Is 100% historical accuracy absolutely essential?

WFGood · 04-05-07, 02:52 PM

Let me start out by saying that I do not normally post. Since 2003 I have only posted 80 or so times, and most of them have been here for SH4. I will state up front that I do enjoy this game. I have enjoyed playing it, even in its current state, and I will continue to do so. I do wonder about the tone and nature of many of the posts here though. This is not a personal attack on anyone but more of a general comment.
There are bugs in the program. It is an acknowledged fact, and the development team is working to correct it. Some of them probably should have been found and fixed prior to release, but they were not. Well, it is being taken care of now. Some of the bugs probably could not have been anticipated until the game met all the thousands of differently configured computers which are out there. I am more intruiged by some of the historical posts that keep popping up.
Is is necessary that the game be 100% historically accurate to be enjoyable? Does it matter that for example if Midway Atoll only had a maximum of 32 ships in port during the war and the game has 34? Is it critically important if certain aircraft are carrying inaccurate bomb loads? Does gameplay suffer if there are 20% more Fubukis and less of another? Doesn't the game still play just as well? It seems that there is a lot of complaint about things that are not really important and worse attacks on the development team for shoddy research, not caring, laziness, etc.
There are many choices in life that have to be made, trade-offs, cost-benefit analyses, etc that factor into decisions that are made. I think the game developers did an excellent example of researching the big picture of the submarine war in the Pacific Theater. Is it 100% accurate? No, and I don't think that it would be possible to do it in a reasonable amount of time. There are mountains of historical documents out there that contain contradictory information; so research probably is not the issue. If the decision is between having all classes of submarines in game or faithful recreations of bases that I will see for 5 minutes at the beginning of each patrol, then I vote for the subs every time. Yes, I would love to see Pearl Harbor strewn with wreckage on December 10, 1941, but what features would I be willing to sacrifice to have that? None. Should Hurricanes and Zeroes have large bomb loadouts? No, but if they merged several aircraft into one in order to save time, then I am fine with it. What is important is that there are enemy aircraft in game for which I have to watch. (I mentioned Hurricanes because it was the same circumstance in SH3 when it came out.)
I think things have gotten much better in the last week or so, but these types of posts just keep popping up. I have seen several today. There is nothing wrong with discussing the historical battles which are reenacted here in game, but it does not have to be prefaced with, "This game sux, and the developers were lazy and didn't do any research because they didn't even know that XYZ happened in exactly this way...." Maybe they did, and they felt that it was less important than some other aspect of the game. They made a choice, and even if I do not agree with it, I am not going to hold their feet to the fire for it.
This is a fun simulation, and it is just that. It will never exactly match the conditions in the war. The fear, real-life decisions, and exhaustion will never be there. You know that you will never be killed playing this game, and that makes a huge difference. When you have a crew and boat that needs to come home, you must take that into consideration before attacking. Simulated carrier landings are fun, but they in no way match the adrenaline and feelings of the real thing.
I will close by saying that I am in no way attacking anyone, I am just saying that perhaps people should look at the big picture once in a while. As President Theodore Roosevelt once stated, "It is not the critic who counts...."
(Don't worry, my time at home is almost done, and I will be back out soon; so you won't have to listen to me for a long while.)

Schunken · 04-05-07, 02:58 PM

No, its not....

I prefer the simulation aspect more than 100% historical acauracy... I will not bother sink the Yamato 3 times in the war.... I will look more that it will not sink with 1 Torpedo hit....

Andreas

AVGWarhawk · 04-05-07, 03:07 PM

Historical accuracy is not as important to me as game play simulation accuracy of submarine and weapons load out. Reason is I'm a small part of the total war and not the determining factor for win or lose. It does not matter to me that X amount of boats were at Mare Island on X date. This has no affect on my simulated game play. As far as planes, yes, some accuracy should be here because I will interact with them and this is part of my game play simulation. Other than that, what has been presented to me in SH4 is great.

Banquet · 04-05-07, 02:59 PM

I agree with you in many respects. The game would never be released if everything was 100 percent accurate. A lot of the detail would only be glanced at anyway. A lot of submarine patrols were to cover surface forces and invasion forces.. the subs were stationed in a set position and most of the time never saw a ship. I wouldn't want too many patrols like that!

Having said that.. although I wouldn't expect the devs to add every ship type, aircraft type and accurately model every port.. I would jump at the chance to download a mod that did that!

WFGood · 04-05-07, 03:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Banquet

I agree with you in many respects. The game would never be released if everything was 100 percent accurate. A lot of the detail would only be glanced at anyway. A lot of submarine patrols were to cover surface forces and invasion forces.. the subs were stationed in a set position and most of the time never saw a ship. I wouldn't want too many patrols like that!

Having said that.. although I wouldn't expect the devs to add every ship type, aircraft type and accurately model every port.. I would jump at the chance to download a mod that did that!

I think that most people truly do think that way or like the esteemed AVGWarhawk, but if I can use an analogy, it is like sharks to blood. People post about bugs or a few critical flaws, and then it seems to open the main induction valve. Everyone has to point out every little detail that is not perfect.

akdavis · 04-05-07, 03:23 PM

Of course, 100% historical accuracy would mean you have zero free action in the game. You would have to simply sit back and watch things as they really happened. But then not being able to have 100% historical accuracy does not mean that historical accuracy is irrelevant.

This just goes to show that discussing anything in terms of absolutes is ultimately pointless and unhelpful.

