Well I'm back with another look at Silent Hunter III, if you're interested in my first look you can find it in the link at the bottom of the page. These aren't really reviews (at least not yet, I like keeping you all on pincushions and all) but just how the new game is looking to me right now.
So where to begin? Well my initial first impressions of Silent Hunter III (SH III from now on) were overwhelmingly positive. I don't usually feel this much goodwill towards something new so either it's the best thing ever made or else I'm overwhelemed by my enthusiasm, which is never a good thing as that guy that ate with Al Capone in The Untouchables found out. But I digress, the first first look (FL1 for those keeping score at home) was how SH III was making me feel a couple days into the "experience," it was like meeting a very good looking woman, taking her on a date and being entranced by her right from the get go. Was it too much to drink? Maybe. But she sure was a looker so I decided to keep her around some more and see how things progressed.
Like any relationship the first impression is the most important, and at first blush SH III stunned me like Seattle cop on a WTO protester. But time keeps on slipping, just like the song says, so I took a break from playing with my new toy to ponder the little things that may not be so good. Nothing's perfect, including SH III, so what exactly did I get myself into here?
There are a few minor things I've noticed since my initial first impressions. There is a definate bug with the AI, I know I said the AI was excellent and I still think it is save for this one little thing, that being that sometimes AI surface vessels will engage one another. As in two British destroyers will start firing at one another if they lose track of you, for example. The Devs appearently know about this and it'll be fixed in a patch, it's not a show stopper and I've only seen it once and that was when I decided to park right outside the port on Malta and taunt the Brits with Holy Grail-like taunts on a "let's see how fast I can die" test mission. I actually survived it which was pretty amazing, the AI bug helped keep a couple of DDs too busy shooting one another to shoot me and I torpedoed a couple of Corvettes and a Tribal when they were chasing me.
That really, really annoyed them and soon I had the whole RAF complement of Malta coming after me in their Hurricanes. But I made it back to the vicinity of Sicily before I quit the game, bloodied badly but not broken.
The other minor thing is even though it storms (lightning is very cool to watch from the bridge) and sometimes rains I never actually see raindrops, I think it's something on my end though with video card settings, which I'm still tweaking for best results. Hopefully I'll get that sorted out soon. Also the dynamic music causes some hiccups on my sound card, which isn't surprising since my sound card has caused me some problems in Pacific Fighters too, again I just need to noodle with it and probably recheck my drivers.
On a somewhat related not, a lot of people that have the game (judging by the Subsim forums) want to turn off the dynamic music but keep the phonograph music from the radio room, the default sound setup is either music on or off which either enables both or kills both, so there are various workarounds to keep the phonograph and turn off the dynamic music. Personally I like the dynamic music, it makes you feel like you're in Das Boot and the quality of the scoring is well beyond what you find in most computer games, but to each their own I say. Meatwater (of the old EAW soundpack fame, I'm sure he's done other things for other sims but I was out of the loop for a while ya know) is also working on a new German speech pack which should be better than sliced bread since he did some of the best sounds I ever heard for EAW.
Now for some minor good things I noticed. I did a second and third patrol in my test campaigns and had awarded medals to my men; those medals showed up, in the proper locations no less, on their tunics. The first time the watch officer turned to tell me something and I saw he had the ribbon for his Iron Cross 2nd Class through the buttonhole and his Submarine Warfare badge on made me grin, a lot.
There's also an undocumented Easter Egg that allows you to not just stand in the standard position you normally take in any compartment but to actually "free cam" walk around inside the sub. Since all of the subs have different interiors this is pretty neat to do from time to time, although every compartment isn't modelled, you basically can go to the bridge, control room, conning room and the radio/hydrophone shack and your bunk. So no walking down to the engine room or the crew quarters...yet. I wouldn't be surprised if the Devs didn't add that in at some point, they have a level of enthusiasm for this thing that I haven't seen since Oleg Maddox when the original IL-2 Sturmovik came out. They're that into it.
