Don't ask me if this will be any good. Looks promising though.
Single player means I am not as interested though,
ABOUT THIS GAME
Destroyer: The U-Boat Hunter is an interactive war thriller which seamlessly blends tactical WW2 anti-submarine warfare simulation with a gripping storyline, presented through Hollywoodesque, interactive cutscenes. Take command of a meticulously reconstructed Fletcher-class destroyer and lead your crew against nazi U-Boats in the Battle of the Atlantic!
The story unfolds through a choice and consequence mechanic, allowing the player to shape the fate of the crew plunged into a deadly struggle against a devious and stealth enemy. They will have to overcome both the underwater threat and their own shortcomings in order to make sure that the convoy they are protecting makes it safely across the pond.
Lead a whole destroyer squadron and make tactical decisions to protect your sheep from the steel wolves. Track contacts and plot anti-submarine attacks using authentic equipment. Experience war at sea from the perspective of a tin can sailor, and shape the story as it develops, making key decisions both in and outside the heat of battle.
It is all in your hands, captain! Will you lead your men to victory by making sure that your convoy reaches its destination, or will it fall prey to enemy torpedoes, depriving the allied war effort of the precious supplies you were trusted to protect? Only you can answer the question!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1272010/Destroyer_The_UBoat_Hunter/
That does look intriguing. Moistened Loins? We'll see.
Looks great, but Q3 2021 seems like soooooooo long away. :buck2:
I like the idea of the destroyer tactics attached to a larger story.
Interest piqued. I think I still have my copy of Destroyer Command somewhere...
(https://www.grogheads.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.ebayimg.com%2Fimages%2Fg%2F464AAOxyqUpQ9IqD%2Fs-l640.jpg&hash=33c6812ec70582c289a1154b8513186a4de07f62)
I'd love a good surface ship game/sim, but this doesn't look like one. It looks like an interactive movie that fully intends to piggyback off the new Tom Hanks movie.
Stop bringing reality into my fantasy world! >:( Actually, I agree Hellfish.
Agree with Hellfish.
Loins are firmly dry, but who knows?
There is definitely a big sloppy hole waiting to be filled by a good surface WW2 game, though.
LOL, I thought it was Q3 2020. Man alive, Q3 2021 is a long time from now.
Quote from: hellfish6 on June 22, 2020, 01:05:26 PM
I'd love a good surface ship game/sim, but this doesn't look like one. It looks like an interactive movie that fully intends to piggyback off the new Tom Hanks movie.
Aww - to be fair to the chaps though, the project had been announced months ago - so I guess the communication might be trying to make the most of the Greyhound buzz, but had my own game been more advanced at the time of the release of the Midway motion picture, rest assured that I'd have done all the same.
Research is top notch, they went to a museum ship to examine under every single angle everything they needed to recreate the ultimate experience. Granted, it is shaping up more as some sort of interactive adventure than an actual ship simulator, and here they're trading somewhat freedom of action in favor of immersion from what I can collect, but if the thrill is there, I would be the last to throw any stone. It will be a solid and enjoyable experience, and as far as I am concerned I can't wait to get my own hands on it. :arr:
I'm not knocking the game for it's references to Greyhound - it makes sense to do it, and other games do it as well - but the A or B type of choose-your-own-adventure type of gameplay doesn't really appeal to me. Maybe I'll change my mind when more is released - at the ship interior looks fantastic - but right now it's low expectations mode for me.
I like the notion of a novel take on this topic. I'd be curious to know when it's set, and how ahistorical it might be. My suspicion is that the emphasis on storytelling will mean that they'll use a lot of dramatic license.
One of the things I found most interesting about the Battle for the Atlantic was the whole variety of factors that came into play, in terms of both technology and doctrine. The interaction between air coverage for convoys, surface ship anti-sub weaponry, escort pursuit doctrine, signals intelligence and cryptoanalysis, air patrols over sortie areas for U-boats, hunting of U-boat sub tenders, introduction of various different radar types in airborne and surface-ship assets, and even shoreline regulation is fascinating. Even questions as simple as "Should bombers set their depth charges to land 20 feet apart, 50 feet apart, or 100 feet apart?" ended up having major ramifications in the grinding war of attrition that was the war in the Atlantic.
