IGN's Silent Hunter 5 Review

[Iron Budokan]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

tater, with all due respect, this topic has been explored thoroughly. Is that a rhetorical question?

Game development (the detailed version)

The short version
Dev team submits a project proposal to game publisher. This pro forma includes the game design, scope, timeline, and resources needed.

Game publisher does market research, forecasts sales, and decides if the game is profitable. If not, they send back to the developer with suggested changes. If the developer and publisher agree to a work document, then the project is greenlit. The publisher will set guidelines and schedules for development before the work commences.

Developer works on the game, meeting milestones until the game is ready for release. If the developer is unable to meet the milestones, slippage occurs. At some point a commercial decision is made to release the game on schedule or invest more resources. A big factor in this decision is the projected amount of revenue the game can make if more resources are invested. If the publisher thinks the game will not make back the investment even with additional resources invested, they will release it and then retain two or three members of the dev team to work on patches.

It all comes down to sales. Always has. If submarine games sold like Naruto games or Madden football, they would get more resources and longer development cycles.

Speaking for myself, I didn't know this information and I found it very informative. Thank you for posting it.

[Méo]

Originally Posted by Iron Budokan

Speaking for myself, I didn't know this information and I found it very informative. Thank you for posting it.

Agreed, thanks Neal.

But seems like there's no bright future for submarine simulations.

[IanC]

But who's fault is it if the sales are low?
Don't invest more resources because the game might not/is not selling well? Well what about investing more resources to begin with, then the game would get 9 out of 10 review scores and guess what... high sales!
In other words; put out a quality product, and people will buy.
I don't get it, admittedly I know nothing about the vid game business.

[Méo]

Originally Posted by IanC

In other words; put out a quality product, and people will buy.

That was my point.

However, (although I have no experience in game design) It seems like a U-boat simulation is a very complex project compared to other type of games.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by IanC

But who's fault is it if the sales are low?
Don't invest more resources because the game might not/is not selling well? Well what about investing more resources to begin with, then the game would get 9 out of 10 review scores and guess what... high sales!
In other words; put out a quality product, and people will buy.

True, but that's limited to all the people who want a submarine game will buy. Like my summary pointed out, they have to make an educated guess on how many copies will sell, even at the highest quality. They cannot just pour money into a project without expecting a decent return. No one I know would do that with their money.

Originally Posted by Méo

However, (although I have no experience in game design) It seems like a U-boat simulation is a very complex project compared to other type of games.

Exactly, the submarine simulation is inherently a demanding title, and the core audience is very knowledgable and has high expectations, making it tough to achieve the level of sophistication needed.

[goldorak]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

True, but that's limited to all the people who want a submarine game will buy. Like my summary pointed out, they have to make an educated guess on how many copies will sell, even at the highest quality. They cannot just pour money into a project without expecting a decent return. No one I know would do that with their money.

You're right, but Ubisoft is not pouring resources into the SH series without any idea of how the sales will perform. They have past data. They know how well SH 3 sold (and in terms of developing that game, they sure invested much more in it than in SH 5). And SH 3 made a profit, otherwise we would never have seen 2 sequels.
Do I have to remind you how the development of SH 3 was high jacked in mid course so they could add a dynamic campaign ? And at that time they didn't know how well the game would sell. You could say they did an act of faith. And they were rewarded for it. But it seems that lesson was lost on them, as both SH 4 and SH 5 clearly show.

[IanC]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

True, but that's limited to all the people who want a submarine game will buy. Like my summary pointed out, they have to make an educated guess on how many copies will sell, even at the highest quality. They cannot just pour money into a project without expecting a decent return. No one I know would do that with their money.

I'm pretty sure there's a profit to be made from a good submarine game. They don't need to pour all their resources into it. Anyways one thing's for sure, they'll never get the sales they want if they keep pushing them out unfinished.

[Cujo]

The review was a little tough, however lets face it, high quality, complex PC simulations are rapidly being replaced by consoles which offer simplistic and redundant run and shoot games that require no thinking or innovation. It will soon be like going to the library and only finding comics to read.

Enjoy now ladies and gentlemen. You are experiencing that last of this breed.

[Iron Budokan]

SH3 sold really well. Not everyone who bought that game was a hard core sub sim fan, either. Word of mouth sold that game and made it a monster hit.

People who had never played a sub sim before heard SH3 was fun and they went out and bought it.

It's not rocket science. Good games sell.

[ReallyDedPoet]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

Exactly, the submarine simulation is inherently a demanding title, and the core audience is very knowledgable and has high expectations, making it tough to achieve the level of sophistication needed.

Plus there are so many opinions, what one person likes, the other does not, you can't please everybody or be all things to all people.

Many here have criticized the RPG elements in 5, but you take a look at all of the current and past Das Boot Threads here and it is not difficult to see why.
You can't blame them for going in that direction or trying something different, heck many pushed them to go that way.

[Faamecanic]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

Exactly, the submarine simulation is inherently a demanding title, and the core audience is very knowledgable and has high expectations, making it tough to achieve the level of sophistication needed.

I disagree with your statement due to the fact that since SH3 there has been stuff that modders can correct in a few hours of work without the benefit of having the CODE that the devs have.

Obvious stuff that is screwed up should have never made it out the door (ships going in reverse, crashing into docks...), the lack of a LEGIBLE manual, totally broken morale system to name a few.

