I would recommend SH 4 and Operation Monsoon, goes to the end and you still lose.
That will give them a chance to fix 5.... maybe.
The modders are hard at work on it and are pretty enthusiastic about it so they no doubt will give it their best shot.

Magic

Why end it in 43' ? because it was over for the Uboat arm by 43', after that they Type VII's rein was at an end, and so few further designs after it saw service they aren't worth doing.
They all but a few were hunted own and sunk or captured.
Essentially, the war was really over for them at that point.

SH5 is called "The Battle of the Atlantic," and this was over in April-May of 1943.
Earlier in 1943, the U-Boats had unprecedented success with overwhelming losses for the Allies in March and April. These losses finally got Adm. King's attention and an all-out Allied war on the U-Boats ensued with massive losses to the U-Boats. As a result, Adm. Donitz recalled all U-Boats from the Atlantic and they never again attacked the convoys, but were limited to defensive action and attacks in the waters near England.
The Battle of the Atlantic was over.

I believe you are correct. Except that's not the rationale Ubi gave.

I still don't understand why they just didn't admit it was due to budgetary and time restrictions. No one in their right mind would blame them for that. But the intellectually dishonest rationale they did give for stopping the game in '43 simply doesn't stand up.

Thanks, would it be possible to mod the capaign to extend it or am I going to have to wait until ubisoft see's how much profit SH5 made and if it's worth making DLC for it?

And that's why the entire war is a perfect game arc for a simulation. Games usually get more difficult as time goes on. They operate on an asymptotic curve of level difficulty. This game stops in '43 when the U-boats were at the height of their power. In other words, the arc stops at a plateau. That makes absolutely NO sense in terms of playability.

Unless you're making an arcade.

Oh, wait....

I must say I have absolutely no patience for the constant (and intellectually dishonest) rationale that the Battle of the Atlantic was over in '43.

How many tons of Allied shipping was sunk from '43 on? How many Allied sailors were drowned? How many U-boat crews were destroyed? I'm sure someone has these statistics at their fingertips.

Tell the dead men who died that this battle was "over" after '43.

Spin it how you like. This rationale simply doesn't hold water in the face of historical fact.

1939

Sep (53)Oct (37)Nov (30)Dec (47)167 ships hit in 1939.
1940

Jan (58)Feb (54)Mar (26)Apr (11)May (17)Jun (67)Jul (43)Aug (66)Sep (63)Oct (73)Nov (36)Dec (50)564 ships hit in 1940.
1941

Jan (15)Feb (47)Mar (50)Apr (48)May (66)Jun (65)Jul (21)Aug (32)Sep (60)Oct (51)Nov (17)Dec (28)500 ships hit in 1941.
1942

Jan (66)Feb (82)Mar (99)Apr (89)May (146)Jun (145)Jul (108)Aug (131)Sep (116)Oct (121)Nov (142)Dec (76)1321 ships hit in 1942.
1943

Jan (49)Feb (88)Mar (131)Apr (57)May (49)Jun (27)Jul (59)Aug (30)Sep (25)Oct (31)Nov (16)Dec (17)579 ships hit in 1943.
1944

Jan (20)Feb (28)Mar (22)Apr (12)May (17)Jun (22)Jul (27)Aug (37)Sep (15)Oct (10)Nov (11)Dec (25)246 ships hit in 1944.
1945

Jan (24)Feb (24)Mar (21)Apr (23)May (6)Jul (1)99 ships hit in 1945.

Got one for uboats sunk for comparison?

1939
57 U-boats were capable of going out to sea when the war began in September 1939. When the year ended 9 of them had been lost.

1940
24 boats were lost in 1940. U-31 was actually sunk twice so she appears twice in that number.

1941
35 boats were lost during 1941.

1942
The U-boat fleet lost 86 boats during this year, most of them in the latter half the year. A sign of things to come ...

1943
With the biggest convoy battles of the war and the highest number of boats at sea, stakes were high. In May 1943 the biggest loss to befall the U-boat fleet came with loss of 41 boats. Overall losses in 1943 were 243 U-boats.

1944
This year was even worse than 1943, steady losses all year brought the total up to 250 boats when the year came to and end.

1945
With the war coming to an end, overwhelming allied forced all around them, Germany lost over 120 U-boats in action in the first 5 months of the year.


:yep:

Source:
http://uboat.net/fates/losses/

So, to put it in very quick mathematical perspective -

Between June 1943 and May 1945 (the part NOT included in SHV), what we have is
17.2% of total U-boat successes and 67.1% of U-boat losses.

If we do a quick-and-dirty correlation of this to the total lives lost in the Battle of the Atlantic as a whole, you are looking at around 5,200 merchant marine seamen, and 18,800 U-boat men who lost their lives during this time. :(

(*on the other hand, here's another sobering statistic for you - the total number of deaths on both sides in this tragic period of the Atlantic battle is less than 1/3 the number of people instantly killed by the bomb at Hiroshima, and about 1.7% of the total number of people killed at Auschwitz (i.e. 58 times less). Talk about perspective...)

Excellent CCIP.:salute:

And as all we Das Boot fans know, of the 30,000 men who went to sea in those Uboats in all the war, by the end only 10,000 ever returned.

