Should I get SH4?

[Renesco]

I was in the same boat (excuse the pun) as you OP, and my experience has been a mixed bag, silent hunter 3 is definitely a better game, more subs and more variety in the subs, better German subs and I might be alone in preferring the crew management in sh3 to the one in sh4, I've come across a lot of bugs in sh4 to the point of it being nearly unplayable until I got the U-Boat missions add-on which fixed quite a few but some serious bugs remain, I've spent as much time editing .cfg files and .upc files as playing the game itself but if you're a sh3 veteran you'll probably have gone through that already with sh3.

Overall the crew management needs less micromanagement, the graphics are very nice (but the animation is poorer in my opinion). Keep a lot of save games around because sometimes they get bugged and you'll need to reload several save games back to find an uncorrupted save, the voice acting is poorer and buggier, the subs you'll be using are not as good as German ones with much shallower depth and they're all pretty much the same except a few minor differences, on the plus side they carry more fire-power on average, 6 forward 4 aft torpedoes on most subs. The Japanese ships take more torpedoes to sink from my experience too.

If you can get over the bugs and put in the time to edit the .cfg files to get the game working the way you want it's fun, but it doesn't hold a candle to sh3.

[Ducimus]

SH4 has it's share of bugs, but it isn't THAT buggy. Now SH5... that's another story.

[Howard313]

Well, you guys have talked me into it. In fact I'm considering to just say "screw Christmas" and buy it tonight.

I would buy it on disc (Lord knows it'd be faster than steam's ungodly download times, and cheaper.)

But my cd-drive stopped working years ago, can't even get the darn thing to open, acts like it's jammed, piece of junk.

So Alas I'm forced to buy the $30 steam version (that's counting the U-boat missions add-on)

As for bugs Silent Hunter 3 has had quite a few on me so I know what's in store, like that lovely bug where the game crashes 70% of the time when you try to use one of the Auto-arrange crew buttons. Or maybe how the lighthouses in it have the ability to generate lights so strong that they can penetrate and shine right through your crew-members on deck. Don't even get me started on the time I saw a disembodied floating head manning the flak gun (I still have nightmares.)

Not hating on them, I'm just saying I'm used to Ubisoft's ability to seemingly miss out on what should be obvious and easily fixed bugs. And for the most part these glitches are not game breaking in any way, in fact they can be kind of humorous at times. (Except that bloody auto-manage crew button, that thing caused me lots of frustration back before I learned not to use it.)

If the bugs in SH4 are anything like the ones you can find in SH3, I'm sure I can handle it. (Seriously, I doubt SH4 has anything that tops disembodied floating heads running around on deck, prove me wrong.)

EDIT: Just bought it and the U-boat Mission expansion pack, can't wait to see how it goes when the download finishes 3 days from now. I'll keep you all updated.

[Ducimus]

Personally id start out using a mod. Playing the vanilla game isn't quite as exciting after playing a modded version of SH3 for a few years, and I haven't heard of anybody who plays vanilla SH3.

edit:
here's a list of known issues with SH4 that i wrote down in mod documentation awhile ago. Some of these were resolved by mod. Other issues and minor bugs not listed were resolved by mod.

1.Incorrect dates listed in the patrol log in the in port office. Often, it will cite all the ships in a single patrol having been sunk on the same day.

2.Transparent crewman on the bridge. The work around for this is to not enable the ***8220;environmental effects***8221; option in the graphics menu.

3.Deck gun crew bug. This occurs when the player moves their deck guns location. This has been worked around by limiting the players options to do so.

4.Buoyancy issues with deep diving. When the player meets or exceeds 600 feet, depth keeping is next to impossible. This primary effects the Balao, Tench, and U-boats.

5.Crew does not change to wet weather gear in heavy seas. They do so, only if it rains.

6.CO2 not being vented while surfaced. It is my belief this bug is caused by alt tabbing SH4 while on patrol.

7.Deck and AA gun crewman being killed while submerged. This is due to a design flaw of the game. Place your crewman in ***8220;hogan's alley***8221; (after battery crew berthing) when not in use.

[Howard313]

Originally Posted by Ducimus

I haven't heard of anybody who plays vanilla SH3.

Uhhh *Raises hand awkwardly* Guilty?

