Why I just pre-ordered SH5

jlederer · 02-24-10, 06:22 PM

I've been sailing my latest career in SH3 w/GWX and SH3 Commander using the open conning tower / open hatch mod which includes FlakMonkey's crew quarters and engine room. It's great stuff.

I've got SH4 and the water is beautiful but I've never played it much. Don't really want to drive US fleet boats (didn't get the uboat missions add-on) - I just really am a fan of the Atlantic theater, have about 2 dozen books on subs but really love the uboats, been to see U505 in Chicago, etc. Typically subsim fanatic like most of you guys I think :-)

Anyway, like many of you, I have been wondering about what we're going to see with SH5 (the good and the bad). Been reading the forums every day, watching for Neal's videos, any magazine preview in any language, etc., and trying to decide whether to buy, wait and maybe buy later when price drops, or hold out until/if DRM is removed.

Finally just now while prowling my new SH3 engine room :-) a realization came over me and I decided to pre-order. The deciding factor for me (and this might help some of you on the fence which is why I share it - if I'm not just trying for catharsis :-) is that while I keep roaming my boat using freecam, ultimately, the problem is, it's lonely. It's lonely in the engine room - nobody to talk to back there. Can't get to torpedo rooms, and even if I could (my 2GB Win7 machine has 90% RAM used with all these extra textures loaded and is prone to going up to 100% and crashing if I try to move around too fast (I can see ram usage on my logitech gaming keyboard display) and too many textures have to load too fast - I have a 320MB 8800GTS video card), I know those rooms would be lonely too. I'm never going to see anybody loading tubes in sh3. Never going to see people doing damage control (not sure if that's in sh5 but hopefully it may be possible to mod it in). I've always wanted to feel like what it was like to sail these boats. And as close as it is, SH3 plus the above mods has gone as far as it can go. There will never be a "living crew" in SH3. And I realized that I really want that experience. I want to give an order and see some guy flipping switches on the electrical panels to carry it out, not just walk by the panels with nobody around which I think may be the best we'll ever see in SH3 with mods (maybe being able to click on panels to control them myself, but then I don't feel like the captain, so while it does feel like sailing in a uboat it feels like sailing it by myself). I want to be in the conning tower and have someone walk under the hatch and whisper up "Contact closing, bearing 350, Herr Kaleun".

Heck, after mods, the crew in SH5 will hopefully be fantastic in the degree of interactions possible (assuming we can mod the conversation files). That's a kind of modding I can definitely do (edit text files and create branching conversation trees) so if they open that up, I can see some real potential for community-created campaigns/missions that could be amazing.

Also, I've looked at the screenshots showing the potential increases possible in my crews skills (forget the ones like getting anechoic hull coating just by improving the morale of my sound guy or whatever, hopefully we can mod that kind of crap out) and I find that I like that idea. I can see "training my own veteran crew" over the course of some missions, perhaps "drilling" the crew on getting better at silent running or better at repairing the boat.

I also think the campaign structure they've come up with for SH5 will make the game more interesting - while the wide-open campaign in SH3 is fun (I sail wherever I want, go wherever I want) I think it will be very interesting to have "orders from high command" to do something specific that's related to helping advance the war effort.

Sorry about going on and on, but maybe this will help some of you on the fence.

Jim

P.S. I'm in the IT business and it really irks me the way software is constantly pirated. I would love to see someone come up with a DRM scheme that actually works. Maybe UBI's latest scheme will work, if so I support their right to protect their livelihood. In many parts of the world there is no respect for intellectual property rights whatsoever so if you don't have a technical solution to prevent piracy you can expect to be majorly ripped-off.

Ragtag · 02-24-10, 06:24 PM

Wow, i'm blind

Seriously, some spacing would be nice

jlederer · 02-24-10, 06:32 PM

Sorry the editor trimmed out all the returns I put in, didn't realize it would do that. I put in some HTML tags to fix it.

Nisgeis · 02-24-10, 06:34 PM

Thanks for sharing jlederer, you're right about the engine having more potential scope. I hope you enjoy it.

Sailor Steve · 02-24-10, 06:34 PM

WELCOME ABOARD!

Some interesting points. I'm looking forward to seeing what it can do, and if all we've been told about modability is true.

I'll be buying it myself, just as soon as they'll let me play it.

jwilliams · 02-24-10, 06:43 PM

Im already sold (im sure most people are)..... I want to get SH5 (like most people) only 1 thing is stopping me preordering it..... and i think we all know what that is!

To me a game that pauses and kicks me out before i can save is not good enough (hate the idea that i could just lose the last 2hrs of my patrol)...