Gripes about Uniforms, cosmetic details, heck even the fact that there is only one sub and 3 or 4 cargo vessels in game, can certainly be blamed on budget/time/complexity and does not affect the overall playability, I will agree with you on.

[St. Cobra]

Originally Posted by Faamecanic

I disagree with your statement due to the fact that since SH3 there has been stuff that modders can correct in a few hours of work without the benefit of having the CODE that the devs have.

Obvious stuff that is screwed up should have never made it out the door (ships going in reverse, crashing into docks...), the lack of a LEGIBLE manual, totally broken morale system to name a few.

Gripes about Uniforms, cosmetic details, heck even the fact that there is only one sub and 3 or 4 cargo vessels in game, can certainly be blamed on budget/time/complexity and does not affect the overall playability, I will agree with you on.

Well duh. You are understating the difficulty in creating the game in the first place, for the modders to play with. Anyone can mod an existing game, the hard part is creating the game first. Give me a copy of Shakespear, I can add a few words here and there, easy!!!

[Capt. Teach]

Hey everyone,

I have been sort of following the SHV discussions ... and I hope I am not saying the same things everyone else is saying ... but there is something I don't understand. [Perhaps you all do, its obvious for you all, and therefore is not clearly stated?]

I don't understand how:

Ubisoft can have SH3 and SH4 +
Know about and visit Subsim.com [assuming they read as well] +
Build using the same core code +
Have access to all the wonderful mods put out [like the rest of us] +
See what the Subsim fans like and don't like [raves on mods etc.] +
seemingly completely ignore all of it.

I would think, that at the very least they would use that as a slice of market research and base decisions upon it. [They did green light SH5 so the decision as to make SH5 is moot.]

It just doesn't make any sense to me that they wouldn't use the core code, re-engineer the mods [or just bring the modders onboard as staff or buy the mod rights from them], and put all of it together into what would be a very stable beta. Sure, it's more of the same but it would be a solid baseline to start from. Then put on a new graphics team to update the look and then start development of all the new stuff like a storyline you can follow [or toss], crew interaction, sub to move through, etc.

It seems like on the money arguement aspect, that just makes perfect sense. It also makes sense on a time aspect [well to me it does anyway]. I would expect all of the stuff for my suggested baseline beta could be done at worst in a few months. That leaves lots of time for development of the new stuff.

Anyway, that is what I don't understand. I'm hoping you guys do and can clear it up for me. Thanks in advance!

[Faamecanic]

Originally Posted by St. Cobra

Well duh. You are understating the difficulty in creating the game in the first place, for the modders to play with. Anyone can mod an existing game, the hard part is creating the game first. Give me a copy of Shakespear, I can add a few words here and there, easy!!!

I will refrain from personal attack here and just state that you missed my point.

There are items in SH 3 , SH 4 , and SH5 that have been fixed by mods (heck I have even fixed them myself in SH3 and 4) that literally took 5 min to change a text line in a .cfg file. Those are the changes that should have been made pre-release that I was referring to.

My main point is... things that have been broken, and KNOWN to be broken since SH3 should not have been just copied over into SH4, then SH5... no excuse (Sub on Rails is an example).

Friendly ships that run in reverse and try everything in their power to ram you is another example of something that should have never been released.

And there are total realism sinkers that would have cost ZERO money and budget to get right. It would not have taken any addtional funding to realize that an individual sinking 100,000 tons of cargo in 1939- june1940 was just totally historically incorrect and laughable. Or for a Uboat to be tasked to sink a capital ship as a Mission objective is just stupid. But these are not game breakers.... just things that ruin the immersion.

Personally I would rather have a SH 4 that was tweaked and 99% MAJOR bug free, and 90% minor bug free...that is immersive and complete...then something with broke new features and flashy graphics that I find almost unplayable if not for my love of subsims.

[Bilge_Rat]

Originally Posted by Neal Stevens

True, but that's limited to all the people who want a submarine game will buy. Like my summary pointed out, they have to make an educated guess on how many copies will sell, even at the highest quality. They cannot just pour money into a project without expecting a decent return. No one I know would do that with their money.

Exactly, the submarine simulation is inherently a demanding title, and the core audience is very knowledgable and has high expectations, making it tough to achieve the level of sophistication needed.

Exactly, simulations have a very small market share. They are more complex to produce than a FPS. Sim customers are a demanding crowd, since they rightly expect the game to simulate more or less the real events.

Because of that, most major publishers bailed out of the Sim market 10 years ago to concentrate on more profitable titles. Simulations these days are generally put out by smaller developpers who enjoy simulations themselves and are willing to live with a smaller return in exchange for putting out a quality product, companies like Battlefront, Third Wire, DCS, 1C.

Even within the Sim market, naval sims have a very small market share. The most popular sims are flight sims followed by land combat sims. The market for realistic subsims is very small.

Sure, a company could spend millions of dollars designing an ultra-realistic state of the art subsim, but they would just wind up losing money since the potential customers are not there. Anyone who thinks otherwise just does not understand the Sim market.

Right now and for the foreseeable future, SH5 is the only new subsim on the market, so the choice is simple: buy it and play it or dont buy it and do something else.

I already made my decision and have had no regrets.