Even the film is an excellent example of things, even at the time that boat sailed. I mean how many ships did they sink on that patrol? Three maybe I think it was?
And then Bdu stupidly sent them on a suicide mission through the Gibraltar straits where they nearly lost the boat and crew, and then only to return to port to have it sunk at the pier, the captain and many of the crew killed and not even on the boat but on dry land.

I think one point that the devs missed in the design of this game is that sinking ships is not all there is to a good U-boat sim. In fact for me sinking ships has always been a very small part of why I enjoy Silent Hunter games. Yet between the early war end, the overdone fireworks and the ludicrous tonnage goals, you can see where the focus of this game is, sadly... However the full-boat and crew elements are a good sign for the other side.

The fact is that blowing up ships is messy business, but it's not massively different from any other kind of game as far as gameplay goes. It's trying to survive where things get really strange and interesting in U-boat sims. That's why I always found late war interesting.

Recommended reading on why the (first?) set of campains end in 1943
 

And then again sometimes im just happy to just go sailing along enjoying the sea and the boat not wanting to blow anything up at all, nor concerned with "game play"

I wish they'd do a sim based on just sailing and boating that sports SH5's engine and graphics.
So few of this kind.
Virtual Sailor is ok, but it's graphics and such dont come close. If it had SH5's graphics though................:yep:

^^ This^^

All so they can sell you an expansion pack later on....which Im OK with provided UBI would have release a COMPLETE game that was at leas 80% bug free.... we have neither.

I'm fine with a narrow-focus, study sim. But yeah, I'm not quite sure I can call SH5 a particularly successful study sim as yet. On the other hand the benchmark of study simulations, Falcon 4.0, was completely unplayable when it was released - and look at it now. Almost 12 years (not to mention 11 years since last official patch) and still going very strong. Community support can make all the difference.

The choice to end the war then and there is a bit odd - it doesn't completely turn me off, but as a design decision... I'm not convinced it was made why it was said to be made.

What is also missing is the assumption this game could have made in respect to "if you do WELL and meet objectives, how could the battle have turned?"

A lot went into the fact that after May 1943 the War in the Atlantic was over.

One example is had German intel been CORRECT in identifying the FACT that Allied aircraft were in FACT using newer radar (Centametric?? radar) instead of thinking this kind of radar could never have been flown in planes as it was to large, then things may have indeed changed in favor of the Uboats. They would have had radar detection devices that would have detected this radar miles out.... Instead Uboat men were told that thier radar detection devices were giving away thier position.... This is just ONE example.

Add to that a diminishing supply of Iron (All the metal was going for the Luftwaffe, then tanks for the army, then artillery, THEN the Uboats got what was left) left Germnay without the capacity to build up the Uboat arm like Adm. Doenitz suggested (as well as Adm. Raeder) in 1935 and on..... Had Hitler let the KM build the number of uboats they wanted from the get go... the war would have ended long before 1943, and it would have ended with England in a stranglehold.

Wow i cant believe so many are actually supporting the fact the UBI has intentionally left out 43-45 because they wanted to make more $$$ on an xpack....

A polished and concentrated effort on the first game???? Hmm jugding from the subsim review, many user complaints, and the endless bugs being reported... This is far from a effort from UBI to release a good 1st halve of the war...

I mean common guys... The game sounds flawed, thank god for dedicated mods that are springing up like weeds to fix this so-called disaster of a game.

In SH3 some of my most intense moments were the biscay run., the endless crash dives, and the INCREDIBLE sense of accomplishment if you actually found a convoy, successfully penetrated the screen, sunk at least ONE boat, and returned to port safely.. How on EARTH could you leave out a part of the war in a WWII SIM?!?!?? This is just mind boggling.

After reading so many complaints but also reading the upside, i was about to spend my 50 some dollars on a game that was already being fixed by mods. Then i heard it ended in 1943.... What a killer :damn::damn:.

No Operation Drumbeat?? No special missions to Japan?? No Milk Cows?? AND NO WOLFPACKS!?!?! Ugh this just sucks soo bad. I was so excited when i heard Sh5 was coming out, i was even prepared to buy the unfinished product. WHY must i always be dissapointed by developers who stopped giving a ****!?!?

The last game i bought and enjoyed was Company of Heroes.. Jesus even that game was bugged but it still was more polished than most games.

::rant rant:: Okay im done now.. Back to just stalking the forums and mod forum and wait for a big change. But i would like to say..

YOU MODS ARE ANGELS SENT FROM HEAVEN!!!!! THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIRELESS EFFORTS TO MAKE A TERRIBLE GAME WORTH PLAYING, AND FOR THE SELFLESS REASON OF MAKING A GOOD GAME FOR US TARDS WHO DONT KNOW HOW TO CODE!!! THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!!!!!

I would imagine cause 1943 was the last year U-Boats stood any chance in the Atlantic, from late 43 on they were pretty much steel coffins. Even with the few boats who got the Schnorkel, it was nearly impossible to do any good out there. And since SH5 seems to be a more personal experience then a technical one, It would make sense to end it in 1943