but no War to use it in. A great sim is about putting you into the "War" so to speak. Giving you the same challenges a real sub captain might had etc. Flipping switches is nice but a Sim should be judged by its combat environment and how well it suspends your disbelief in the War and not solely on its accuracy of switches and knobs.

Incidentally, I recently bought DCS Black Shark, and I'm mightily impressed by it.

If they wanted to make SH5 "accessible", then they failed miserably. A tutorial that teaches you nothing, documentation (the "manual" and in-game text) that barely explains the most basic functions... I'm pretty sure that someone who wanted a game where you can be Das Boot and shoot things up will have given up long ago. Compare this to other simulation titles, like Red Baron 3D, Strike Fighters/Wings over... and IL-2. At high difficulty settings they offer good realism, while at the lower settings they play very much as "point and shoot". Even DCS Black Shark has a separate "Game Mode".

Where realism is concerned, I expect a good game (not necessarily a simulation) to be plausible. I don't expect it to show all the switches in a vehicle or a scientifically researched physics model, but if I see e.g. a sloop blowing a ship of the line out of the water or a 767 doing an inverted loop, then it's no fun for me.

As for SH5, the RPG element they tried to build in could have been a nice addition to enhance the immersion, but it's so linear it gets old very quickly.

I agree with H-Street, most of all a good simulation should make you believe that "you are there". In that respect, I got tired rather soon of the highly regarded IL-2 and Lock On, while I still enjoy playing Red Baron 3D, Falcon 4 and Mig Alley.

I'm probably in the minority, but even though I am a hyper grognard, I don;t care in the least about a "clickable" submarine. Not even a little.

I'm the CAPTAIN, I don't even have to pour my own coffee, a steward will bring me my java.

Again, what matters are outcomes and the realism of attacks, and how the good or bad decisions of the CAPTAIN alter those outcomes. Nothing in the sub—nothing—is more important than the observation and plotting paradigm, IMO.

Pretty much everything that you might want to click should actually be "clicked" by crew, not you. This idea of serially playing every member of the crew doesn't interest me in the least.

So IMO, it's wasted energy (for the devs, anyway) to make the sub clickable where there are far more pressing realism issues. For the sub these include bouyancy, dive plane, and port/stbd engine control. For the world, better weather, terrain (reefs, etc), and a world that is a sphere. For the surface units a FAR better DM (abstracted is FINE), zig zagging, AI improvements.

Everything else is fluff.

Have to agree with Tater (again, it's getting repetive... ;))

Where in the past series, the challenge was to manipulate mechanical devices (knobs, buttons and so on...) to get a required result, SH5 offers an unique challenge in how you actually get your information. You're no longer a button press away from the next crew member but that crew member is now working for you.

In that regard, even the time needed to get from bridge to command room is a new degree of realism. You just can't be "everwhere at once".

I haven't seen much reports on what happens with boat damage, but again here there's a chance to represent realistic levels of information filtering down to you as captain, from different departments.

So ultimatly and of course only in my personal opinion, the realism challenge in SH5 will be to COMMAND a boat, not just "control" it.

Dangerous Waters did Speech Recognition, if ever there was a game that should have followed this example it's SH5. I want to scream "Damage reports!" into my mike and hear various compartments reporting back, then having to "half-blind" assign men and priorities to these repairs. Depending on skill level, damage reports and repair time estimates could even be off, leading to wrong decisions by me as captain.

That is the kind of first-person experience now possible with the technology. I wouldn't spend too much time on graphical interfaces for dials and gauges which we already had in their basic form in SH1.

Did that, even went as far as training with the program so it would respond better to my voice, although I still had instances where orders would be misinterpreted causing me to scream into the microphone to be understood.

Of course, when the action got hot and heavy, I would scream so loudly at my screen that my dogs and wife would rush in to see what was wrong. My dogs would stare at me with a worried look, shaking their heads from side to side trying to figure out what was wrong..my wife would just shake her head and leave with an exasperated look...it sort of killed the immersion factor...

...there is such a thing as taking a simulation too far...:arrgh!:

Yeah, but would a subsim with that level of fidelity really be more realistic from your viewpoint as a Kaleun? Because after all is said and done you're still the skipper, and thus never directly operate any of the machinery yourself anyway...

:sign_yeah:

Was perhaps a bit stoopid from me to compare DCS:BS and SH5, BTW. Apples and oranges, b/c those Ka-50 jockeys really are one-man-bands IRL too...

No, what I want is that kind of depth of simulation. Depth affecting your speed and chance of cavitating, hydrophones infuenced by thermal layers and surface noise, soundwaves bouncing off the seabed and mirror flat surface. Those are the things I want.

To be honest, manning stations like hydrophones or deckgun yourself, as a captain, is ridiculous; that's not your job. However, Silent Hunter has a bit of 'action-game' in it after all, and I find it fun to do. It doesn't bother me, but I would happily trade it for better AI and more realism.

The BEST OPTION IMHO is that the game should have had an "ARCADE" and "SIMULATION" option in the settings menu.

The former would give us everything the game shipped with and the latter could give the Sub Simmers more features that were in the previous titles in the way of playability and UI including an interactive TDC Computer.

Anyone who has played: Eagle Dynamics Combat Heli Sim, DCS: Black Shark, can understand exactly what I'm talking about.

Well one of you needs to win the Lottery so you can start a Hard Core SIMULATIONS only software company, because thats what we need, and not run by corporate and happy to make enough to pay the bills and salaries and put out a decent product, with Profit not playing the major factor. If the company stays in business and everyone gets paid and doesnt run in the red, then mission accomplished.

You see that's the problem...nobody does anything for the sake of doing it anymore (except modders of course). It has to be about making money (lots of it) or it's just not going to happen. The technology exists to make incredibly realistic simulations but the cost of using said technology to produce the sim results in a product too expensive for the average simmer. This is the sad irony of the times.

This is why I keep saying we need a new business model for the simulation market. The sim needs to be defined and priced out before anything is done to produce it. People are informed of what it will cost and they will either sign on or reject it. If there is enough of a market pool to make it worth while then the project goes forward.

Of course this all depends on coming up with a way for a very large number of people to sign on and actually commit money to the project. That's a very big hurdle.

Yep you are correct, makes you sad doesn't it. How did the Ultima series start, how did apple/windows start, now its all about the money. Unfortunately it is now the key thing that factors into everything nowadays.

A subsim with the level of realism evident in Blackshark would be incredible. I doubt, however, I will see that in my lifetime! Blackshark was developed (afaik) off of the back of the developer's real military simulators. This is why it is so realistic, the flight dynamics and KA-50 modelling were paid for by the military. The game itself, to the best of my knowledge, is basically a sideline for the devs. This is the reason why, for example, the AI is poor to non-existant and the current graphics engine is borrowed from the original Lock-on. They just couldn't afford the gamble of doing it all at once.

For a much larger company like UBI the economics of producing a niche market game like SH5 mean that the budget just isn't there to produce a true sim which would appeal to a very limited number of people.

My only real issue with SH5 aside from bugs and DRM is that I would have preferred that UBI allocated more resources to improve the realism rather than adding in RPG elements.