Honestly I did run a couple of mods back in the day, I don't know if you've heard of it or not, but I ran one called GWX for a few months. But recently I slapped a fresh unmodded copy back on to my computer in order to play online with a friend.....with the exception of an edited .cfg file in order to have a higher max time compression.

I'll surf around for mods after I get a good feel of the game's quirks and feel and see if anything catches my fancy

[WernherVonTrapp]

I've never played any of the sims prior to SHIV so I have no baseline to compare it to. I notice that you have an integrated graphics system instead of a dedicated graphics card. This may be an area of concern, but not necessarily. Your CPU and RAM certainly should be able to handle the load. The only way to know for sure is to load up SHIV and run it for a while. If others have run SHIV on similar systems, you (theoretically) should have no problems. Everyone's rig is different. If you should run into any problems, you'll certainly find helpful hands here. If it is at all economically feasible, you may want to consider getting a dedicated graphics card, but that's for later, if you have problems getting SHIV to run.
Good luck mate.

[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by Renesco

the subs you'll be using are not as good as German ones

American subs were capable of winning. German subs were not. Which were the better subs? Just playing the games SH3 and SH4 leaves no doubt that the American subs were superior war machines by a large margin over the WWI designs of German U-Boats used in WWII. And the games give only an incomplete picture of how bad the comparison really was.

[Flaxpants]

I recently took the plunge and bought SH4 after playing SH3 for some time- I now play both, depends on my mood.

I would say that if you like sumarine simulations in general, then you can't put a foot wrong with SH4, and as has been mentioned, the performance is just as good, if not better.

Your system specs will run the game just fine, they are slightly better than mine. I also got some lag in Sh3 ports and around convoys (anywhere where there's a lot of other objects), SH4 is no worse.

Fast loading times are a bonus, as is the crew management and obviously the graphics.

I am currently using the Real Fleet Boat Mod with the RSRD Campaign, plus a few additonal bits and pieces. I plan to play the TMO mod and Operation Monsun mod (german subs again!) in the future.

Go for it.

[Rockin Robbins]

For a long time SH3 and SH4 will be the best submarine simulators on the planet. There is a lot in the U-Boat war that is only in SH3 and all of the Pacific war that is only in SH4, so it makes sense to own them both.

SH4 is much more realistic than SH3 just by coincidence, because so much of the German submarine effort was oriented toward wolfpacks concentrating on a single convoy. Since wolfpacks don't exist in either sim, that is a near fatal blow to the authenticity of SH3, while since American boats acted singly, even when in "wolfpacks," SH4 is pretty authentic as far as tactics and strategy go.

There are a lot of differences between the U-Boats and fleet boats. Don't make the mistake of trying to make a fleet boat act like a U-Boat. They're different and need to be treated as you would two different languages. Thinking in U-Boat while speaking fleet boat will make you very dissatisfied, just as the reverse is true. If you go to the Sub Skipper's Bag of Tricks thread and look at the Dick O'Kane method you'll find an analog of the Fast-90 U-Boat attack. This will help you discover how the American TDC works, while keeping you one pretty familiar ground as far as tactics go.

Even more than the U-Boats, the American subs are surface raiders that have the ability to submerge when absolutely necessary for the smallest possible amount of time to get the job done. With their 20 knot surface speed and very long range, they are optimized for staying on the surface and searching the maximum number of square miles per day. That is how you discover more targets and sink more tonnage. Lurking below the surface waiting for targets is wasting the superior abilities of the American boat.

While you're on the surface, if you are equipped with radar, run the darned thing! All the time! Here's the situation. With your radar you know the position, course and speed of everything that floats or flies to way beyond visual range. IF the enemy has radar detection he knows one thing: you are out there somewhere. Advantage you!

Use its strengths and ignore its weaknesses. A submarine at 1000' isn't fighting anyway. It's hiding. A hiding submarine is harmless. Don't be harmless!

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

. A submarine at 1000' isn't fighting anyway. It's hiding. A hiding submarine is harmless. Don't be harmless!

Probably why historians say that the Battle of the Atlantic was pretty much won by the Allies in late 1943. A submerged WW2 submarine (in pacific or atlantic) , is little more then a floating minefield, and only dangerous when something happens to blunder accross it's path.

[Howard313]

Well I got it up and running and I have to say, I see potential. Not that it doesn't have it's issues but there are some things about this one I can really get into.

For one I love how instead of them just giving you a designated sector and telling you to blow things up that you actually can have specific objectives, snapping photos, delivering secret agents, I like the variety.

