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Old 06-22-21, 03:26 AM   #1
Mowgli
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Support Should I buy it guys?

Guys I love SH 5 WOS and had a blast but like the idea of crew management and more that is in UBoat but am put off by the fact that it looks a bit arcadie if you know what I mean.

So i would appreciate opinions. Thanks in advance.
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Old 06-24-21, 01:11 PM   #2
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In my opinion it isnt "arcadie" at all

If you download off steam and go to the workshop you can download the TDC mod which works with the current 129.9 beta (assuming you opt in for that)

The TDC works essentially just like our old familiar friend from SH3, so there is very little learning curve there.



you still plot your course out to your patrol grid a la SHIII

you still have to identify the ship, measure its mast height for range, gather its speed data, input it into the TDC and fire. You still get duds, you still get driven down to 210 meters and hunted for several hours in game by escorts eager to send you to the bottom.



damage control is INSANELY cool - i mean when you are down at 210 meters creeping along in silent running under the blue lights, trying to keep quiet - youve shut down the gyrocompass, youve switched from electrial steering to manual, the batteries are low so you have shut down power to non essential compartments. you could hear a pin drop then BAM, Forward torpedo hatch taking water!!! under the extreme pressure of the deep water is spraying in, your chief engineer stands on crates to repair the leak, the frightened faces of your men glisten in the beam of your flashlight as you supervise. fortunately its a quick fix and the water in the torpedo room is only ankle deep making you a bit bow heavy. your planesmen struggle to keep the boat trimmed but its manageable. forming a bucket bregade of 4 or 5 sailors to move the water to the control room bilge will help level things out. The pump isnt very efficient at such depth, also its noisy so we will have to ride it out until we can come shallow. Finally the escorts give up their hunt and run back to the fading convoy across the horizon, its safe to surface and pump out the water.

In the meantime there are half a dozen lifeboats all around you bobbing in the sea... do you disperse food and water? go boat to boat looking for officers to capture? do you ignore them and sail on? all are options you have in version 129.9

several days later you spot a lone merchant flying the Argentine flag. You come along side and order the ship to stop, it complies and you form a boarding party, arm your men and go aboard. The merchant ships captain speaks perfect english, fortunately so does a member of your delegation. He informs you that the ship is carrying tobacco from argentina to a neutral port in spain. his papers appear in order... search the cargo hold?



let them resume the voyage? are they carrying tobacco to Vigo? or are they actually carrying rubber to Liverpool? Is this a british merchant carrying a false flag? or a legitimate neutral? do we use a torpedo on them? or do we plant explosives in the engine room? you have to decide and work it out - but make the wrong choice and you face severe repercussions at HQ!



I have more play time on this title than any of the 176 other games in my steam inventory and i have found it to be VERY engaging and entertaining.

are there things that need tweaking? improvement? more work? of course there are, and there will continue to be things needing attention for some time... people forget this is a work in progress.

but there have been 9 patches in the past 23 days an average of one major bug fix patch every 2 and a half days - the dev team takes the product seriously and listes to feedback on steam which is their primary platform. so if you have suggestions or grievences it does more good to air them out there rather than here.

In a nut shell, the game play (once the GUI is figured out) is - IMHO - a lot like SHIII, only Uboat does a lot of the things i always wished we could do in SH3 (run out of food, board neutrals, board supply subs, help lifeboaters, see damage being repaired) you dont have to pretend all that stuff is happening anymore while some arbitrary timer on a 2D damage control screen counts down. You have to make smart decisions and prioritize repairs for example - i had bottomed out at like 180 meters and the boat was a wreck, air was going to run out fast, so i made restoring power to the engine room and repairing the air chemical purification system a priority or else repairing everything else would be pointless because they would all suffoctate soon. in prior games, you just clicked a compartment and a timer counted down. now you have to actually assign an officer to one task, and another officer to another task and so on. (though they will generally prioritize on their own)

currently, the game is like $29 on steam - i've spent way more than that on stuff i regretted way more than a game so if you get it, and go through the tutorials and learn the GUI and the ins and outs of things and give it a chance and a honest fair handshake for a couple of days with the understanding that it is a WIP and constantly being tweaked and updated, im certain you'll enjoy it too
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Old 06-24-21, 01:39 PM   #3
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this video of gameplay is about a month old - you'll notice that targeting ships is different in the current build especially with the TDC mod.

crew panic attacks etc are a lot less frequent in the current build

but this video gives you a pretty decent idea of the gameplay

one thing to keep in mind is that the game can certainly be played most of the time in first person view... however the third person cut away view as seen frequently in screenshots like the one below...



