SUBSIM Radio Room Forums



SUBSIM: The Web's #1 resource for all submarine & naval simulations since 1997

Go Back   SUBSIM Radio Room Forums > Current crop of subsims & naval games > Crash Dive & Crash Dive II
Forget password? Reset here

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 06-04-15, 08:02 PM   #1
Shallow Water Sailor
Nub
 
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 2
Downloads: 0
Uploads: 0
Default Crash Dive Comments

Hello all! Sorry it has taken me so long to post. Just as I joined the forum, things started springing leaks all over the place and I had to batten them all down. Here are my thoughts, observations and comments about Crash Dive, which I play almost daily on my Android tablet.

ABOUT ME:

I’ve been studying 20th century naval history nearly all of my life (I turn 69 this year). In elementary school in the 1950s, my favorite books and movies dealt with submarine warfare. These included Commander Edward L. Beach’s novel Run Silent, Run Deep and the Clark Gable movie of the same name, plus his non-fiction work called Submarine!. I must have watched the movie The Enemy Below (Robert Mitchum, Curt Jurgens) at least fifty times. In my teens and early twenties my favorite novels were The Cruel Sea and Three Corvettes (Nicolas Monsarrat), The Good Shepherd (C. S. Forester) and HMS Ulysses (Alastair MacLean),all of which were about the North Atlantic, Russian, and Mediterranean/Malta convoys. I played my first naval simulation game – Jutland by Avalon Hill – in my early twenties.

As a young adult, my best friend and I designed and played our own naval war game, set in the mid-1940s. The premise was that the Axis Pact won WWII, and that Germany and Japan were fighting for control of the Pacific. We took pains to research the capabilities and foibles of the vessels comprising our respective navies. Obviously, most of the play was done on maps. Air-to-air, air-to-ground and air-to-ship battles were handled with dice. When any ship-to-ship action took place, we used 1/700 waterline models that we either purchased, or crafted from balsa wood. Because the scale we used for ship-to-ship maneuvering and ranging was five feet to the nautical mile, we needed ROOM. Major surface engagements were fought on weekends, using a back parking lot at the local university as our ocean. Fortunately nearly all of our numerous sub-versus-escort battles would fit on the living room or garage floor.

Long story short, I’ve developed more than a little knowledge about WWII submarine warfare.

FEEDBACK -- First, the good things.

I have really enjoyed playing the game for many reasons. It is well-thought-out and well-structured. Most of it is quite realistic and true to the time period. The graphic depiction of the surface vessels is nothing short of outstanding. I also really like the automatic targeting feature, as it is realistic enough to allow me, the captain, to “delegate” that to my cyber-crew.

Also quite true-to-form, the Fletcher-class destroyers provide challenging targets, but they can be torpedoed. (It generally takes two hits to sink ‘em.) Flower-class corvettes can usually be sunk with a single torpedo, IF you can hit them at all. This is an extremely difficult task at best and, once they’ve gone to battle stations, it becomes nearly impossible. They are quite nimble, another most-realistic trait. When it comes to dealing with corvettes, therefore, I generally choose discretion over valor.

Next, the not-so-good things.

The biggest problem is that the escorts routinely move directly through other vessels, including each other. Obviously this is a physical impossibility. There is a closely-related point – escorts routinely operate in very close proximity to each other, and to other surface vessels. In reality they always maintained a safe distance between themselves and other vessels. To be clear, I understand that issues of scale are involved, but what I've been seeing goes beyond scale issues. Such things would not, and could not, happen in the “real world.”

Next, and also a major issue, is that escorts deploy depth charges so that they detonate very near to, sometimes directly beneath, other surface vessels. Were that to happen in the real world, the charges would sink said vessels – or at least cause severe damage.

Third, the sonar is much too precise for World War II. For example it can detect a U-boat that is directly beneath another surface vessel, and even directly beneath the searching escort. It can also detect a submerged U-boat on the opposite side of a surface vessel. In reality, none of these could happen. I can provide greater detail if requested.

Fourth, the game gives Flower-class corvettes the capability of moving at thirty knots. The actual ships had a maximum speed of 16 knots. BTW, the U-boats have a surface speed about 1.5 knots faster than their real-world counterparts, but I’m inclined to overlook that one.

Though I don’t have the precise data on this, it appears that the game allows escorts to speed up and slow down much more rapidly than could their real-world counterparts.

