Why do you play Silent Hunter?

[Boris]

G'day fellow Silent Hunter players,

I need to conceptualise a study for a university assignment and need your help.

Basically, all I would like is for you to explain why you play Silent Hunter 3/4.
What are your motivations, what do you get out of it, and anything else that pops into mind.
Also, do you tend to play alone, with others, online etc.

Don't take these questions too rigidly, just write generally whatever you think about why you like playing Silent Hunter games.

The main thing is, why do you play Silent Hunter?

I hope you guys can help, the more responses I get, the better.

Cheers

Boris

[clayp]

To take care of the hours of the day and kill the enemy..

[Raptor1]

I'm a Naval History freak (among other things), i know pretty much everything there is to know about Naval History in the last 150 years, and currently SH4 is the game that recreates WWII Naval combat the best way (atleast that i've seen)

Game-play wise, It's the dynamic campaign, which is truly awesome...

[Torplexed]

It's a combination of a lot of things. Fascination with fighting ships and naval history. The ability to operate deep behind enemy lines alone, without being tied to a squadron or task force. The stealth factor. I've also always been taken by the unique and somewhat flawed hybrid nature of diesel subs. Not quite a complete submarine, not quite a surface ship.
It's also a pleasant diversion from mundane real life.

[tennozan]

History, the asthetics of the ocean, era and cause involved. Probably the entertainment of the cat and mouse chase of it all.

[maerean_m]

It's fun

and a nice change from the likes of Bioshock, Portal, NFS and Freecell.

[Boris]

Originally Posted by maerean_m

It's fun

and a nice change from the likes of Bioshock, Portal, NFS and Freecell.

On that... (@ everyone) what does Silent Hunter give you that other games can't? ... and where would you rank SH among all the games you play?

Thanks for the answers so far guys

[DeepIron]

I play SH4 as a Fleet boat skipper, not U-boats, because I've had a life-long facination with the US Submarine Service in WWII. I've studied and read extensively on the subject and its history for over 35 years. Currently, SH4 is the only subsim I can purchase that allows me to "experience" that history at least partially.

BTW, FWIW, I'm a "hardcore" PTO player and I'm interested more in historical accuracy than eye-candy...

[Raptor1]

I already answered what SH gives me that other games don't in my last post

As for how i rank it, currently it's on the top of my "Naval Simulation" category (I can't really compare it to Portal, Bioshock and all the rest of them because it's an entirely different game)

[Deerdiver]

It's a great Sim. It has stimulated an interest in WWII naval history that I never had before. Always been interested in things nautical as my Uncle was in the Royal Navy and I always thought he was just the bees knees. When I was just a wee boy, he took me down to the Submarine Museum at HMS Dolphin. Great stuff. I am even off to Truk lagoon in 2010 to dive the wrecks of the Japanese fleet so I can combine my love of scuba diving and link it into the game. Not many computer games you can do that with!

[Rockin Robbins]

As a teenager, I read Edward Beach's "Run Silent Run Deep" trilogy, was fascinated and just put them down. I got a glimpse into a world I would never get to inhabit.

Ten years later I was married, and my wife's grandfather was a crewmember aboard the USS Kraken. He never talked about his own personal role on the sub except that he was almost ten years older than all his crew except for the officers. But he made up for his reluctance to talk about himself by his enthusiasm for the US submarine program in WWII.

He was an active member of the US Submarine Veterans of WWII and always sent me their newsletters, from which I learned much of what I know. That explains why my viewpoint is often in conflict with history books. The newsletters gave me a taste for primary sources. When Warren Watkins passed, he willed me his entire library of submarine books, most of them signed by the authors, predominately books written by the sub sailors who fought in the war.

An important part of his library was a collection of books on German U-Boats, the character of which made it crystal clear that the American submariner looked at U-Boat sailors as brothers worthy of respect and admiration. "Iron Coffins" began my fascination with the U-Boats and "U-505" by Daniel Gallery was saturated with the respect and admiration of American seamen toward the U-Boat organization.

So I had no resistance to picking up Silent Hunter 3 last October, especially since it was on sale. I learned more about U-Boats from the game than I had learned about in the books just in the limited time I played SH3.

But then SH4 hit the market and stuck the chord: maybe I could command the USS Kraken and maybe she could have a career a bit more in keeping with the spirit of the sailors aboard her than the lackluster career begging for targets that Kraken actually had by virtue of joining the war too late.

SH4 delivered that and more. Thanks to a collection of bits and bytes, I've been able to experience some of the choices, face some of the hardships and feel some of the frustration and joy that the real heroes of WWII faced. Although my life didn't depend on the outcome, I've experienced the frustration of dud after dud, circle running torpedoes, perfect solutions that miss, perfect approaches ruined by a too-alert airplane, great explosions, ships that refused to sink with four hits, fuel leaks and hull damage. I've had both periscope heads turned into scrap metal during a depth charge attack and had to return 3700 miles back to Pearl Harbor blind, depending only on my radar to keep me safe.

It is only a game, but it remains the best way to experience some commonality with the men who fought. As such the purpose of playing SH4 is to honor these heroes by experiencing their lives in as realistic a way as possible.

Down scope!

[silentrunner]

I would say beacause I usually like games where you can build a career. Silent Hunter does that veary well. I also dig anything about subs so Silent Hunter is the best game out there.

[FIREWALL]

I'm not bright enough to play any of the more complicated games. It's that simple.

I was told anyone with the IQ of a shoelace can play SilentHunter.

And I think UBI knows that too!

[stabiz]

I like the pace of subsims. I have time to do other things, I have time to micromanage the crew, look at stuff and just whistle away. I also like the fact that I never know what is going to happen, and without dynamic campaigns I guess I would play less.

But most off all I like the free roaming camera.

[kylesplanet]

Honestly, I'm really not a gamer, I only had a couple of flight sim games and thought that was all I would ever need. Got bored one night and downloaded SH4 and have just been deeply involved in it and the history of the US sub war ever since. I keep coming back, day after day, because it really puts you in that submarine. Like RR was saying, you experience the frustrations, fears and jubulation of these heros . When I sit down at my computer and fire up SH4, it 1942 again. When I turn on the in-game radio and hear the Andrews Sisters, Jack Benny, cigarette commercials and the newscast of the day, it's like I'm there and in my mind I am.

I love SH4 because it focuses on an area of WW2 that is so often looked over or just recieves a passing mention, though I imagine part of that is because of the cloak of secrecy the Silent Service has always operated under. I guess in the end, in some fabricated way, I get to participate in a time that has past that truly facinates me and reminds me daily of what these great men did not only for themselves and their shipmates but the entire world. I'm not one of them but for a few hours a day, I feel like I am.