Where is this world heading to?

[maerean_m]

I was reading that the Electronic Arts' Sims 2 franchise sold 70 million copies so far. Also Ubisoft's Petz product line (Catz, Dogz, Horsez) collectively sold 3.5 million units.

So, when GRAW2 sales only 1 million copies and Silent Hunter 4 only a couple hundred thousands, WHY should anybody be bothered to make Silent Hunter 5?

Everybody complains about what a crappy game Silent Hunter 4 is and that SH4 is just a big collection of bugs and how they want back the $50 spent on the game. Nobody just enjoys the game. Everybody should join the navy and see what it means to be a captive of Time Compression =1 and not being able to blow the ships you spot (WW2 is kinda over).

You can imagine that making a Silent Hunter is not a walk in the park (as it is when making Sims 2).

WHY should there be a Silent Hunter 5 (Silent Hunter must reach the 230 version number (Silent Hunter 230) to have the same sales as Sims 2)? Ubisoft should stop all projects and start making Sims 2 clones and make BIIIG bucks. 2 years from now you'll only find Sims 2 clones in the shops. I wish everybody to enjoy their future copy of Sims 2.

[Mud]

If a programmer ( as you state in your profile ) of SH4 is giving up and think about the big bucks then we all gonna play The Sims.
And BTW not everybody is complaining but there are some valid concerns about the state of the game which is maybe related to the sales ?

Mud

[maerean_m]

If the sales hardly pay for 11 months of development, there will never be enough time to implement the features the designers (and you) dream of. It normally takes at least 2 years to make a great game. Other games (like WOW) take 5 years to create.

[TDK1044]

Originally Posted by maerean_m

If the sales hardly pay for 11 months of development, there will never be enough time to implement the features the designers (and you) dream of. It normally takes at least 2 years to make a great game. Other games (like WOW) take 5 years to create.

I've tried to make the same point many times. There's not much money to be made from making a subsim because of the demographic such a sim attracts. Add to that the fact that SH4 was made on a ludicrous production schedule, and you start to understand just what a good job the Devs did with this game.

Some people don't seem to understand that if you're not given a realistic production schedule in the first place then you have to resort to patches in order to make the game good.

[Herr Kapitan]

Originally Posted by TDK1044

I've tried to make the same point many times. There's not much money to be made from making a subsim because of the demographic such a sim attracts. Add to that the fact that SH4 was made on a ludicrous production schedule, and you start to understand just what a good job the Devs did with this game.

Some people don't seem to understand that if you're not given a realistic production schedule in the first place then you have to resort to patches in order to make the game good.

Kudos for the Devs for doing a good job under pressure, but as for the people who put them under such duress, well

[ZaPPPa]

Why would anyone buy a Sims clone? I wouldn't buy it if it wasn't at least as good as the original. That's more than five years of catching up to do against a company with nearly infinite assets.

After Doom came out, many companies jumped on the bandwagon and a huge number of FPS were released. Some succesful, many not. Same with Everquest. Now WoW dominates the MMORPG market and new unknown companies don't stand a chance making any good money. Sims2 dominates the life-sim market, so the market share that is still available for those markets is awfully small.

SH4 is already heading for mainstream. Ask yourself what got the biggest overhaul in this version and it is definitely the graphics engine. AI was hardly touched. Crew management got changed because the SH3 version was unworkable. The career got very little attention.. Look at an average (hardcore) sim and the screenshots that get released before the game goes gold. It's always action shots, never a campaign map or administrative screen.. Yup, SH is way more mainstream than you may think.

[GnarPow]

You guys did a good job thus far, Just dont throw the towel in yet.

Some of these guys on here are probably still sucking on their mommies nipples so I would take their opinions with a grain of salt. I've been playing computer games for over 20 years now and bugs is just part of it all. Just keep hard at work and forget what a couple of these jokers are saying.. You might notice that there is more posts from little bitches complaining than there is about people who really love this game... Thats because the latter is busy playing it and we dont have time to cry to mommy and daddy that our game isnt exactly the way we like it.

I myself get a bunch of CTDs everyday for no apparent reason (usually from going periscope to map) and all I do is just save more often and its not really a problem. Usually it just tells me I've been playing too long and its time to stop :p

As long as you dont stop at V1.2 and keep fine tuning a lot of the issues that are a problem you should be fine. The fact that you only sold 100,000 copies is because EVERY review out there made note of all of the bugs. If you guys get the game working correctly and send out a message to EVERY reviewer out there to review the game again than you should definately increase sales. But in the state of 1.1 and before you cant expect reviewers to give you guys a 10/10... I think with time and effort this game is definately a 10/10 ... as It stands right now I would give it a 8.5/10 and that is still pretty good.

Keep up the good work over there in Romania

GnarPow

[Sad Sailor]

Originally Posted by ZaPPPa

Why would anyone buy a Sims clone? I wouldn't buy it if it wasn't at least as good as the original. That's more than five years of catching up to do against a company with nearly infinite assets.

After Doom came out, many companies jumped on the bandwagon and a huge number of FPS were released. Some succesful, many not. Same with Everquest. Now WoW dominates the MMORPG market and new unknown companies don't stand a chance making any good money. Sims2 dominates the life-sim market, so the market share that is still available for those markets is awfully small.

SH4 is already heading for mainstream. Ask yourself what got the biggest overhaul in this version and it is definitely the graphics engine. AI was hardly touched. Crew management got changed because the SH3 version was unworkable. The career got very little attention.. Look at an average (hardcore) sim and the screenshots that get released before the game goes gold. It's always action shots, never a campaign map or administrative screen.. Yup, SH is way more mainstream than you may think.

