What I like about this sim is it reminds very much when I was on patrol boats, the drone of engines, sound of waves. It was work 24/7 standing watches sometimes six on six off, cleaning, maintenance, eating, sleeping, scratching your butt. You looked forward to finding a target plotting an intercept, stop and board to break the monotony. Then it was back to the patrol area and a lot of boredom.
The only thing that made those days fun was the social interaction between the crew. Like jamming a handful of marbles under the XO’s bunk and hear him complaining to the chief engineer (who was in on it) something rolling around keeping him up at night.
I think social interaction of multiplayer could make it fun. What I think this game does well is make things interesting. It’s a big sandbox that allows you to make your own decisions regarding, targeting, search areas, intercepts, tactics, watch standing, escape and evasion.
When I first began playing I was always firing from outside the convoy. Escorts know almost immediately the direction my torps came from and I paid the price for it. Learning as go along I found if I can wheedle my way into the middle of the convoy without being detected and sink a boat. Escorts have a very hard time finding me. Little things like that keep this sim interesting and satisfying knowing I got away with it.
Time compression helps alleviate the boredom a lot. But even that can be dangerous at 12x because before you know it a plane swoops in out of nowhere and drops bombs on you.