May I just suggest a few more?
1. H.Sies realism fixes.
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=174225
Read post one for a rundown.
I now consider this mandatory.
2. There are some good environment mods
The two I am thinking of are
MEP and
SH5 Water for SH3.
I use the second and it is just beautiful.
You don't say whether you are running Commander.
That is an absolute must IMO.
Finally if you are experiencing CTDs or a failure to load you'll have to disable them all then enable one by one until you find the culprit.
Could be one of them has not downloaded properly and is corrupt or incomplete.
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