... is simply the easiest and quickest way to manage damage and move crew where needed.

it is just to be thought of as a very detailed advanced more interactive version of this...

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Old 06-24-21, 05:18 PM   #4
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Absolutely. It is a very good game. Not arcade at all. You'll enjoy it.
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Old 06-25-21, 01:35 AM   #5
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Default I am convinced

Thank you gentlemen for your replies. I am sure the detailed reports will be most useful to many others besides myself. I shall download today.
This forum rocks.

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And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf that shall break it must die.
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For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
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Old 07-01-21, 03:11 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mowgli View Post
Thank you gentlemen for your replies. I am sure the detailed reports will be most useful to many others besides myself. I shall download today.
This forum rocks.

Personally I look forward to hearing your feedback .. since you seem familiar with the genre and said to play sh5.
Besides, the game is on sale .. take advantage of it!
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Old 07-02-21, 03:28 AM   #7
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Icon14

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kal_Maximus_U669 View Post
Personally I look forward to hearing your feedback .. since you seem familiar with the genre and said to play sh5.
Besides, the game is on sale .. take advantage of it!
Well my first impressions were not over the moon as I still have my SH5 WOS loaded but I stuck with it and started to enjoy it more.

I really like the fact that you can really manage your crews and so spend some time creating my own sea watches and shifts etc and prioritising the work of the officers and assigning specific sailors to specific tasks.

Once I got familiar with the UI it became more fun with being able to wander around my boat and just enjoy the graphics - which are superb but I still kind of prefer the internal sub graphics of SH5 but each to his own.

I have not completed a mission as I had to restart a new campaign in order to get my extra radio music working and now have one for Germany and one for England and that makes the game great for me as I love to cruise real time and just chill.

I cannot really speak about combat other than using the automatic targetting which works fine but eventually I will download a TDC mod to make it more realistic.

Modding from the workshop is very straight forward and there appears to be something there for everyone.

I like the look of the tech tree and the way it is implemented.

For more realism - at this moment in time - I would say that both SH3 GWX and SH5 WOS are superior but UB makes a nice change and is till under development.

In short, I am enjoying playing it and would recommend it as a buy.
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Now this is the Law of the Jungle -- as old and as true as the sky;
And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk the Law runneth forward and back --
For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
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Old 07-04-21, 02:15 PM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mowgli View Post
Well my first impressions were not over the moon as I still have my SH5 WOS loaded but I stuck with it and started to enjoy it more.

I really like the fact that you can really manage your crews and so spend some time creating my own sea watches and shifts etc and prioritising the work of the officers and assigning specific sailors to specific tasks.

Once I got familiar with the UI it became more fun with being able to wander around my boat and just enjoy the graphics - which are superb but I still kind of prefer the internal sub graphics of SH5 but each to his own.

I have not completed a mission as I had to restart a new campaign in order to get my extra radio music working and now have one for Germany and one for England and that makes the game great for me as I love to cruise real time and just chill.

I cannot really speak about combat other than using the automatic targetting which works fine but eventually I will download a TDC mod to make it more realistic.

Modding from the workshop is very straight forward and there appears to be something there for everyone.

I like the look of the tech tree and the way it is implemented.

For more realism - at this moment in time - I would say that both SH3 GWX and SH5 WOS are superior but UB makes a nice change and is till under development.

In short, I am enjoying playing it and would recommend it as a buy.
Thank you for your appreciation .. I agree on the management of the crew which is more successful than the Sh series .. on the other hand the crew in the submarine .. they are still too stupid .. besides I would have liked to be able to give direct orders with a realistic chain of command with each NPC playing ... regarding the TDC you have a mod that is very well explained on steam who should be part of the game! but even with the TDC I find that the immersion is not at the rendezvous during the attack phases .. approach or other .. as I said the sound is really bad here .. it totally weighs down the immersion especially the dialogues. .not talking about the atmosphere in the Uboat I just installed update 11 the navigation is too rigid !!! no feeling !! during the phases of diving .. or well surface .. no inerçie .. in the building it is worse ... all the gauges just still do not work .. a shame anyway for a game of Uboat .. it is arcade bar point .. moreover the Uboat has a funny way of navigating .. because even at the quay .. it is fixed and does not move .. a bit !! at sea one has the impression that he has an axis is eye forward and backward very bad I think .. for a game which is supposedly not arcade .. no?
Okay now let's wait for the updates Wait..Wait..Wait ..
oh yes the KriegsMarine will see the uzo it would be ashamed .. a sophisticated device developed by Zeiss..d elsewhere I like all the German technology which is all point superior to everyone here at the time ... moreover if you go in the space today ei eh ... !!! and even today they are still very good ...https://www.subsim.com/radioroom/sho...ostcount=15896
good take pleasure with this one .. once again thank you for your comments but would like you to talk more about navigation .. best regards KM_U669