For a great pair of books on the topic, I heartily recommend either Operation Drumbeat or Black May, both by Michael Gannon.
As soon as I saw that this was supposed to model a Fletcher class DD I got all excited and that still does excite me but to a lesser extent. Fletcher's were flush-deck designs as opposed to the Porter and Somers classes with raised forecastles thus the Porter's and Somers' were better able to handle rough seas. The Fletcher's had greater range and much better AA armament. As a result the Fletcher's were almost exclusively sent to the Pacific with the Porter's and Somer's sent to the N. Atlantic convoy runs. Thus the Fletcher's as U-Boat Hunters is not very accurate. That's my understanding but, believe it or not, I have been wrong before (as I recall, it was the summer of '56 when I was 10 :-"). Admiral, you seem to be our resident naval authority (at least I think so), so feel free to jump in here.
Oh well, I am no destroyer expert (and the makers of this game are now aware of your existence, you mortals, so beware their wrath :coolsmiley:) but although Fletcher were certainly made with the Pacific in mind, in terms of mere numbers they also dwarved both Porter and Somers classes in numbers in the fleet. And of course, the original source for technical knowledge used by the team being a Fletcher museum ship, it figures that they'd keep her at the centre of the game design.
Besides, both Porter and Somers classes were destroyer leaders, which made them a bit more adapted to the needs of fleet escort considering their armament and endurance - on the other hand, there were plenty pre-war Manhan/Gridley/Bagley/Benham/Sims/Benson/etc... To do the job. Still; a bit later they were superseded in numbers by Destroyer Escorts which were probably better suited for this role, but this happened later during the war from 1943 onwards, and I suppose that just like in Greyhound or the novel The Good Shepherd, the focus wants to be put on early war struggle, when the U-boot threat was at its peak, US preparedness at its lowest point, and destroyers thrown into the fray for a job they weren't necessarily always the greatest at. Although I'd still gladly play an video game version of The Enemy Below anyday O0
Looking forward to this. Even with the over done U-boat evil pack meister markings on the u-boats.
Still gonna be fun.
Well, I am cautiously hopeful that this game is something I'll enjoy. I'll be watching.
This thread did get me to buy a copy of Black May off Amazon last night. I actually teach a lesson on the Battle of the Atlantic at work, but my knowledge of the conflict is really pretty limited.
Hey Admiral, thanks for the reply... great stuff... informative as usual. I'd like to add that in spite of the mildly ahistorical concept of Fletchers combating U-Boats, I'm really looking forward to this game. Anything that models a Fletcher is right near the top of my mental wish list. I must admit that I'm a bit concerned with the pick action A or B in an interactive movie game play but I'll just wait hopefully until the game is released.
Drifting a little bit off topic... When I think off WW2 naval action the image of Carriers, Subs and Destroyers jumps to the fore. With Subs, the boats that come to mind have names like Wahoo, Flasher, Tang and the rest of the USN fleet boats (a bit of a contrast to many of you who seem to be more interested in U-Boats and the Battle of the Atlantic) and my image of a destroyer is a Fletcher with a bone in her teeth driving forward to attack a Battleship. If that seems idiotic to you, you might explore the story of Taffy 3 and the Battle off Samar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_off_Samar
or video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AdcvDiA3lE
To say that this was THE example of "Tin Can Sailors" at their finest is a massive understatement.
Always a pleasure!
It's fine but in effect Samar is one illustration that is more an exception than anything. The only comparable action I could think of was in the MTO, and Glorious for the lack of planes doesn't even qualify. Same with sub/air naval combat interaction - Nautilus' action at Midway being the single most famous example perhaps.
Otherwise the three aspects (aka surface, sub & air combat) of naval warfare very, very scarcely interacted with each other within the same action/engagement. And the three of them I dare say never ever did. Doesn't mean they didn't over the course of several days of course, like in Midway - but that's something else entirely.
Today's Flare Path (https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2020/06/26/the-flare-path-fletchers-and-forklifts/) has me much more interested.
It all sounds very interesting, but it also sounds kind of like one of those play-it-once games.