WFGood · 04-05-07, 03:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by akdavis

Of course, 100% historical accuracy would mean you have zero free action in the game. You would have to simply sit back and watch things as they really happened. But then not being able to have 100% historical accuracy does not mean that historical accuracy is irrelevant.

This just goes to show that discussing anything in terms of absolutes is ultimately pointless and unhelpful.

No, I don't agree. You can recreate conditions 100% and have different outcomes based upon the decisions of the participants. You could, for example, recreate the Ward's patrol outside of Pearl on the morning of December 7, 1941 and based upon the timing of your decisions or the decisions themselves, you could miss the one in a million shot that hit the midget submarine. Besides, I think the post is pretty clear in spelling out that we are talking about recreating ports, aircraft, etc 100%, and not making a carbon copy of the war to unfold as a movie. The negative posts take the developers to task for not creating ports authentically or modeling planes completely to detail. To me those things do not affect gameplay. Having the Japanese task force off Midway not there for the battle is a flaw that needs addressing, but the number of ships at the atoll during the course of the war is eye candy and not a factor, which is my entire point.
You cannot recreate things 100%, which is an absolute, but time after time we see posts where the developers are taken to task for just that, not being 100% accurate.

mookiemookie · 04-05-07, 03:44 PM

Agreed that tradeoffs need to be made for the sake of differing historical records, playability, technological limitations, etc. I remember Kpt Lehmann saying that when GWX was being made, they wanted to recreate the historical composition of convoys but couldn't because they were just too huge and the game would choke on that number of ships. An example of where technology holds us back.

I love historical accuracy as much as the next guy and would even consider myself a stickler for it. But if the game misses it, I don't hold it against the developers and say it's their fault. There's just too many other factors in the equation to say that they didn't put X in because they were too lazy or inept or whatever slander you want to throw at them. First and foremost they're making a game and they're on a timeline. Some things will need to be omitted so they can get it done. But luckily there's enough flexibility in the game that the modders can step in and take the time to research the things that the developers had to sacrifice for the sake of getting the game done.

So all in all, I guess I agree.

akdavis · 04-05-07, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WFGood

Quote:

Originally Posted by akdavis

Of course, 100% historical accuracy would mean you have zero free action in the game. You would have to simply sit back and watch things as they really happened. But then not being able to have 100% historical accuracy does not mean that historical accuracy is irrelevant.

This just goes to show that discussing anything in terms of absolutes is ultimately pointless and unhelpful.

No, I don't agree. You can recreate conditions 100% and have different outcomes based upon the decisions of the participants. You could, for example, recreate the Ward's patrol outside of Pearl on the morning of December 7, 1941 and based upon the timing of your decisions or the decisions themselves, you could miss the one in a million shot that hit the midget submarine. Besides, I think the post is pretty clear in spelling out that we are talking about recreating ports, aircraft, etc 100%, and not making a carbon copy of the war to unfold as a movie. The negative posts take the developers to task for not creating ports authentically or modeling planes completely to detail. To me those things do not affect gameplay. Having the Japanese task force off Midway not there for the battle is a flaw that needs addressing, but the number of ships at the atoll during the course of the war is eye candy and not a factor, which is my entire point.
You cannot recreate things 100%, which is an absolute, but time after time we see posts where the developers are taken to task for just that, not being 100% accurate.

So he was actually making a statement in absolute terms that was not absolute. Like I said: unhelpful.

nattydread · 04-05-07, 09:13 PM

As close as possible to historical acuracy is essential for those of us(and there are many of us here) who want and look to have an accurate representation of the what happened. Now it doesnt have to be forced for all, but when we have realism options we should get an option setting that provides that accruacy.

Now when I think of accuracy, Im thinking of contact frequency, available targets, difficulty, numerical unit conservation...so 1 Yamato, etc., unit performance and tactics, etc.

mookiemookie · 04-05-07, 09:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nattydread

As close as possible to historical acuracy is essential for those of us(and there are many of us here) who want and look to have an accurate representation of the what happened. Now it doesnt have to be forced for all, but when we have realism options we should get an option setting that provides that accruacy.

Now when I think of accuracy, Im thinking of contact frequency, available targets, difficulty, numerical unit conservation...so 1 Yamato, etc., unit performance and tactics, etc.

My dream was always to have a mod that went back through the actual shipping records and used those historical ships at sea at those historical times....The number of contacts problem would solve itself then

I doubt it will ever happen. That's a HUGE undertaking, and there's no way of knowing which ships were exatcly where at any given day just given the departure and arrival dates. But I can still dream.

nattydread · 04-05-07, 10:12 PM

I dont need the exact ship for the exact place and time. Just an accurate representation of shipping frequency/quanity. The routes are already in game. They just need to reduce the numbers across the board, and increase the ratio of small, coastal shipping in the form of solo and small convoys.

As it is now, i think the high rate of COMSUBPAC contacts reports in the vicinity of teh patrol area is too high. It may be creating the illusion of more shipping.

As it stands, it seems about 90% of all my sinkings have been contact reports given to me in the area...thats about 20 tons a mission just given to me...and I dont even go after all of them.

perisher · 04-06-07, 12:18 AM

It would be possible to start the war with 100% accurate orders of battle, but as the "war" progresses you must, inevitably, lose accuracy. For example, what if, in January '42, you come across the Japanese fleet carriers and sink 2 of them? What happens at Midway now?

As always it's a trade off and we all would have done it a little differently if we could.

Grothesj2 · 04-06-07, 12:29 AM

Having historical accuaracy is good up to a point. But eventually the game play and historical accuarcy has to diverge. Those that truely want a submarine experience instead of a game should join thier navy's sub service.