So i wait for the review and comments from those that have bought the game to tell me that OSP doesn't do this.

Hopefully i will be playing SH5 soon.

Cptn_Enth · 02-24-10, 07:13 PM

Welcome to the forums, jlederer.

Like you, I too will be making my judgements on the game when I get my copy on Tuesday. If I don't like it, it will probably sit and collect dust until the community "fixes" the game like we've done in the past, then I'll probably mod the hell out of it and start playing it again.

I'm just glad that UbiSoft continues to create their games with the expectation that we in the community will offer our own contributions and criticisms on how to make their product better...though it would be nice if they actually DID something with the advice/mods we create other than point and say "Ooooh...That's nice..."

Regards,

frenema · 02-24-10, 07:26 PM

Is there a benefit to pre-ordering a game? Just saying because in another forum with another game (I won't mention names), people religiously waited for the game for almost a year and the hype was high up in the sky. People pre-ordered the game en mass because they never doubted for a second that it was going to be the best game ever, but when the game was finally released, all hell broke loose with fans crying and pissed (and no, it wasn't about DRM). Luckily, I was one of the few that waited for the game to be actually released first without pre-ordering. I'm just saying...

And if you feel so lonely, you can always take a break from the computer and explore the rest of the world you know.

Heretic · 02-24-10, 07:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by frenema

Is there a benefit to pre-ordering a game? Just saying because in another forum with another game (I won't mention names), people religiously waited for the game for almost a year and the hype was high up in the sky. People pre-ordered the game en mass because they never doubted for a second that it was going to be the best game ever, but when the game was finally released, all hell broke loose with fans crying and pissed (and no, it wasn't about DRM). Luckily, I was one of the few that waited for the game to be actually released first without pre-ordering. I'm just saying...

And if you feel so lonely, you can always take a break from the computer and explore the rest of the world you know.

Just a leap of faith. You're gambling that the game will be good enough to risk getting it a few days earlier.

02-24-10, 06:22 PM	#1
jlederer Bosun Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 63 Downloads: 48 Uploads: 0	Why I just pre-ordered SH5 I've been sailing my latest career in SH3 w/GWX and SH3 Commander using the open conning tower / open hatch mod which includes FlakMonkey's crew quarters and engine room. It's great stuff. I've got SH4 and the water is beautiful but I've never played it much. Don't really want to drive US fleet boats (didn't get the uboat missions add-on) - I just really am a fan of the Atlantic theater, have about 2 dozen books on subs but really love the uboats, been to see U505 in Chicago, etc. Typically subsim fanatic like most of you guys I think :-) Anyway, like many of you, I have been wondering about what we're going to see with SH5 (the good and the bad). Been reading the forums every day, watching for Neal's videos, any magazine preview in any language, etc., and trying to decide whether to buy, wait and maybe buy later when price drops, or hold out until/if DRM is removed. Finally just now while prowling my new SH3 engine room :-) a realization came over me and I decided to pre-order. The deciding factor for me (and this might help some of you on the fence which is why I share it - if I'm not just trying for catharsis :-) is that while I keep roaming my boat using freecam, ultimately, the problem is, it's lonely. It's lonely in the engine room - nobody to talk to back there. Can't get to torpedo rooms, and even if I could (my 2GB Win7 machine has 90% RAM used with all these extra textures loaded and is prone to going up to 100% and crashing if I try to move around too fast (I can see ram usage on my logitech gaming keyboard display) and too many textures have to load too fast - I have a 320MB 8800GTS video card), I know those rooms would be lonely too. I'm never going to see anybody loading tubes in sh3. Never going to see people doing damage control (not sure if that's in sh5 but hopefully it may be possible to mod it in). I've always wanted to feel like what it was like to sail these boats. And as close as it is, SH3 plus the above mods has gone as far as it can go. There will never be a "living crew" in SH3. And I realized that I really want that experience. I want to give an order and see some guy flipping switches on the electrical panels to carry it out, not just walk by the panels with nobody around which I think may be the best we'll ever see in SH3 with mods (maybe being able to click on panels to control them myself, but then I don't feel like the captain, so while it does feel like sailing in a uboat it feels like sailing it by myself). I want to be in the conning tower and have someone walk under the hatch and whisper up "Contact closing, bearing 350, Herr Kaleun". Heck, after mods, the crew in SH5 will hopefully be fantastic in the degree of interactions possible (assuming we can mod the conversation files). That's a kind of modding I can definitely do (edit text files and create branching conversation trees) so if they open that up, I can see some real potential for community-created campaigns/missions that could be amazing. Also, I've looked at the screenshots showing the potential increases possible in my crews skills (forget the ones like getting anechoic hull coating just by improving the morale of my sound guy or whatever, hopefully we can mod that kind of crap out) and I find that I like that idea. I can see "training my own veteran crew" over the course of some missions, perhaps "drilling" the crew on getting better at silent running or better at repairing the boat. I also think the campaign structure they've come up with for SH5 will make the game more interesting - while the wide-open campaign in SH3 is fun (I sail wherever I want, go wherever I want) I think it will be very interesting to have "orders from high command" to do something specific that's related to helping advance the war effort. Sorry about going on and on, but maybe this will help some of you on the fence. Jim P.S. I'm in the IT business and it really irks me the way software is constantly pirated. I would love to see someone come up with a DRM scheme that actually works. Maybe UBI's latest scheme will work, if so I support their right to protect their livelihood. In many parts of the world there is no respect for intellectual property rights whatsoever so if you don't have a technical solution to prevent piracy you can expect to be majorly ripped-off. Last edited by jlederer; 02-24-10 at 06:38 PM.

