[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by vincentz

Sorry for the rant, but I recently got UBM in the hope that some of the obvious bugs would be fixed, but instead it brings even more.

Did the devs actually ever play the game????

Some of the more -bugs are :

Okay! I'll take a whack at it, shoot!

Originally Posted by vincentz

AA gun in bathtub conning tower = Impossible to aim, as the railing blocks the view.... I mean, wtf!!!

Stupid but non-consequential. You have no business shooting at planes anyway. The gun works perfectly well as a noisemaker and place to hang laundry. If you're being attacked by a plane do like the real guys did. Get the heck below and dive! Yelling "ratatatatatatatat!" at the plane was more effective in real life than shooting at them anyway.

Originally Posted by vincentz

Max officer restriction = makes it impossible to promote. To make it possible 5 or 6 officers has to be sacked..... I mean, WTF!!!

You promote where the game lets you and leave the rest in your pocket. Like you said, there's no advantage to having a crew full of officers anyway and it would never have happened in a real sub. Why make is so in the game?

Originally Posted by vincentz

No "normal speed" hotkey = so you just got radio'ed that a convoy is passing in front of your nose, and panicly tries to hit numpad- 10 times to be able to set a new coarse before the convoy is bye bye.... I mean, the hole keysetup and lack of customization. WTF!!!!!!

In the stock game, what's wrong with <backspace> (pauses) then mash <numpad +> shazzam! You're instantly at 1x. You had two keystrokes there, a major feat of manual dexterity. You were probably better off hitting <numpad -> 11 times. Never mind......

Originally Posted by vincentz

Lack of AI = Especially the destroyers are a piece of cake, and offers absolutely no resistance even on 100% difficulty, often not even firering if the sub is surfaced. If submerged they will do the excact same depthcharge-run and turn, ending up with a broadside and 12 knots just waiting for that torpedo..... WAY to easy, and another WTF!!!!!

I don't know how the stock game behaves, it's been to long. Try that cute stuff in TMO, I dare you! Hint: in order to see him 12 knots, broadside and waiting for that torpedo, you must survive the depth charge run at periscope depth. That's a tall order pardner....

Originally Posted by vincentz

Blind and dum gunners = The deckgun crew, if left to themself, cant hit a barndoor from 30 yards. The player however can hit 3000+ yards with every single shot..... I mean WTF!!!!

In real life deck guns were for sinking sampans, plugging floating mines and hanging laundry. Shooting it out with escorts was just plain stupid and merchants were armed better than submarines. You needed a hundred hits to sink the merchie and one hole in the pressure hull and you were on a one-way all expenses paid trip to Davey Jones' locker. You do the math.

Originally Posted by vincentz

Bad interface/gameplay = f.ex. if trying to follow a convoy at a distance (waiting for better weather or similar) you get 10000 soundcontacts, which force you to hit numpad+ sooo many times, that when a destroyer has spotted you, you are already on the way to davy jones locker as the warning that you were being shelled was between nr 8647 and 8649 of soundcontacts. WTF!!!!

That's just bad planning. You know how far away you have to be to be below the horizon. Your radar range is much further. Keep them below the horizon. Problem solved.

Originally Posted by vincentz

More bad interface = The torpedoes you launch is hidden behind position keeper display. WTF! The Rec manual is hiding the switch for torpedo settings. WTF! The slow/fast torpedo setting is per default set to slow. Does anyone ever shoot slow torpedoes??? WTF! The Clock is too big while the compass too small. WTF! Its lacking the more obvious hotkeys. Especially the "send xxx to TDC". WTF!

The first observation makes no sense. The position keeper is a pop-out on the left side of the screen. The torpedo launch buttons pop out on the right. How can one get in front of the other? The recognition manual is meant to be closed unless you are using it. Torpedoes have to be set either fast or slow initially. So long as they are always one way or the other what's the problem? There was no digital input for just about anything in WWII. Numbers were set by turning dials.

Originally Posted by vincentz

The Rec manual... jesus christ... atleast it could have post-its for different ship classes, so every time a new ship has to be identified it wouldnt take forever, plus maybe a page 1 with all the ships listed, for those easy recognized ships. The hole recmanual stinks in soo many ways (too bright at night. too big. not show real info. too clumbsy. too slow to flip pages etc etc) WTF!!!!!

Yer preaching to the choir there. But as long as you have radar the recognition manual is garbage anyway. Lighten the boat and toss it overboard.

Originally Posted by vincentz

The Airpatrols... You know what I'm talking about.... WTF!!!!

This is an artifact of time compression and not a real problem. It is true that the stock game spawns planes out of thin air when there is nowhere for them to come from. RSRD fixes that nicely. I'm still getting swarmed in The Slot, late 1942 playing TMO+RSRD. That's authentic.

Originally Posted by vincentz

The Campaign... OMG, dont get me started there

Run RSRD and you'll be happy there. The stock game doesn't have a campaign, just basically randomly generated targets in unrealistic configurations. Naked TMO is better. RSRD is paradise.

The fact is, SH4 is about as good as we're going to get under the present business model. Since the game company is producing a drink coaster with no residual value, they can sink only so many resources into a simulation. This limits development resources in time and people to levels below what it takes to get what you and I want.

The only way to improve our situation is to trash the disposable drink coaster model of game production. Games must somehow produce an income stream so development can continue for years and years, not several months.

The subscription model accomplishes two things. It makes defects in the game fixable on the hard coded level by keeping developers hired and devoted to a single game for years. They can retro-fit and release patches, improvements, fixes to all players on a regular basis forever. And let's look at the money angle. We're paying $50 for a game. If we pay $5.00 per month, less than we pay to drink soft drinks we discard in the toilet every day, we've paid the game company $60, just for the first year! They've increased their profits!

Version numbers are a thing of the past. We just have one game--Silent Hunter and it gets better year after year. Old features are retained. Bugs are eliminated. Features are added as computing power increases. Programmers have stable employment. Gamers pay because they're happy. The game goes south and they just quit. Customers are paying the company to produce a great game. And they get it.

Until we get from here to there, what you see is what they give. Each game breaks things that worked in the last version and fixes a couple of things. Higher version numbers just mean more problems to deal with. Finally the game company says "I guess people just don't want to buy World War II submarine simulations any more" and they quit altogether, victims of their own stupidity and shortsightedness.