Is this it?

[scrapser]

This is not a rant.

This is the first new WW2 U.S. sub sim to be released in a decade. Unfortunately it was developed by people who use the metric system (not a negative remark) and funded by a company that has so many other ways to make money that its survival does not depend on making sure quality is there before putting products on the market. SH4 would have faired better if it were developed by some little upstart company that had to do it right the first time.

Anyway, I'm hoping there will be another patch that brings this sim to the standard we all expect (i.e., "finished"). I bought the game the day it was released and still have not played it. I patched 1.3 last night but today have started reading about the issues that still remain (mag torpedoes always on, transparent crew on deck, non-functioning periscope animation, to name a few). Incredible!

I realize it will never be 100% perfect but I have to tell you, the stuff that was wrong with this sim when it was first released (and even after the first patch) had me wondering how people who are smart enough to study historical submarine technology and translate that into a computer sim could let their code be packaged and put on market, knowing it was incomplete (and they had to know...some of this stuff is so glaringly wrong it would blind you).

I'm a software developer. I know the complexity of this field. I just find it baffling and at the same time inexcusable to see what has become of the software market in general. Half-baked software is now the norm!

Should we as consumers be happy and grateful that a company has grudgingly decided to patch something they put on the market, knowing it was incomplete? Is that what we have become? Happy like dogs to get the scraps somebody decides to throw our way?

The solution here is to stop buying software from a company once it's known they will release incomplete products to the public. Make them accountable or this will only get worse. Of course I realize the vast majority of the buying public knows nothing of this issue and is out there blindly buying garbage and being wowed by all the pretty bells and whistles, so I'm not expecting anything but it still remains that our purchase is our vote and as long as people keep buying crap, the companies out there will gladly supply more.

"Consumers are to economics as voters are to politics."

Everytime you buy something, you are saying "Yes" to whatever it is...whether it be an incomplete piece of software or an overpriced house or condo. You are saying you accept, condone, and agree with the quality of what you're buying and the price you are paying for it.

Anyway, maybe they will allow one of their people to work on another patch or (cross your fingers) create a special relationship with a handfull of simmer/programmers so they can work on the source code and fix the problems just because they want it done right. Falcon 4.0 eventually got into the right hands as did EAW. Maybe UBISoft will see the light at some point and realize there are alternatives to their current marketing strategy.