History/Realism vs gameplay

[tater]

I replied to a post regarding aircraft swarming a player in the other forum. He said that he got bombed a lot, but their accuracy was so lousy he'd not get damaged. I suggested that they (the devs) might have nerfed the accuracy because the bomb loads were so rediculously high.

Got me thinging about history/realism vs gameplay.

There have been a few discussions regarding realism, and I think there is a good reason that history and realism be the baseline state for a game such as SH4. The plane example above works perfectly.

Example 1: The devs don't bother to get the realism right regarding proper japanese bomb loads. They chcuk in the grossly wrong figures we see in vanilla SH4. In playtesting, they get sunk constantly by aircraft. So they make the planes aim poor. Alternately, they might nerf the bombs themselves such that a near miss by a 500kg bomb does less damage than it should.

That's an example where it would be better to start with the "clean slate" of accurate bomb loads and bomb damage, THEN tweak for gameplay.

Example 2: Escort AI. There have been many tweaks/mods on this already because of the perception that the AI stinks at ASW. The tweaks DO make ASW more effective, but the perception of incompetance on the part of the AI could also be because the AI levels on the vast majority of escorts is set to "novice" in the campaign mission files. Perhaps the devs dropped convoy ASW AI levels because they were too hard on competant, veteran, or elite. That might well be true since so many convoys are escorted by multiple fleet DDs, something that would have been rare even in late war. If the Task Force escorts are set to "elite" (and they almost all are), then the same DD types should be "elite" on convoy duty, the ship, officers, and crew are all the same, even if they get detached to convoy duty for a couple weeks. So ignoring history results in too many DD escorting each convoy (and too many convoys of too large a size). Because there are too many DDs, the AI is nerfed to make it easier.

There are more examples, but the basic idea is that the best starting point is accuracy because when things are realistic, we know what the outcomes SHOULD be. As soon as things are moved away from reality, cause and effect become less reliable—tweak this, then somethign downstream breaks, which requires another alteration, etc, ad nauseum.

tater

[castorp345]

well said, tater!

[joea]

[Ducimus]

Post title = =

[AVGWarhawk]

:rotfl:

[nfitzsimmons]

The problem is partly because of potential loss of sales. I first saw this with Gran Prix Legends. It was extremely realistic, but the realism made it so difficult to play that only the truly hard-core who were willing to spend every waking hour practicing could come close to succeeding at it.

Not that many copies of it were sold because of this. If SH III or SH IVwere 100% realistic I wouldn't want to play it because, particularly in SH III, I don't really want to invest in a game (sim) there's a 75% chance you're gonna die, no matter how good you are. Like playing Russian roulette with 5 chambers loaded. Why bother?

If you don't sell a certain number of copies you're going to lose money, and you won't develop the next product to lose money. For some games 100% realism just don't cut it.

I see we are back to making ubi excuses. HAVE WE EVER HEARD OF SETTINGS? Options. Easy, Medium, Hard.

Uh, duh

[nfitzsimmons]

That was my point. I won't play a game for very long that isn't fun for me, no matter how accurate and realistic. As a old ex-Marine friend used to say, "You don't have to practice being miserable."

If you want realism in Silent Hunter, play while having a friend or spouse pour buckets of cold salt water over your head.

[Jungman]

tater, I like your idea.

I want a simulator, not an arcade game. We have enough of them!

[Egan]

Originally Posted by nfitzsimmons

That was my point. I won't play a game for very long that isn't fun for me, no matter how accurate and realistic. As a old ex-Marine friend used to say, "You don't have to practice being miserable."

If you want realism in Silent Hunter, play while having a friend or spouse pour buckets of cold salt water over your head.

Would say the same thing about a sim like 'Falcon?'

It sometimes feels as if those of us who want realism and historical accuracy were to say the converse of that such as 'If you don't want realism or accuracy go and play 'Battlestations Midway or something.' we would get labelled as realism Nazis or similar.

I want my sim to actually simulate something. Otherwise, why bother?

