World of Silent Hunter V?

[Safe-Keeper]

Who's interested in an MMO [Massively Multi-Player On-line]-version of Silent Hunter/Destroyer Command?

This is not really for the developers to ponder or anything. I just wanted to discuss it.

Basically, you'd have this World War II on-line-ish game where you play either as a submarine captain, a surface warship captain, or perhaps a merchant skipper. You'd have AI merchant traffic and AI ships, and you would operate against enemy ships and undertake orders from High Command.

I suppose it'd be better to have this actual time-line with the players fighting until the war ends and then starting over, instead of this weird "infinite world war"-style conflict of games such as World of Warcraft and Galaxies. You start in 1941 (or 1940, if the theatre is Europe), and then fight your way at time compression x1 to 1945, where the game ends (I suppose player efforts would be able to influence the war).

As much as I like the single-player campaigns of Silent Hunter III, I think an MMO would be awesome, too. Imagine cruising the Pacific with two friends, trying to co-ordinate attacks on shipping without your radio messages being intercepted by enemy players who want you dead.

You'd have to allow the game to run in the background, with alerts going off when something happened, otherwise the x1 time compression would get boring quite fast (and no, I'd not like it if time compression was scaled. It'd be infinitely weird, in my opinion):p.

[Kruger]

Yes, I have thought about this idea a lot lately, I even discussed it with my friend, whom is a silent hunter addicted too. It would be something awsome....something like Eve Online. Imagine that the server would recreate the whole WW2....and we would be part of it... It would take a huge effort in programming, and I doubt that it could be free, but who cares. I would pay to play something like that. It's something beautiful...i just hope that someday this will become reality.

[STEED]

I thought this was to bounce ideas around on a possible SH.V in the near future.

[Safe-Keeper]

My fault. I was going to name the thread something like "Silent Hunter V an MMO?", but I re-named it just for fun's sake to make people think of World of Warcraft.

Picture yourself 50 nautical miles off of the Philippines (sp.?) in your Gato-class, getting a message from Neal Stevens that there's a juicy under-defended convoy at this-and-that position and that he's inviting friendlies to operate against it with him. Then STEED calls in saying he's close enough to intercept, too, and the three of you agree to form up and hunt convoy.

Tough luck Safe-Keeper in his war-torn-but-trusty Japanese destroyer has intercepted your radio chatter and pin-pointed you with fatal accuracy. Oh well, another US sub for him to paint on his hull.

Imagine that the server would recreate the whole WW2....and we would be part of it...

There is already World War II On-Line if you're interested, but it does not focus on naval engagements. It's a 1:2 (?) representation of Western Europe, featuring the French and British trying to hold back the Germans.

[UglyMowgli]

Before asking for a MMO, ask for Destoryer command 2 or IV
and when you see the the capacity of ubisoft to manage multiplayer game:
SH4 only 4 online :rotflnly 4 to make a MMO
At MS we have a joke about SH4:
Better than punkbuster, MPA the new anti-cheat protection of SH4. MPA mean Multi Player Alone.
( (c) Crabe Tambour, 2006 ).

Ubi$oft did not (never) hear the voice of the community so a MMO is a Dream, perhaps for SH-20 when silent Hunter will not be published by this editor.

[Safe-Keeper]

Before asking for a MMO, ask for Destoryer command 2 or IV

Er... OK. Ubi, can we have a game called Silent Hunter IV (it's already underway? Swell!) with an expansion pack called Destroyer Command 2 (you're thinking about it? Awesome!)?

There. Now, Ubi, can we have an MMO?

[admit it, galileo, you just got "owned"]

and when you see the the capacity of ubisoft to manage multiplayer game:
SH4 only 4 online :rotfl:

That's indicative of their capacity? And here I sat thinking it was just that they prioritized single-player over multi-player.

only 4 to make a MMO

That was a joke, right?

How many people could play together in Warcraft III? Eight.
How many can play together in World of Warcraft, should they for some odd reason want to? Thousands.

At MS we have a joke about SH4:
Better than punkbuster, MPA the new anti-cheat protection of SH4. MPA mean Multi Player Alone.
( (c) Crabe Tambour, 2006 ).

Seeing wolf-packs weren't really bigger than that, I don't see the problem.