I´ve played Silent Hunter 1, many years ago, I just love it, recently I was finishing playing Silent Hunter III , now I´m playing IV, many bugs, but great game. Although a good job trough the years to develop such a game with such an historical and realistic touch.
So I think why always money have to come first, we pay the game, we enjoy the game and after all off this someone thinks that Sims 2 it´s somehow more interesting to the people and they all buy it. In reality not all the people like torpedoes but they like SIMS2, I like both but SH has the big chance to live almost FOREVER, like submarines.

"Apa trece petrele raman".
"The water passes, but the rocks will stand".

[ed3r]

Who buys these apparently "popular" games? I dont know a single soul who owns them.
The Silent Hunter series is just unique, I may be new to the game but its easy to see its unlike anything Ive played before, and frankly Im enjoying myself.

[SteamWake]

I dont know if programming the "Sims" was a piece of cake (shrug)

But as to the topic in general ... Some people just want to blow stuff up and not worry about the how and why.

[EAF274 Johan]

Originally Posted by ZaPPPa

SH4 is already heading for mainstream. Ask yourself what got the biggest overhaul in this version and it is definitely the graphics engine. AI was hardly touched. Crew management got changed because the SH3 version was unworkable. The career got very little attention.

Actually I think that the career mode got a good deal of attention in SH4. There are many improvements over SH3: intro video's, animated briefings, missions during the patrol...

I am kind of hoping that, apart from making blockbusters or cashcows, developers/publishers also care to be represented in smaller market segments. It looks like Ubi is doing this for simulations (Il-2 series, Lock On, Silent Hunter). Who knows, maybe in 5 years all mainstream genres will have moved to consoles and simulations will be the only thing left for the pc.

[John Channing]

Originally Posted by EAF274 Johan

Actually I think that the career mode got a good deal of attention in SH4. There are many improvements over SH3: intro video's, animated briefings, missions during the patrol...

I am kind of hoping that, apart from making blockbusters or cashcows, developers/publishers also care to be represented in smaller market segments. It looks like Ubi is doing this for simulations (Il-2 series, Lock On, Silent Hunter). Who knows, maybe in 5 years all mainstream genres will have moved to consoles and simulations will be the only thing left for the pc.

Lock-on was dropped by UbiSoft due to poor sales caused by negative reviews and commentary by the flight-sim community.

Silent Hunter... well, read the first post here and draw your own conclusions.

IL-2 seem to be the exception to the rule. It has a strong, loyal, community of supporters that stayed with it, defended it and supported it through it's troublesome first years.

Something I see sadly lacking here.

JCC

[btaft]

IL-2 seem to be the exception to the rule. It has a strong, loyal, community of supporters that stayed with it, defended it and supported it through it's troublesome first years.

Falcon 4.0 and Grand Prix Legends are two other great examples. They are basically games that have been kept alive by there community support and modders.

I would be surprised to Ubisoft to publish another Silent Hunter title...the numbers are just not there. I was very surprised (though pleasantly so) to see them come out with SH4 following SH3.

If there is an SH5 it is likely one that is going to be produced commercially by a group of modders after Ubisoft abandons or sells the license. I think in general the future of hardcore/semi-hardcore sims lies (sadly) in the world of commnity supported download software (a-la GTR and Falcon 4.0). You will likely not see thist type of genre on the store shelves at Best Buy or Walmart but if there is enough support and contribution we may be lucky to download it from Battlefront or Matrixgames or a similar site.

Times have a changed........I'm getting old

[Scott Bruno]

Originally Posted by maerean_m

I was reading that the Electronic Arts' Sims 2 franchise sold 70 million copies so far. Also Ubisoft's Petz product line (Catz, Dogz, Horsez) collectively sold 3.5 million units.

So, when GRAW2 sales only 1 million copies and Silent Hunter 4 only a couple hundred thousands, WHY should anybody be bothered to make Silent Hunter 5?

Everybody complains about what a crappy game Silent Hunter 4 is and that SH4 is just a big collection of bugs and how they want back the $50 spent on the game. Nobody just enjoys the game. Everybody should join the navy and see what it means to be a captive of Time Compression =1 and not being able to blow the ships you spot (WW2 is kinda over).

You can imagine that making a Silent Hunter is not a walk in the park (as it is when making Sims 2).

WHY should there be a Silent Hunter 5 (Silent Hunter must reach the 230 version number (Silent Hunter 230) to have the same sales as Sims 2)? Ubisoft should stop all projects and start making Sims 2 clones and make BIIIG bucks. 2 years from now you'll only find Sims 2 clones in the shops. I wish everybody to enjoy their future copy of Sims 2.

I promise you no real game is a "walk in the park" to make. The fact that something like the Sims looks cartoony and silly to the average hardcore sim fan doesn't have a heck of a lot to do with how "hard" it is to make.

As for why this franchise persists, it's entirely possible to make a little money from niche titles. You don't have to sell 5 million copies to succeed; you just have to take in a reasonable amount more in than it cost to make, market and distribute the thing. A game like this is never going to be a grand slam. But give it a short schedule, keep the team as small as you can, and you can get away with relying on your core fanbase plus some number of casual purchases to keep a series like this alive for at least a few iterations.

[fredbass]

Originally Posted by maerean_m

Everybody complains about what a crappy game Silent Hunter 4 is and that SH4 is just a big collection of bugs and how they want back the $50 spent on the game. Nobody just enjoys the game.

Now that just isn't true. It's just a fact of nature that people will criticize and complain more than compliment so it is always going to be disceptively apparent that a larger amount of posts will come from that side of things. If there wasn't anything to complain about, then the amount of people frequenting this forum would surely be much less than it is now. See what I mean.