I'm also enjoying the Allied submarines and their differences from my usual German U-boats, it's a very unique experience being able to get a vague idea on both sides of the war. They have a whole skillset to their own with their own strengths and weaknesses and I'm practically a rookie again (Which is something I wasn't expecting, I was assuming it would be the same old stuff in a shiny new package.)

Of course it's not all great, performance has taken a bit of a hit since SH3, it runs sure...... but at about 15-20fps. Ugh, disappointing but not exactly unexpected. Time to get the monkey wrench and see what kind of boosters I can put on this thing.

The graphics seem kinda choppy, even more-so than SH3's relatively low Screen resolution, but I'm willing to believe my video card is to blame for this and not the game itself, if some of the pictures I've seen on this site hold any merit, this game can be very beautiful to look at when you have the proper stuff to run it.

My final complaint is the controls, yeah I liked SH3's better, probably because I've had time to get used to them, I'm sure they'll grow on me, but as for right now....meh.

All-in-all?


Oh and any tips to boost my FPS would be great guys, I'm working with an old dinosaur of a PC here.

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by Howard313

The graphics seem kinda choppy, even more-so than SH3's relatively low Screen resolution, but I'm willing to believe my video card is to blame for this and not the game itself, if some of the pictures I've seen on this site hold any merit, this game can be very beautiful to look at when you have the proper stuff to run it.

It might be hardware, driver, or something in vanilla that was fixed awhile ago. The game doesn't seem all that choppy to me and does look pretty sweet with the right stuff done to it.

I like this movie for a few reasons:


- First part of the movie is the mod earlier in development, with the second part of the movie showing the mod later in development after more environmental work was done to it. So in an odd way it kind of showcases some of what the game can do graphically, and how its improved over time.

- user created dramatic submarine youtube movies are almost always cool to watch, and the movie maker used TMO which put a silly grin on my fugly mug.

My final complaint is the controls, yeah I liked SH3's better, probably because I've had time to get used to them, I'm sure they'll grow on me, but as for right now....meh.

Yeah I can relate. The VERY first thing i did when SH4 was launched was to reconfigure the controls to SH3's. Which sort of bleed over into the TMO supermod, so in an odd sense, every user of TMO is using a SH3-esque keyboard layout.

Oh and any tips to boost my FPS would be great guys, I'm working with an old dinosaur of a PC here.

Try enabeling only volumentric fog and not enabeling environmental effects. What your really doing is preventing the ghostlike transparent crew from appearing when its foggy, while retaining the transparent water. What you lose is the cloud shadowing effect on the water.

You should absolutely get it,
I was hesitant at first too, but If you liked III, You'll Love IV, I'd avoid V for a while, but that's just personal preference.

[Renesco]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

American subs were capable of winning. German subs were not. Which were the better subs? Just playing the games SH3 and SH4 leaves no doubt that the American subs were superior war machines by a large margin over the WWI designs of German U-Boats used in WWII. And the games give only an incomplete picture of how bad the comparison really was.

German subs had less striking power as the yank ones have mostly 6 forward 4 aft and superior radar, but German subs had a much deeper diving depth and snorkels, and were fighting an uphill battle versus airpower and a large enemy surface navy yet still nearly strangled England, also the XXI was the pioneer of most cold war subs. The Americans had it easy by comparison, with air power and surface naval power on their side.

Just because the soviet union won the war for you does not mean your subs were better than the German ones, correlation is not causation in this instance.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Renesco

German subs had a much deeper diving depth and snorkels,

The Type VII had a deeper diving depth, but not "much" deeper. The Type IX was about equal. US boat builders were more conservative in their ratings, but more than one US sub survived a very deep dive.

The Americans had it easy by comparison, with air power and surface naval power on their side.

Tell that to all the US sub sailors who died.

Just because the soviet union won the war for you does not mean your subs were better than the German ones, correlation is not causation in this instance.

First, the Soviet Union didn't "win the war for us". Their contribution was as great as any, their loss greater. That said, if the other Allies hadn't been tying up the Germans on the other fronts, and sending the Russians supplies, they likely wouldn't have faired so well either.

Second, no one mentioned any causation, or even correlation, so why are you implying they did? While I disagree with RR's summation that US boats were greatly superior, he said they won "their" war, not "the" war.

Third, talking down to people doesn't mean you're right.