Silent Hunter 4, help

Originally Posted by modelrrfan51

I recently started playing Silent Hunter 4, Wolves of the Pacific. One thing, not sure if a problem, is that when the map shows the Japanese ships, when get close to them, they vanish off the screen. It also will show a ship on the map in range of sub and when check the TBT the ship is not there. Had one time was sunk when a destroyer all of a sudden appeared right on top of the sub. So question is this normal part of the game or is this a clitch in program and is there anyway to repair this.
Also, I have seen some of the youtube videos and some of there screen are different, with different dials and instruments, is this normal, or is it just what sub and time frame you are in. Also saw with some having a compass to help plot torpeado runs. Where do you find this in game at.
And last, not really a computer person, so if have to download any patches or things, will need some help with that.
Any help with these will greatly appreciated.
David.

well that happens a lot in the game, not sure why it does that but "if" the contacts are really there, they can sometimes vanish before you reach them since the game spawns things from point "a" to point "b" then they vanish so the game isn't trying to constantly create animations for a million different things. its a way of saving resources and not requiring so much from your computers cpu and grafics card.

the second part of this is false contacts that just vanish as you get closer, these can be frustrating but you learn not to trust any contacts at first glance and don't just turn and chase things like that. sometimes zooming in the map will make false contacts vanish but basically you just learn to roll with it and often there will be contacts that aren't real.

another thing, and this one is a killer, because of what I said earlier, there will come a point in time when you find a contact, linre up and shoot, and right when you are sure you are going to get a hit, the ship reaches the end of its spawned path from point "a" to point "b" and then they vanish
and your torpedo was wasted for nothing. that doesn't happen often but it "can" happen so be aware of it.

as to the dials and things, there are endless mods that do all sorts of things for the game from changing how things look to changing the skill level required (making the game harder) so check out the mods section and you download them in our downloads section.

I suggest you start with using my GFO mod because it doesn't change the game but it does fix many of the things that are incorrect or need fixing in the game. to use any mods you first need to install the jsgme mod installer and read the instructions provided.

there are also links in the sticky threads filled with great information fort just about any questions you might have.

not everything in the game can be changed however and some frustrating things are just unfixable but a huge amount of stuff in this game can be modded and if you want to mod something you might have to make your own mod for it and just ask questions and the people here will guide you with as much help as possible, but some things are just done by trial and error