02-24-10, 06:24 PM	#2
Ragtag Seasoned Skipper Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Oslo, Norway Posts: 654 Downloads: 163 Uploads: 0	Wow, i'm blind Seriously, some spacing would be nice __________________ Intel I7-7800x CPU. 16Gb G.skill DDR4 3600MHz. Asrock Taichi X299 mb Palit RTX 2080Ti. Fortron 1000W PSU. BenQ XR3501R LCD.

02-24-10, 06:32 PM	#3
jlederer Bosun Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 63 Downloads: 48 Uploads: 0	Fixed spacing Sorry the editor trimmed out all the returns I put in, didn't realize it would do that. I put in some HTML tags to fix it.

02-24-10, 06:34 PM	#4
Nisgeis Ocean Warrior Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 2,909 Downloads: 77 Uploads: 11	Thanks for sharing jlederer, you're right about the engine having more potential scope. I hope you enjoy it. __________________ -------------------------------- This space left intentionally blank.

02-24-10, 06:34 PM	#5
Sailor Steve Eternal Patrol Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: High in the mountains of Utah Posts: 50,369 Downloads: 745 Uploads: 249	WELCOME ABOARD! Some interesting points. I'm looking forward to seeing what it can do, and if all we've been told about modability is true. I'll be buying it myself, just as soon as they'll let me play it. __________________ “Never do anything you can't take back.” —Rocky Russo

02-24-10, 06:43 PM	#6
jwilliams Ace of the Deep Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: New Zealand Posts: 1,013 Downloads: 124 Uploads: 0	Im already sold (im sure most people are)..... I want to get SH5 (like most people) only 1 thing is stopping me preordering it..... and i think we all know what that is! To me a game that pauses and kicks me out before i can save is not good enough (hate the idea that i could just lose the last 2hrs of my patrol)... So i wait for the review and comments from those that have bought the game to tell me that OSP doesn't do this. Hopefully i will be playing SH5 soon. __________________ Windows 7, 64bit. Phenom II 965BE (OC 4cores @ 3.8 Ghz). Radeon HD4870 (1gb gddr5). 6gb Ram.

02-24-10, 07:13 PM	#7
Cptn_Enth Watch Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: NY, NY Posts: 29 Downloads: 56 Uploads: 0	Welcome to the forums, jlederer. Like you, I too will be making my judgements on the game when I get my copy on Tuesday. If I don't like it, it will probably sit and collect dust until the community "fixes" the game like we've done in the past, then I'll probably mod the hell out of it and start playing it again. I'm just glad that UbiSoft continues to create their games with the expectation that we in the community will offer our own contributions and criticisms on how to make their product better...though it would be nice if they actually DID something with the advice/mods we create other than point and say "Ooooh...That's nice..." Regards, __________________ Cptn. Enth USS Drum Squadron 98 "Blackwater Pirannahs" Pearl Harbor, HI

02-24-10, 07:26 PM	#8
frenema Torpedoman Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Canada Posts: 116 Downloads: 8 Uploads: 0	Is there a benefit to pre-ordering a game? Just saying because in another forum with another game (I won't mention names), people religiously waited for the game for almost a year and the hype was high up in the sky. People pre-ordered the game en mass because they never doubted for a second that it was going to be the best game ever, but when the game was finally released, all hell broke loose with fans crying and pissed (and no, it wasn't about DRM). Luckily, I was one of the few that waited for the game to be actually released first without pre-ordering. I'm just saying... And if you feel so lonely, you can always take a break from the computer and explore the rest of the world you know.