The Silent Hunter IV (Pacific Campaign) WISH-LIST

[DeepSix]

Welcome aboard!

[Iceberg]

How about support for wide screen resolution in SHIV?

Wide, as in 3840X1024 to work well with the Matrox TripleHead2Go.
(That would compensate for the poor 1024X768 they gave us with SHIII)
C'mon Devs... Add your game to the list!

Cheers,

Iceberg.

[Safe-Keeper]

More moddability: Ability to add interiors and player-control to any entity in the game. A deeper mission editor with far more trigger options and events.

[Patboot]

Not having read all ten pages, but my 2 bits?

Polycrewing- Being able to man stations with other players.

Think having 2 or three of your friends on the boat, in a mission.

[-Pv-]

What would a mult crew do? 99% of the time they're sitting around wating for something to happen, then each of them clicks one button and it's all over, then wait some more. The game is too simple for a mult crew on one boat, even if they made it twice as complex. My opinion is this game pivots on complex game logic, AI and historical immersion. The player just needs to make a few simple timely decisions.
To elaborate, what would the diving officer do? Maybe he gets to press S or P every 8-24 game hours.
What would the Torpedo Man do?
Imagine being the Watch Officer and staring at the horizon for endless hours.
If you have a Chief, he would do 50% of the work, the CO, 40% and you 10%.

Let the AI do the boring stuff and I'll be the captain. Gives me something to do a few times a day.
-Pv-

[Fritz Fraghof]

Many fantastic suggestions here. A few vital ones from me: update the graphics at least to include shader model 2 & 3 support and normal/bump mapping for sub/ship skins. Modelling the open ocean is not about polygons so much as having good surface effects. Also I suggest adding bigger waves and better particle effects for waves : both 'whitecaps' and waves hitting the bow & conning tower. Please try to model fog somehow with some sort of (particle/shader) effects, rather than just a grey horizon. (In SHIII I have to ask the navigator to confirm how foggy it is.) It would be very nice to include some sort of animation for the crew manning and leaving the conning tower in the external view. Use a good beta program to cut down on bugs and incorportate valuable feedback. Include good support for mods as with SHIII. Mods elevated SHIII (for me) from very good to the almost sublime. A SDK release for modders would be great (before release preferably), even if just for adding extra ships. Things like this drum up community interest and support and are free content as far as developers are concerned. (Sims 2 did this cleverly pre-release with a Sim skinner or such)

[Fritz Fraghof]

Originally Posted by Trout

BEST IDEA?

Read below. SH3 was on the right track with the 3d interior, but they really need to go this next step if we are to have a fully modeled 3d boat (all compartments).

The goal should be to minimize the necessity for a 2d interface, which only serves to ruin your immersion in the game, and to get rid of "quick jump" options that do the same.

Finally, we need to come up with REASONS for a captain to occasionally vist the fore and aft torp rooms, the wardroom ect.

.

I like this idea. Tap key once and you 'walk' there slow (on track so no worries about collision detection, AI etc.), double tap it and you run fast (with sound effects).

[Fritz Fraghof]

Originally Posted by Cipher

I would like to see;

1. Crew populating enemy ships, abandoning ship when its sinking, swimming in the water after it sinks and floating casualties above and below the surface after a sinking.

Nice idea. Then someone can create a shark mod! Cue Jaws music...

[Sulikate]

Originally Posted by Fritz Fraghof

Many fantastic suggestions here. A few vital ones from me: update the graphics at least to include shader model 2 & 3 support and normal/bump mapping for sub/ship skins. Modelling the open ocean is not about polygons so much as having good surface effects. Also I suggest adding bigger waves and better particle effects for waves : both 'whitecaps' and waves hitting the bow & conning tower. Please try to model fog somehow with some sort of (particle/shader) effects, rather than just a grey horizon. (In SHIII I have to ask the navigator to confirm how foggy it is.) It would be very nice to include some sort of animation for the crew manning and leaving the conning tower in the external view. Use a good beta program to cut down on bugs and incorportate valuable feedback. Include good support for mods as with SHIII. Mods elevated SHIII (for me) from very good to the almost sublime. A SDK release for modders would be great (before release preferably), even if just for adding extra ships. Things like this drum up community interest and support and are free content as far as developers are concerned. (Sims 2 did this cleverly pre-release with a Sim skinner or such)

Nice graphic suggestion, 100% agreed.

I have to add here that I would like a working anchor....if that isn't too much to ask? :p

[Immacolata]

Simple wishes from me

HDR support

Dynamic resolution

Better tools and assists for manual plotting and target solution
- mods have made this somewhat easier, but I believe the game should be much kinder towards players that wants to plot their own solutions. Like proper rulers, ability to have officers to make time plots on map from bearing and range that you give them.

Missions. Dynamic campaign is one thing, but the ability to get special orders from BdU would be nice. Doesn't have to be historically accurate for my sake, as long as it is fun.