Another little odd thing is that even though the US version of the game ships with the Bismark being painted with a swastika on the deck and with German shipping having the naval ensign with swastika on them, none of the GUI screens have the swastika in the wreath on any of the documents or whatnot, nor on any of the medals. Now we all know why there aren't any on the European version due to the laws over there, but it seems a little strange to me that they'd go out of their way to include them on the flags and deck of the Bismark but not on any of the GUI screens where there's a gaping empty space in the wreaths and everyone knows what's supposed to go there. It could have been a time thing I suppose but having them in some instances but not others is a little strange, I'd understand if it wasn't in there at all but...well like I said it's a little strange. But as we all know from our WWII sim time someone will (and already has) made a mod that adds the historical markings to the GUI screens' documents and to the medals.
Okay now buckle up...it's time for my minor rant...
Why in the world would the Devs decide to not allow the keyboard commands to be customized? Now this may seem a very minor thing, and it kinda is, but there's a huge problem that rears its ugly head from this being locked from time to time and that is...weapons malfunction. Trust me, it will happen to you. You might think it won't, you'll say that you're immune, but it will happen and you'll have to shrug and say to your Weapons Officer "Believe me Klaus, that never happened to me before." And then it'll happen again, and won't you look silly...
Basically the Enter key is the default launch torpedo key. Doesn't sound so bad does it? In fact it sounds downright logical right? Well while it may be logical in some grander scheme of the universe for monkeys to fling their own poo at one other but that doesn't make it any less annoying now does it? See here's the problem, the Enter key (while logical) is placed in close proximity to the ][ and ' keys. Okay so what's the problem? Well the ] and [ keys are the full rudder right and full rudder left keys, respectively; and the ' key is the rudder amidships key. Starting to see how this could be a problem?
Even better is that the Enter key on the keypad is also set to fire your torpedo, this of course being right below the - and + keys which are the keys to scale time down and up...see how this is a double problem? Having the torpedo launch key right next to the three most used maneuvering keys and the always used time compression keys is just a very, very bad thing. I mean it's such a bad idea that the guy that had surgery to make himself look like a lion from Ripley's Believe It or Not looked at it and said,"Man that's a baaaad idea." Yeah that's how bad it is.
If it were up to me (and let's face it, we're all happy that most things in the world aren't up to me) I'd not only ask for a way to rebind all keys but also to disable some, namely the fire torpedo hotkey. There are plenty of places on the Periscope, UZO, Control Room, TDC and Weapons Officer stations that you can click to fire a torp, a key isn't 100 percent necessary (at least not to me) and I'd rather have to move my mouse a little, get some excercise and burn that .0005% of a calorie while pushing the button with a mouse click than be lobbing torps all over the Atlantic because I was trying to steer or let the crew have some nappy time. Nothing makes you want to viciously beat your Weapons Officer more than having him announce in a cheery voice "Tube Three fired, Sir!" when you're trying to steer out of Kiel harbor. Trust me, it will happen to you, and I hope Klaus understands.
Is is too much to ask that the keyboard non-mapping SNAFU gets changed? I hope not, and it seems to be a bone of contention all around the sites that have boards devoted to SH III, and as I said the development team is very enthusiastic about their sim so I fully expect for this to be adressed in a patch somewhere done the line.
I could go on, but I won't. Partially out of consideration for all of you (and we all hate when someone babbles on and on) but mostly...well to be honest, time spent typing this stuff is time that I'm away from U-52, and I'm starting to twitch from SH III withdrawl; which is about the highest praise I can give a game. At least on a second look. Later on I'll be posting my After Action Report on the first "real" campaign I'm doing which should give you an idea on how the nuts and bolts of how things work in "combat" condition. Then, maybe, just maybe, when that's done I'll feel confident enough to give a full on
review.
You've been warned...
So what do I think now that the date's over and I've woken up with a splitting headache from being up all night only to discover that not only has she moved in but there are unmentionable feminine things in the medicine closet? Well I'm not gnawing my arm off that's for sure. Yes there are small annoyances with the sim, some more annoying than others (premature torpedo deployment syndrome being the top of my gripes list).
All in all I'll stand on my first look at Silent Hunter III, it definately should get recognition as the best simulation of 2005 and if I had my druthers (again we can probably all be happy I don't have said druthers) it'd be a strong contender for Game of the Year for '05. Yes you read that right, it is just That Good, warts (minor though they be) and all.
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