[Sailor Steve]

I disagree with most of the summations here. My computer barely runs SH4, but one look at it and I was sold. In my opinion the water does look a lot more real, as does the crew. And the interiors look more real to me too. One of my complaints about SH3 was that the guages looked like they were drawn or painted onto the bulkheads; I compared them poorly to the 2D guage panels in SH1. Of course the Bordeinstrument mod fixed that somewhat, but I think SH4's still look better. The crew look more like real people and less like game figures. The crew management is a vast improvement, and in fact in this case the devs heard what people said the management should have been, listened, and did it exactly as suggested.

As far as this five-year running arguement about which theater is better goes, it doesn't matter. A substantial part of the market is American, and many of us are old enough to have grown up watching movies like Run Silent, Run Deep and reading Roscoe's American Submarine Operations In World War Two, and many of us just like the boats and the action, no matter which side it is.

As to comparing the stock games, I'm with RDP. Maybe you weren't here three years ago to hear all the complaints about how bad SH3 was and how some folks were never going to buy another UBIsoft product ever again. I submit that SH4 compares unfavorably in your mind because you've been playing SH3 and have gotten used to it. Yes, I would have preferred that the interface be the same; I like the little officer icons, and I like the mod that makes all the gui go away except when I put the cursor on them, and then they're really big. But I didn't have that in Aces of the Deep, and I didn't have that in SH1, and if I don't have it in SH4, so be it.

I'm not talking to everyone who has complaints. Those are legitimate, and honest. I have complaints about every game I play. I swear at Pirates every time I play it. But I'm still playing it. My problem is this should have been posted a year ago. There were lots of posts like this when the game was new, and all anyone has to do now is read the threads or ask if there have been complaints.

If you bought the game blind, you have a right to compain; I'm not saying you don't. But I've been hearing "IT SUX!" for so long that I'm tired of it. I'm also with Wilke: if you really hate it that much, just post that you would like to give your copy to someone who wants it. I'll take it.