Deeper simulation. SH3 feels a bit shallow, no pun intended. Where is the thermal layers? Why do DC not disrupt destroyer's? Damage model? Repair times? Plane trim?

30 km visual range, ta. Doesn't have to mean 30km visibility all the time, but we need more visible horizon from SH3s pitiful, embarassing 8 km.

[Onkel Neal]

My wish list:

1. A working stadimeter, as the US subs had, where a dual image is lowered until the mast height is even with the surface of the ocean.
2. Complete red-light shading: SH3 did this well in 80% of the screens, but the Ship ID log and the UZO blind me when playing at night in a dark room.
3. More realistic escort visual abilities: US subs frequently slid into convoys at ranges of 2000 yards without detection on moonless or overcast nights. US subs also used sailing fleets and junks as camouflage.
4. Neutral Russian ships – very important along the coast to ID ships, sinking a Russian neutral should cause a skipper to be relieved of command, career over.
5. Coral reefs, shoals, rocks, and shallows should abound. Some not marked on the charts. Big part of the US sub war was trying to avoid running aground.
6. Radio traffic and more of it. HQ does most of the talking, sending Ultras, convoy info, and area reports
7. No “Enemy Target Destroyed” messages
8. A new compartment to view; such as the engine room, mess, or torpedo room, with 3D crew.
9. Tokyo Rose broadcasts – and lots of them!
10. Phosphorescence of sub and torpedo wakes. In certain areas, at certain times, US subs at high speed would leave a glowing trail. This would be a good tactical consideration that adds to the gameplay.
11. Large-scale naval engagements, such as Midway, Battle of Coral Sea, Battle of the Philippine Sea, the Okinawa Invasion, etc.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by Immacolata

Simple wishes from me

HDR support

Dynamic resolution

Better tools and assists for manual plotting and target solution
- mods have made this somewhat easier, but I believe the game should be much kinder towards players that wants to plot their own solutions. Like proper rulers, ability to have officers to make time plots on map from bearing and range that you give them.

Yes, agreed. I love to do all the plotting by hand, even of the ships' locations and courses. I would like to have a freehand pencil to initial targets, and a better compass where I can lay it over my ownsub, and lay down the bearing of the targets. The SH3 compass works but could be better.

[Safe-Keeper]

7. No “Enemy Target Destroyed” messages

I've got nothing against them, actually, but they need to be broken up a bit ("I've got break-up noises", "she's sinking", "she's broken in two", "they're abandoning ship!", etc.), and should only be shown if you know the ship's going down. Also, it shouldn't be "Enemy target destroyed", but "Target Destroyed", unless you've actually identified the target as friendly, neutral, or hostile.

11. Large-scale naval engagements, such as Midway, Battle of Coral Sea, Battle of the Philippine Sea, the Okinawa Invasion, etc.

Historical events is a must. Big things and small things. The B-25-bombing of Japan after Pearl Harbour, the sinking of the USS Indianapolis, and so on.

I'd like it if you could affect those battles, if not the entire war (although, of course, altering a large battle could have a kind of impact on the conflict). For example, you can be rewarded for spotting the survivors from Indianapolis, sinking the Japanese patrol boat that would otherwise spot the carrier task force en-route to bomb Japan in the said mission, etc. Should give you a good deal of renown and perhaps some other rewards.

[DeepSix]

I like that list, Neal. Agree 100% with every one of those points, and also with the wish for a free hand pencil or some sort of means for making text notes on the map.

One question, though - IIRC, there were half a dozen or so Russian ships torpedoed by U.S. subs, but were any U.S. sub skippers actually relieved for sinking a Russian neutral? The only particular case I can remember off the top of my head is where one skipper (might have been Moon Chapple?) torpedoed a Russian trawler. Aware of the gravity of his mistake, he took the trawler crew on board. By the end of the patrol, he'd hosted them so well that by the time they were interrogated, they all insisted that they'd been torpedoed by a Japanese sub, and that a U.S. sub had kindly rendered assistance. What if instead of relief there were a huge loss in renown?

Only other thing I'd add to that is that ALL the Russian ships that were sunk were in the general area of the Sea of Japan, the Kuriles, Sakhalin, etc. - in other words, if they're included, there should be NO Russian ships plying the waters off Rabaul or Kwajalein. My wish would be for them to be found only in logical and historically correct areas.

@safe-keeper: those are great suggestions; how about adding to them "Radar reports contact lost" or something like that? Many claimed sinkings were based on either loss of contact from radar or loss of contact from sonar, or both.

[EDIT: Forgot to mention:

8. A new compartment to view; such as the engine room, mess, or torpedo room, with 3D crew.

Make mine the wardroom, then. So I can read or study the Nat'l Geo. Society map of the Pacific and whatnot. Or play chess - that's one area where I could tolerate a multi-player function. Play online while you patrol. Sure, it would be against other skips, but I could easily pretend that the other captain was instead my XO, etc. Likewise for the other player. And since U.S. officers frequently served aboard one boat before taking command of another, it sort of works. ]