who is still playing sh4?

[Havan_IronOak]

With the release of a new version of Version 1.1 of Fall of the Rising Sun Ultimate Edition, I decided it was time to dust off my copy of SH4.

Still not up to doing all my own navigating but at least I'm reasonably competent at manual targeting this time around.

Just completed my first patrol with a silver star performance...

Sank a Jap Cruiser... using the cork in a bottle method - determined the convoy speed using the 3 minute sonar technique, went deep at 90° right on a task force's path, killed my engines, preset my target bearing and AOB using the table, popped up to periscope depth as soon as the leading destroyers passed, then loosed two as the cruiser crossed my forward target bearing. Two hits and down she goes. Of course as soon as that 2nd torpedo was loosed I dove back down and jinked a few times - changed course with the rudder hard over at 1/3 (silent running) to avoid the enraged destroyers.

In my "Best of all possible worlds" mindset, there are a few things I'd change about the game if I could. It seems to me that this game would be 100% better if I were able to set up some standing orders. After all, I'm not the only one on this sub.

I'd like to make a standing order to "Dive at Dawn" and run submerged until about lunch time, then surface the boat to clear the CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) buildup before returning to periscope depth amid the Hydrogen Dioxide (H2O) and running till dusk. Ideally I could determine what speeds I wanted the crew to maintain while surfaced and submerged as part of these orders.

Of course I'd expect to be called (and returned to normal time compression) for any of the other things that currently turn off time compression.

Ideally, I could also control separately whether or not the crew were to break time compression to notify me of shallow waters. I'm pretty careful when I lay in a course so this notification is more an annoyance than an aid.

Of course, fixing the ALT TAB bug that causes CO2 to not be reset when surfaced would be great as well. That is one of my biggest annoyances with the game.

[XenonSurf]

Currently FOTRSU 1.1 is the best mod around for SH4, it has the best interiors and the widest camera angles for a true immersive experience. Then, a lot of new ships added.
I would add an optional mod for it to make contacts all grey giving you a harder game - but please: only optional! That's about it, I have no other wishes, the mod is perfect if more traffic is added into its campaign, also with the new units, but the team is working on the mod, so there is hope


Alternative good mods are all those which allow free camera movement and clickable items inside the submarine:


TMO 2.5 + OTC
Ralles ModSoup (TMO + OTC + RSRDC)
RFB 2.0 (for those who like realism)


Then...There are mods to have playable ships in the game, but they all need a dedicated campaign, but otherwise they are very eye-candy and fun to play.



XS

[Bilge_Rat]

reinstalled SH4 a few months back, currently using a customized version of TMO25+RSRDC.

SH4 has a lot of flaws, but when it clicks, it is one of the most immersive sub game.