The future of Submarine simulations

[Cybermat47]

If Silent Hunter was sold to another company, who actually tested their games, and released betas, I reckon that subsims would be stronger than ever.

[Rokko]

See? I think what is necessary for simulation gaming company (not including those crappy German "simulations" that get chucked out every few months)
is to have a realistic picture of how big the community is and adjust content (=development time involved) and pricing. Most hard core simulation gamers are willing to pay to more since they reckon that they will be much more involved with their favourite simulation than with your average 6-hour-singleplayer+crappy-multiplayer mainstream game.
And all these succesfull sims I've mentioned do it that way. I'd also include War in the East which sells for 80$ I think.
They also limit their sims content and sell extra content. Battlefront for instance sell their games at relatively high prices which also don't get much lower over time and now go more and more into selling extra content packages at also relatively high prices.
777 has taken a different approach with their Free2Play model where you pay pretty much for extra planes or maps or weapons. I can't say I like this much, but as long as it works and keeps the company alive and able to produce more high quality flight sims I'm totally fine with it.
Now with a new Silent Hunter (or maybe a revived version of SHV) it could be just like that. A submarine simulation going from 1939 to 1945 featuring every single (lets say German) boat and every theatre around the globe is probably unrealistic. But a well functioning TypVII simulation for which you can buy extra stuff like TypeII or TypeIX boats or more remote theatres or more "NPC" ships or planes could maybe work.
I at least would definately pay again for re-release of Silent Hunter 5 if it actually did all that the original promised (and was a bit more realistic in mission terms).

[TorpX]

I would certainly like to see something along these lines. Ideally, a PTO sim. and am willing to pay more to get a better quality product.

I think if it was done right, it could be successful. Perhaps, not overnight, but over time. A good WWII subsim could set the table for expansions with surface naval sims, different theaters, randomized campaigns, etc. I believe people would be willing to pay more for a good product.

[Hinrich Schwab]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

If Silent Hunter was sold to another company, who actually tested their games, and released betas, I reckon that subsims would be stronger than ever.

I say that if SHO does poorly enough, have Subsim start a Kickstarter campaign to buy the rights from Ubisoft and make SH6 ourselves.

[Julhelm]

Wouldn't it be better to spend all the cash on development? I can't possibly imagine they'd sell the IP for cheap even if the games go poorly.

[the_tyrant]

silent hunter as an IP isn't really worth much I'm afraid

There are no iconic characters, and there is no original story.

[Julhelm]

Neither does Homeworld, which is another beloved IP that so happens to be owned by Activision/Blizzard and so the chance of anyone buying it and making a new game is close to zero. Unfortunately these big corporations tend to hold on to stuff forever even if they have no plans to do anything with it.

[BigBANGtheory]

Originally Posted by Julhelm

Neither does Homeworld, which is another beloved IP that so happens to be owned by Activision/Blizzard and so the chance of anyone buying it and making a new game is close to zero. Unfortunately these big corporations tend to hold on to stuff forever even if they have no plans to do anything with it.

I think you'll find that THQ owns it as it wasn't passed to Sega with its purchase of Relic.

Tbh I'm not sure I care too much about the SH brand, in some ways SHO would have benefited from not using it I think.

[Julhelm]

No Activison has it from buying up Sierra

[Schmonzo]

Originally Posted by Hinrich Schwab

I say that if SHO does poorly enough, have Subsim start a Kickstarter campaign to buy the rights from Ubisoft and make SH6 ourselves.

A Kickstarter Subsim is really needed. I think it would really pay off for the devs and the players. I'd never thought I'd use this silly frase, but: I would throw money at my screen

[Bilge_Rat]

Subsims are dead.

[Cybermat47]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

Subsims are dead.

Bilge_Rat, I am very dissapoint

We should just make our own!

[Herr-Berbunch]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

Bilge_Rat, I am very dissapoint

We should just make our own!

You're young enough, go learn.

Personally, I'm waiting for DCS to realise they need a sub sim in their repertoire.

[DedEye]

I strongly agree, any new subsim should do its best to distance itself from the Silent Hunter series.

After SH 5 I vowed I would not buy (or F2P) another Ubisoft product unless it was met with universal critical acclaim from both the press and the community.

I think it says a lot about the mindset of a company when its executive makes a statement that 95% of their customers steal from them. You seriously believe that? Incredible...... and insulting.

They release bug riddled software with broken or missing features, kick out a token patch or 2 that fixes issues that often have already been solved by modders, leave the hard coded bugs in, and walk away. Not just once, 4 times in the SH franchise alone. Cliffs of Dover worked out really well too didn't it? Glad I passed on that one.

Why would I keep supporting a company that behaves in such a way?

Btw, I feel bad for the guys on the ground who worked so hard on them.

The great thing about sims though is the fans tend to be very passionate about their hobby. I have little doubt that there is a group of people out there with big ideas for the next great subsim! Well there is here already!

I think there is still a market for a good (both quality & substance) subsim. I think if one were to appear, it would be very successful, and have large and dedicated folllowing.

I'm willing to wait, have many times

Wrt to aircraft, Rise of Flight is very good; I wait for sales to buy aircraft. I hear there's a deal in the works for a "real" sequel to Il2 as well

[Sonarman]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

Subsims are dead.

I think they are only "dead" because publishers don't want to make fund/them any more due to the risk/reward ratio... it's much easier to churn out an FPS/RTS or cute puppy game.

The market for subsims is still there. Most of the SH series achieved sales of around 300,000 which was considered a healthy number for a simulation game and sims have traditionally have had a longer shelf life than most other genre games. Ubi have developed SHO as a free to play primarily because they see the PC as being riddled with piracy, their CEO Yves Guillemot quoted a figure of 95%.

Ironically I believe in the case of SH5 it was their own "always on" anti piracy DRM scheme that negatively impacted on the sales which they may have wrongly attributed to piracy of the product resulting in a premature death of the dvd-rom series and the creation of Silent Hunter Online.