fingers crossed that these issues are fixed. thx to you chaps who do believe me. i guess to those that don't, when you get your copy, have a go and i think you'll see what i mean. some of those items may not bug you but the fact that no reviews are out yet, the PR has been shocking, that Neal, god bless him, has been quite quiet about this game must indicate that things aren't what they should be. There's certainly been no raving about how good it is. Crikey i wish i was wrong.

inside of manual, page 3...says

Table of contents

Getting started...04
Introduction...06
Games Modes...07
Multilplayer...10
Controls and Interface...11
Online log...31
tech support...34
warranty...35

So few games are without bugs at release. I'm not an apologist for Ubi (I think i mentioned elsewhere that I'll pass on this one due to the DRM), but just about every title I've been excited about has been released half-baked over the past 3-5 years.

I think I'm having a bigger problem in what the OP posited was the "direction" that this title is going. It appears to be going away from any sort of fidelity. The problems I had with SH3 - the big ones - were thus:
Idiotic sonarman
DD's that could pinpoint you even though they were steaming along at 20kts and you were all-stop
Dumbed-down oceanographic/atmospheric model

In essence - while titles like 688 were striving to improve the simulation aspect, Ubisoft ignored what I considered to be of upmost importance.

Now, we have a title that looks very heavy on the eye-candy (which I admit I'm a sucker for) but has done little to propel the realism forward. I really do not care to invest in a conversation with a virtual bosun's mate. I want the above plus mechanical breakdowns, milk cows, true wolf packs, realistic command and control from OKM, fully modeled crew handling. From being on these forums for years I can confidently say that these are the wishes of many fans of the series. Can an owner of SH V tell me they have delivered?

OK, so Ubisoft decides us lunatic subsim fanatics are such a niche crowd that they are better off tailoring to the masses who want to blow stuff up while underwater. The game apparently is very modable, but the basics I mentioned (the top three for me) should IMHO be delivered with the original package.

If the AI is identical, why not just play SH3?

I was at first disappointed as well. The frame rate was atrocious, that what was really bothering me, besides the many bugs. But I got the latest drivers for my video card, and frame rate improved dramatically. Then I got the patch, and it is as smooth as honey with graphics maxed, and many of the bugs I noticed were corrected. I am no longer disappointed, and now I am falling in love. Sure, there are still bugs, but no show stoppers so far, and I am sure these will be fixed in the coming months. I having been playing sub sims since Silent Service 1, and for the first time this represents everything I have always wanted in a submarine simulator. It really feels like you are there. It is going to be hard to get any work done for a while. Good job!!!

My concern is just how accurate you probably/possibly are :hmmm:

Jesus don't fall in for this - tell the "suspicious ones" to go take a s**t. Your previous posts I think have done enough to prove yourself.

Although I think at least one of them was speaking a bit tongue in cheek.

It is absolutely ashame that the players are basically required to finish the game for the devs. You shell out 50-60 bucks for the game and it's only half finished because they know you will buy it and the community will finish it with mods. SHIV I played for about 2 days and shelved it, it left such a bad taste in my mouth that even when I installed the mods I only played it for maybe another week and just said screw it.

I was looking forward to this game and told myself I was not going to buy it once I learned about DRM. I ultimately said the hell with it and I would try it. So far I am utterly disappointed. The auto TDC, one of the easiest things in this series, has been made completely useless. It completely sucks the life out of the sim when you line it up only to have a bout a 10% chance of actually getting a torp to hit. NO matter how close you are to the target.

Ubisoft really sucker punched all subsimmers with this release. I don't see how they released the game as is, to me it needed much much more time in development. I'm sad to say I think they are killing the Silent Hunter series.

Thanks for doing it in an orderly fashion. :salute:

SH4 sure is fun....:D

It is hard to believe they sale a game that unfinished. That's why I just can't buy new released games, but this sounds really unfinished. It's like having cake, but not being able to eat it. Just a few of those bugs would ruin the game for me, but I'm into realistic play, not arcadish and seems this one is arcade play. They have to know they released crap.

Hopefully I can pick it up in a bargain bin for $5 after it's patched and some mods are up in about a year.

Uh-oh, now Neal is basically saying he feels virtually the same way :o A damning indictment indeed! I haven't even got my copy yet!! Talk about 'lowering my expectations'!

cheers Neal and to all you positive guys out there. I also know that some of you don't want to believe me, i don't want to either, trust me, but its not what we hoped. It does have real potential for sure but out of the box, and the trend of the SH series in general on release is going down hill. there's someone important in UBI who doesn't care about this series anymore, thats the truth.

the complaints about missing manuals, no maps, as well, and i even saw the super fast moving clouds of sh4 at one stage, well its a crying shame.

i'm off now to cry into my cup of tea. i've already had several ciders, possibly the cause of my original post, so appologies, but the facts are indeed in my bug list.

so long cruel world.... i'm off to try and work out how to hit the side of a battleship because the manuals no help.

atleast they got the seagulls right. :arrgh!:

It's alright saying 'it's all Ubisoft's fault', but is it? They're just guys in suits these days, stumping up the cash. Surely it's up to the Devs to provide their bosses with a realistic work schedule and budget before embarking on such a project? :hmmm: If the game goes to release unfinished, surely they share atleast some of the blame? I mean, shouldn't lessons have been learnt on the previous releases?

Even in the best of worlds I would think its quite difficult to plan the makings of a complete simulator and the devs have deadlines to hold on too, I dont think we will ever now what really went on put Im quite sure the schedule was a stressed one and fixed.

some of these are not as black and white, for example:

I see 4 actual confirmed bugs: #2, #3, #12 and #23.

15, 16, 17, 19, and 21 appear to be graphic card issues which are not game related.

1, 6 and 14 are game design issues.

all those are bugs & bad design/graphic issues, that ultimately subtract from the enjoyment, for me.

my point was that out of the box, without having to remap the keys these are issues.

having the same conversation and no options for a conversation are not the same either.

my setup is xp, E8400, 4GB, 285 GTX (lastest driver), SSD.

the destroyer was aprox 500m away running from parallel with me, i actually went to periscope depth 3 times and surfaced again, before finally attacking him with a deck gun to get him to engage me. i then, at periscope depth, cruised about a bit trying to get sunk in 40m of water, and he still wandered off and depth charge miles away from me.

win xp, vista or 7 ?

strange, I have a E8500, but your 285 GTX is more powerful than my 4890. Just trying to troubleshoot the graphic issues.

Do you have the same issues, i.e. 16, 17, 19 when you turn off shadows and turn off AA?

what is your FPS? (hit ctrl+f8 in game)

re: the clipping, i.e. issue 21, does it occur at 1x tc? I am wondering if it is linked to using TC and/or low FPS.

I'm always amazed to see how easily people claim to hold the truth... (or know what is the truth).

No, I'm not saying anything other than thanking the OP for making his points with hysteria and hyperbole.

I do agree about the manual, it's very bad when you get it on PDF and some of the illustrations cannot be read, and it dedicated 5 pages to cheesy crewmen stories, but only 1/3 page to a very inept bit about actually sinking ships with torpedoes.

Ok, fair point, I was over the top there. I am actually very disappointed that this game wasn't what I hoped. I'll be more careful with my wording in future.