[Egan]

Oh yeah: I AM a realism Nazi by the way..Just in case anyone was wondering...:p

The thing is. I would love all the boring stuff: Trim dives, proper navigation (or at least simplified so I can ask my naivgator to take a star/sun fix etc) and, yes, I would not be bothered If i died way 75% of the time - i frequently do anyway. And I'm happy about my career ending after half a dozen patrols and getting shipped to a desk job.

I like getting an idea from the sim what it was like in real life. A tiny idea, granted, but an idea nevertheless.

[akdavis]

Originally Posted by nfitzsimmons

The problem is partly because of potential loss of sales. I first saw this with Gran Prix Legends. It was extremely realistic, but the realism made it so difficult to play that only the truly hard-core who were willing to spend every waking hour practicing could come close to succeeding at it.

Not that many copies of it were sold because of this. If SH III or SH IVwere 100% realistic I wouldn't want to play it because, particularly in SH III, I don't really want to invest in a game (sim) there's a 75% chance you're gonna die, no matter how good you are. Like playing Russian roulette with 5 chambers loaded. Why bother?

If you don't sell a certain number of copies you're going to lose money, and you won't develop the next product to lose money. For some games 100% realism just don't cut it.

Problem is that there are a lot people whose egos get hung up on that number 100 and feel that whatever realism level they are comfortable with and enjoy should be the benchmark for the number, and will even argue for aspects of the game to be stricken rather than made as additional options so that nothing cuts into their 100%. (I've seen it with Il-2 for years and I've seen it here already). Even though these same individuals' standard will creep higher as they play the game more and seek more challenge, they will never acknowledge that they were not at "100%" before. Then there are the die-hard elitists nuts who care more about competition than an immersive experience and go around using the same arbitrary number to club people about the head who they don't consider worthy to play the sim.

Sometimes I wish that number said 100% no matter what options were selected. It would save us all alot of grief and conflict, and maybe allow the devs more latitude to include "full real" features that might not have broad appeal (at least at first).

And I'm a full real guy who's number says 88% and doesn't give a damn.

[nfitzsimmons]

Actuallt I don't give a damn what anybody else's realism number is. I was just pointing out that if you make the bar too high to begin with a lot of people won't even try. And the won't buy the game. And UBISoft (or whoever) won't write more games.

I'll play at a realism level that lets me enjoy the experience, and I hope that everybody else will do the same, whatever realism level that happens to be.

I just bought SH III, installed it, and didn't even load it before I installed GWX. I've never even seen the base game. I just finished re-reading Iron Coffins (read it first about 18 years ago) and at this point I have realism settings set lower so I can learn how the game works without dying on the first patrol.

Iron Coffins reminded me how easily German submariners died in real life. Sailing out pr port and dying in the first 24 hours four times in a row ain't my idea of fun, and it doesn't give you a chance to LEARN anything.

As I get better I'll crank up the realism until I'm not having fun anymore, then I'll turn it down a little. And I'm sure not going to look down on anybody who wants to play at a lower level than I am.

I don't mind have the increased difficulty available, but please lets hope that the developeers leave the game accessable to novices or casual gamers. Not everybody wants to make it a career.

Good post Tater. I think each player here wants a different level of realism in SH4. I think the main problem is that SH4 was rushed during development. It would have taken the dev team too much time and money to do serious historical research to make this game ultra realistic. But also, it's about money. Arcade games sell the most. Hard-core sims are a dying breed. But I think players should be given choices. There really isn't a right or wrong way to play SH4... there's just opinions.

[nfitzsimmons]

Originally Posted by nvdrifter

Good post Tater. I think each player here wants a different level of realism in SH4. I think the main problem is that SH4 was rushed during development. It would have taken the dev team too much time and money to do serious historical research to make this game ultra realistic. But also, it's about money. Arcade games sell the most. Hard-core sims are a dying breed. But I think players should be given choices. There really isn't a right or wrong way to play SH4... there's just opinions.

I agree with you; that was the point I was trying to make. Just didn't do it very well, I guess.