A wolf-pack of three submarines against a fleet of escort ships controlled by a fourth player? Suits me just fine.

Ubi$oft did not (never) hear the voice of the community so a MMO is a Dream, perhaps for SH-20 when silent Hunter will not be published by this editor.

Nonsense. Ubisoft keeps a close eye on this community and respects us.

Silent Hunter III was never really finished with all the features they wanted to add, but they did delay it for half a year to include dynamic campaigns when the players wanted them to.

As for the "voice of the community" on this question: Currently as many as 44,44% of the players are against the idea. 33% like it, but don't think it's truly a great idea. Only two out of nine really likes the idea.

It's not like this is something the community's stated it can't live without.

[Takeda Shingen]

My selection was option 3. I could care less about the frag-and-splash world of multiplay, regardless of how massively online it is.

[Pants]

I would'nt mind paying for a MMO " IF " these options are taken into consideration
1, Co-oP is an option ( you and team mates taking on the enemy )
2, side Vs side ie:- ( Us Vs IJN ) you get to choose what side you want to be on
3, The WHOLE map used after all WWII was a WORLD WAR so you should be able to fight in any Theatres
4, You get to choose what you want to use ie:- player controlled MTB's, Subs, planes or what ever.

[Safe-Keeper]

1, Co-oP is an option ( you and team mates taking on the enemy )
2, side Vs side ie:- ( Us Vs IJN ) you get to choose what side you want to be on

That'd pretty much be a given, I think. Free-for-all and World Wars don't go well together.

There'd need to be some balancing involved, though. Although I never really played World War II On-Line (only the off-line demo), I hear one of the worst issues with it is that you can change teams at will. So once one side starts to really win, everyone defects to that team.

They'd need to implement something that kept players from joining an overwhelmingly winning team, or switch sides once they'd joined a team.

3, The WHOLE map used after all WWII was a WORLD WAR so you should be able to fight in any Theatres
4, You get to choose what you want to use ie:- player controlled MTB's, Subs, planes or what ever.

Those I'm less sure of.

Creating the entire world would take ages, even with a big team and lots of time and resources, and I'd be happy with only one theatre. But I suppose they could for example do the Pacfic first, and then add the Atlantic with its forces with an expansion pack (I suppose the Surface Ship Command-part would have to be an expansion-pack, too)?

As for letting the players fly planes, Silent Hunter and Destroyer Command are ship/u-boat simulators, not flight simulators, so that one sounds fishy to me. Having said that, I'm sure it'd be fun to take off from Midway in a Catalina packed with depth charges and gun ammunition and go hunt Japanese subs with it!

And maybe if you commanded an aircraft carrier, you could be given indirect command of the planes stationed on your ship? Kind of like the way you can command fleets of destroyers in Silent Hunter IV? I'd like to command a medium cruiser and be able to deploy my ship's sea-planes for some short-range reconnaissance.

My selection was option 3. I could care less about the frag-and-splash world of multiplay, regardless of how massively online it is.

Multi-player can be very complex and realistic, actually. Case of point: World War II On-Line. Download the demo and see if you can even start a Jeep.

[Takeda Shingen]

Originally Posted by Safe-Keeper

Multi-player can be very complex and realistic, actually. Case of point: World War II On-Line. Download the demo and see if you can even start a Jeep.

Not really. It has the same type of problem that DW multiplay has: You know where the area in which the combat will be confined. You have an idea what the OpFor is going to be. Those are great variables in submarine warfare, and they are absent in multiplay. The hunt, which is 90% of sub sims, regardless of whether it's a Type II or an SSN-21, is largely absent.

In mulitplay, you spawn, get your buddies, intercept the enemy, and frag away. It's like Rainbow multiplay, but in slow-motion. Wolfpacks, despite directives, were a rarity. Most of the life of a submariner was solitary, slow, and deliberate. You lose this in multiplay, and to an even greater degree with a MMOG.

I am pretty sure that you don't want to use WWIIOL as your example, with all of it's problems. None-the-less, it is still a 'frag-fest'. The bottom line is that you lose the depth of coding used in pure simulations when you adapt things for massive multiplay. With a submarine simulation, that's a bad idea.