Once again, Crash Dive is a great game that I play almost daily. These words are intended only as one man's suggestions about how it can be made better.

-- Shallow Water Sailor

Last edited by Shallow Water Sailor; 06-05-15 at 11:10 AM.
Shallow Water Sailor is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 06-04-15, 09:30 PM   #2
Aktungbby
Gefallen Engel U-666
 
Aktungbby's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: On a tilted, overheated, overpopulated spinning mudball on Collision course with Andromeda Galaxy
Posts: 27,709
Downloads: 22
Uploads: 0


Default welcome aboard!

Shallow Water Sailor!good review. PanicEnsues would appreciate a PM on this, I'm sure, as he strives to improve his BBY!
__________________

"Only two things are infinite; The Universe and human squirrelyness; and I'm not too sure about the Universe"
Aktungbby is online   Reply With Quote
Old 06-05-15, 06:01 AM   #3
Jimbuna
Chief of the Boat
 
Jimbuna's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: 250 metres below the surface
Posts: 180,310
Downloads: 63
Uploads: 13


Default

Welcome to SubSim Matey
__________________
Wise men speak because they have something to say; Fools because they have to say something.
Oh my God, not again!!


GWX3.0 Download Page - Donation/instant access to GWX (Help SubSim)
Jimbuna is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 06-06-15, 08:50 PM   #4
PanicEnsues
Dev Team
 
Join Date: Jun 2014
Location: Southern California
Posts: 114
Downloads: 0
Uploads: 0
Default

Thanks for the review and the feedback!

I've gotten no small number of complaints regarding the fact that enemy ships don't collide with each other. Unfortunately, that was a trade-off I had to make to get the game to run on the wide range of hardware I wanted to support.

(Tech aside: The collision itself isn't too expensive, the problem is the additional A.I. required to deal with the additional navigation problems.)

It's definitely something I will address in the sequel, but I can't break the current game for customers can run it on their first-gen iPad.

Regards,

-Scott
__________________
Scott Goffman
PanicEnsues is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 06-07-15, 01:39 PM   #5
Shallow Water Sailor
Nub
 
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 2
Downloads: 0
Uploads: 0
Default

Understood, Scott. In fact my "top four" are probably all A.I. issues. The "excessively-speedy corvettes" and how fast the escorts can speed up and slow down are probably not.

Again, its a great game!

-- Shallow Water Sailor
Shallow Water Sailor is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-22-15, 05:42 AM   #6
CaptainRamius
Sonar Guy
 
Join Date: May 2014
Location: In shallow waters
Posts: 388
Downloads: 19
Uploads: 0
Default

Welcome aboard!
Great first (or second) post! Extremely detailed, I love it!
Hope you enjoy your stay!
CaptainRamius is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-02-16, 07:15 PM   #7
cfsflyer
Swabbie
 
Join Date: Jun 2012
Posts: 8
Downloads: 7
Uploads: 0
Default Great game

I wanted to thank this forum for posting about this sub game and ofcourse Panic Ensues for making it for tablets too, I put it on my
RCA tablet a few days ago, the free version, and tonight I am planning on buying the pro version as I am having a lot of fun playing it. I just do not get on my computer that often where I have SH3,4,5 but on my tablet every night.
__________________
Pentium dual core 2.5 ghz E5200
Nvidia 9500 GT
4 gigs DDR2 667
Windows 7 Ultimate
cfsflyer is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-03-16, 12:08 AM   #8
Aktungbby
Gefallen Engel U-666
 
Aktungbby's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: On a tilted, overheated, overpopulated spinning mudball on Collision course with Andromeda Galaxy
Posts: 27,709
Downloads: 22
Uploads: 0


Default Welcome back!

cfsflyer! after a long 4 yr. silent run!
__________________

"Only two things are infinite; The Universe and human squirrelyness; and I'm not too sure about the Universe"
Aktungbby is online   Reply With Quote
Old 09-05-16, 02:29 AM   #9
cfsflyer
Swabbie
 
Join Date: Jun 2012
Posts: 8
Downloads: 7
Uploads: 0
Default

Ty for the welcome back, it's been awhile. Been playing the pro version of Crash Dive but staying on easy settings and having a blast
__________________
Pentium dual core 2.5 ghz E5200
Nvidia 9500 GT
4 gigs DDR2 667
Windows 7 Ultimate
cfsflyer is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 03:27 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright © 1995- 2024 Subsim®
"Subsim" is a registered trademark, all rights reserved.