Last edited by Kal_Maximus_U669; 07-04-21 at 04:25 PM.
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Old 07-05-21, 07:30 AM   #9
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Icon2 Navigation

I must confess I am not a fan of Navigation currently in Uboat compared to the SH series.
I miss the plotting of courses, relative bearings to targets, the tools, calculating targets speeds and courses.
Despite the graphics and the crew management I am starting to wonder about whether I should just go back to SH5 WOS or maybe invest some time in SH4 Uboat missions.
I will give it a go for a bit longer as I am still enjoying it.
I also miss not being able to use Voice Attack to command my boat and the better radio stations and gramophone of the SH series.
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Now this is the Law of the Jungle -- as old and as true as the sky;
And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk the Law runneth forward and back --
For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
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Old 07-06-21, 05:08 PM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mowgli View Post
I must confess I am not a fan of Navigation currently in Uboat compared to the SH series.
I miss the plotting of courses, relative bearings to targets, the tools, calculating targets speeds and courses.
Despite the graphics and the crew management I am starting to wonder about whether I should just go back to SH5 WOS or maybe invest some time in SH4 Uboat missions.
I will give it a go for a bit longer as I am still enjoying it.
I also miss not being able to use Voice Attack to command my boat and the better radio stations and gramophone of the SH series.
In time.

I am able to calculate courses, relative bearings to target et using the map tools and calculate speeds etc manually justs as i was always able to in SHIII so im not sure if you are playing with the latest version or have the right settings etc.

try to remember, many of the features you find in SH3 and SH5 were not available in the full release version and were not added to the game until years later with mods.

perhaps you could tell me how you are doing it?

for me, i spot the target in the periscope, ID it, verify range with stadimeter, plot the course of the ship in the map screen using the ruler tool, then find AOB using the compass tool, the speed can be determined by the 3:15 method, or by passage of one ship length through the scope. once these are input into the TDC (spectacularly modeled by the way) its time to send them to the bottom.
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Old 07-12-21, 05:37 PM   #11
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Default Update 12

Good evening .. update number 12 ..
I must admit that a little effort has been made at the level of the uzo ... but the kioque is sorely lacking in reality ... Sasha's boats are terribly better ... plus he built them a while ago .. inspire you ... because your games are far from being at this level in all areas ...
please the player ... Kind regards KM_U669
Sasha's boats 'Напоминаю, что это ш4'
Мы работаем с увлеченными людьми, здесь явно лучше

Uboat

Sasha's boats

Uboat

Sasha's boats


the work is much higher here
Uboat

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Old 07-26-21, 11:20 AM   #12
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Looks amazing, i'm on the maiden voyage learning as I go, I left in a hurry and am not sure if everyone is on board. How cool that it fills up in heavy seas if you leave the hatch open, so i'm familiarised with the pump at least .
edit: as an ex SH3 fanatic i've had my eye on this a while, and at £10.77 in the Steam sale I couldn't resist it, so far i'm delighted. The release 129 extras sound fantastic.

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Old 07-31-21, 01:06 PM   #13
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Default UBOAT

Its very solid and deep, and once a version is "Stable" the modders go at it with some excellent "issue resolving" mods! I have my historical realism issue list, but this can wait as they dont inflict much damage to the sims enjoyment.
With over 500 hrs I encourage everyone to add this to their inventory.
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Old 03-15-22, 05:10 AM   #14
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After all these reviews I thought I'd give the game a go.

I then realised I've already bought it and its been sat, unplayed in my Steam Inventory since 2019.

Guess what I'm doing tonight!
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Old 03-15-22, 10:38 AM   #15
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Thanks for the video GoldenRivet, looks great, some nice features ! I'll have to give this game a try; how is the damage model ?
Hopefully better than the silly, very incomplete version in SH3, modded included (no fault of the modders though).
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