More difficult? No. It is actually easier than Stock in some regards, but that's where that "realistic" comes in, in that the US subs initially had no idea how inept the Japanese management of convoy escorting was. Some areas were really tough, others not so much. The main thing against the US submarines at the beginning of the war was torpedo performance. Some would say a lack of skipper aggression, but from what I've read over the years, a lot of the skippers were removed from command because they didn't sink anything. Well, "torpedoes". The attempt has been for realistic "feeling" in the early "orders", and in the Japanese "escorts" behavior". Some will seem downright inept - but the US skippers did not know this at the time. Also, the world about you "moves", and not just out in the middle of the ocean. You will see Allied forces as well as Axis, and as the game progresses, you will see surface and air engagements. No dogfights though, because the game's AI doesn't do that...
The bik movies will still play, and they do follow the "famous" parts of the war in the Pacific, but if you are based in Pearl, you will usually not be assigned the Solomon's area. Neither will you be if based in Fremantle. This is not to say you can't go there though. While FotRSU is based more upon "follow orders" because you get more points by completing objectives as opposed to sinking ships (which also blunts high scores some), there is basically no penalty for doing whatever you want to in the game. So in that regard, "orders" were worded differently for the first round of missions assigned, as well as some of the 2nd round assignments. We might eventually work our way through them all, but those "generic" assignments are still in there, due to the way the DynamicMiss functions with Status Updates. We do have ideas for further refinement of those assignments also though.
If you attempt to do as US sub skipper might, and you have "duds" activated in the gameplay menu, you will be proud of yourself for sinking one ship per patrol. We have worked on the damage models of some of the ships, and some no longer have "glass jaws", but there are still quite a few of those. You will also encounter the occasional maniacal DD skipper that won't turn you loose, and he helps keep his brothers on your tail. While FotRSU is based on TMO, it has morphed with what the AOTD_MadMax team did several years ago with it, and has morphed even further with the FotRSU Mod Team's work on it. Give it a whirl, see if you like it. Just be sure you empty the Save folder contents after activating it and prior to starting the game with it, and do not have SH4 in a Program Files folder, else the mod won't "take". Simplified instructions in the first post here, and on the download page, but all sorts of boring stuff in the mod's Support folder...
