Sh3 engine versus Sh4 need your light?

[Hans Witteman]

Hi shipmates,

Since i never try or play with SH4 i would love to ear your opinions on the pro and con of possibly porting my mod to Sh4.

I mean by that what would be the greatest drawbacks and difficulty to do the campaign and adding all boat from the Atlantic theater?

Is there more limitations from the SH4 engine than SH3?

I am waiting for your view on the matter.

Best regards Hans

[Sailor Steve]

Besides having better graphics, SH4 also has automatic crew management. It also runs better. I can't run SH3 above 1024 TC without having major problems. I can run SH4 up to 4096 TC with no problem at all. SH4 also only loads a 6-month period surrounding the start date, rather than loading the whole war, so it loads faster and runs smoother. I've been playing Operation Monsun for awhile, and it's a very nice campaign, but none of the cool SH3 stuff is there. The harbors are pretty naked, and none of the cool things like Privateer's blimps have been ported into SH4.

I have felt for a long time that it is by far the better platform for all these mods.

But of course that's just my opinion.

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Besides having better graphics, SH4 also has automatic crew management. It also runs better. I can't run SH3 above 1024 TC without having major problems. I can run SH4 up to 4096 TC with no problem at all. SH4 also only loads a 6-month period surrounding the start date, rather than loading the whole war, so it loads faster and runs smoother. I've been playing Operation Monsun for awhile, and it's a very nice campaign, but none of the cool SH3 stuff is there. The harbors are pretty naked, and none of the cool things like Privateer's blimps have been ported into SH4.

I have felt for a long time that it is by far the better platform for all these mods.

But of course that's just my opinion.

Hi mate,

Thank for your quick reply, i am looking at the possibility SH4 offer versus SH3 but i would like to have modders point of view on the feasibility of porting all assets from Sh3 Atlantic theater to Sh4.

By reading old threads i saw that the GWX was trying to do so but they abandoned the project because of Ubisoft SH5 but i wonder if maybe they just saw that the amount of work required would have been too much?

I think the only answer i will get is that i buy myself a copy and start analyzing file structure to see where the biggest drawbacks are!

If thing could be done without too much difficulty i might consider it seriously.

Best regards Hans

[CCIP]

I agree with Steve. By and large, you have to realize that SH4 is more or less the same engine as SHIII, but with a few mechanical additions and a much nicer set of graphical features. It's got a much better and more flexible campaign structure. It generally performs much better, and is more adaptable hardware-wise. It is more stable and less glitchy, especially when it comes to time compression and saved games. It also received better official patching support (mostly because of the expansion), and while there are a couple of annoying issues left over, it is all in all in a substantially better stock condition than SHIII.

SHIII's advantage over SH4, development-wise, has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It's the fact that SHIII has been developed much further by modders and there is a bigger base of stuff to build on, and a somewhat bigger community supporting it.

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by CCIP

I agree with Steve. By and large, you have to realize that SH4 is more or less the same engine as SHIII, but with a few mechanical additions and a much nicer set of graphical features. It's got a much better and more flexible campaign structure. It generally performs much better, and is more adaptable hardware-wise. It is more stable and less glitchy, especially when it comes to time compression and saved games. It also received better official patching support (mostly because of the expansion), and while there are a couple of annoying issues left over, it is all in all in a substantially better stock condition than SHIII.

SHIII's advantage over SH4, development-wise, has nothing to do with the game engine itself. It's the fact that SHIII has been developed much further by modders and there is a bigger base of stuff to build on, and a somewhat bigger community supporting it.

Hi mate,

Thank for giving your point of view but i still think my best option will be to buy myself a copy and see how hard it would be to implemented a full Atlantic theater campaign.

I forgot to ask if there is support for dynamic shadows and normal bump for all ext and int parts??

Thank for the feedback greatly appreciated

Best regards Hans

[Schwieger]

Personally, I prefer the graphics of SH3. Something about SH4 turns me off, but can't exactly pinpoint what.

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by Schwieger

Personally, I prefer the graphics of SH3. Something about SH4 turns me off, but can't exactly pinpoint what.

Hi mate,

You have a point here and i think i know what is it, after looking at some videos on youtube it look like there is a bloom effect that is overdone washing out the graphic and i agree with you if i compared SH3 to Sh4 side by side picture i prefer SH3!

But this could possibly be tweak on the SH4 engine and i know SH4 have a shader folder so we can possibly write our own just a tough

I am just looking at all options available to give us the best of everything.

Best regards Hans

[megadan]

Howdy Hans, Lurker or wclear would be the people to askLurker who made opmonsun megamod and w clear also ported a lot from sh3 into sh4 for his uboot mod The problem with silent hunter 4 graphics r the reflections and a lack of atmosphere compared to sh3

[Reece]

The only thing I have against SH3 is the widescreen problem, there are mods to suit 16:9 but none so far for 16:10.
SH4 needs a LOT of work to change to Atlantic theater, plus although the u-boat buoyancy has been improved it still needs work IMO, also the zombie men annoy me, but this is just my opinion! other than that I would probably prefer SH4. Again setting up an Atlantic Campaign like SH3 would be a HUGE job.

[Robin40]

Originally Posted by Hans Witteman

Hi mate,

You have a point here and i think i know what is it, after looking at some videos on youtube it look like there is a bloom effect that is overdone washing out the graphic and i agree with you if i compared SH3 to Sh4 side by side picture i prefer SH3!

But this could possibly be tweak on the SH4 engine and i know SH4 have a shader folder so we can possibly write our own just a tough

I am just looking at all options available to give us the best of everything.

Best regards Hans

yep...I like SH3 graphics better than SH4 one...

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by megadan

Howdy Hans, Lurker or wclear would be the people to askLurker who made opmonsun megamod and w clear also ported a lot from sh3 into sh4 for his uboot mod The problem with silent hunter 4 graphics r the reflections and a lack of atmosphere compared to sh3

Hi mate,

Thank for pointing me to modders who already know more than me on SH4.

I also think SH3 look better but this is only my humble opinion

Best regards Hans

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by Reece

SH4 needs a LOT of work to change to Atlantic theater, plus although the u-boat buoyancy has been improved it still needs work IMO, also the zombie men annoy me, but this is just my opinion! other than that I would probably prefer SH4. Again setting up an Atlantic Campaign like SH3 would be a HUGE job.

What part of the atlantic campaign does OM not get right? IMO at least campaign-design wise (in terms of traffic and mission areas), OM is easily the best, or at least most historically-accurate Atlantic campaign of any SH version. And I say that as someone who's worked pretty substantially on SHIII's campaign layers.

[Robin40]

Hey...someone edited my avatar in my profile

How can I modify i?

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by Reece

The only thing I have against SH3 is the widescreen problem, there are mods to suit 16:9 but none so far for 16:10.
SH4 needs a LOT of work to change to Atlantic theater, plus although the u-boat buoyancy has been improved it still needs work IMO, also the zombie men annoy me, but this is just my opinion! other than that I would probably prefer SH4. Again setting up an Atlantic Campaign like SH3 would be a HUGE job.

Hi Reece,

Yes that exactly what i think it would be too much work to do.

Since SH3 have already the campaign structure in place.

In a word too much work for little gain that might explain why no one want to get involved in it.

But like i say sometime it is good to see all the different approach we have to make the best out of it

Best regards Hans

[Hans Witteman]

Originally Posted by Robin40

Hey...someone edited my avatar in my profile

How can I modify i?

Hi Robin,

Avatar change as you post you got a sticky one if you made donation to subsim

Best regards Hans