15 minutes of gameplay on YT https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i4wqucuHkQ
Submarines were more a tool of strategic/economic warfare, as opposed to anti-combatant tools. Although, as noted, the primary use of submarines in major fleet engagements seemed to be as picket ships.
Submarines played a critical role in two major periods of the war: The first 42 months of the Battle of the Atlantic and the last 24 months of the Battle of the Pacific. In both cases, the primary reason that they were so successful was the same: The enemy didn't dedicate enough resources to stopping them.
The Japanese simply never built enough escorts, destroyers, or ASW planes in the first place. They couldn't really afford to, especially not if they wanted the capital ship force that they did. The end result was free range hunting by US sub captains, once they got their torpedo woes sorted out and enough forward bases established that they could roam the South China Sea.
The Brits had largely fought the U-boats to a standstill by late 1941. U-boats were still sinking freighters, but the rate was no longer in their favor. It was only after the US entered the war, and the USN spent the first 6-12 months of the Atlantic War with their head stuck up their ASW asses, that the war started to tilt back in the favor of the U-boats for a while.
By mid-1943, the Americans had finally embraced a mature ASW doctrine, and the Allies finally had enough DDs and DEs, to say nothing of land-based ASW craft and the newly deployed CVEs, to put the squeeze on the Germans. The ability to finally deploy long-range ASW craft to the Azores was not exactly a decisive blow, but it was in many ways the final nail in the U-boats' coffin, as it eliminated the last major land-based air coverage gap for convoys steaming directly from US or South American ports to Africa (where a lot of traffic was being sent directly, to support the war in the Mediterranean theater).
Demo for this is out now. Requires you to opt in to the test via their Steam store page, then you can install the demo. Limited number of demo downloads apparently so get in quick.
Videos of demo gameplay look good, right up my alley. Looks like they pushed back on the publisher's desire to simplify things (demo was delayed because it was 'too realistic').
This releases today. Looks pretty good...
From Subsim
Available for purchase now on Steam for $26.99. Launching the Alert 5 credit card......
Quote from: Tripoli on September 28, 2022, 11:01:37 AM
Available for purchase now on Steam for $26.99. Launching the Alert 5 credit card......
You're at CreditCON 5? ;D
At the risk of being a total sub warfare geek, do the German U-boats attack like they actually did, on the surface and at full speed? Or do they attack more like American subs did, submerged and lurking at periscope depth?
The ASW history of WW II is very interesting, because it occupies such a different place for different countries. For the Germans and the UK, the submarine Battle of the Atlantic was the defining naval battle of the conflict and it got such treatment from historians in both countries (but especially the British).
For American historians, it received more treatment as a side show. Not because it was less important, but because it was less dramatic, less varied, and lacked the sort of narrative that many popular readers prefer. I think the literature ranks were also pretty crowded earlier on: The British invested A LOT of money in framing the history of WW II immediately after the war, so there was simply less English-language material available on most of the Pacific conflicts by the time American historians and authors started producing lots of scholarship on the topics.
I've just read "A Game of Birds and Wolves" by Simon Parkin which is primarily about the use of wargaming to develop ASW in the North Atlantic, so this game definitely ticks a box for me. Especially as nearly all previous games came at the fight from the opposite direction. Book is highly recommended btw.
I toyed around with the tutorial...
Very, very, very early impression is...positive.
I don't know much about the actual controls used on WWII destroyers, but this seems to be authentic, or at least "authenticish". The player has to learn to use analog controls, mechanical computers and the voice reports of your crew to find and then move to enemy submerged subs. Not to mention the nifty mechanical computer that helps calculate optimal depth charge drop points.
It makes you realize how most games on this subject 'baby' the players. This game gives you an appreciation of how difficult it really was to find and destroy subs in real life, using the tools they had in the 40s. For example, because there is no digital map (as in every other game out there) I found that it was better to actually listen to the voice reports of the sonar man to make decisions, than to use the tactical map table. This tactical display seems true to the period. It is just a map table that one of your anonymous crew marks with a grease pencil whenever your sonar man calls out new contact reports (BTW, one nice touch is that you can actually do the plotting yourself and not leave that to your robo-crew).
The game has somewhat of a technical learning curve. But is not out of reach for PC simulation jockeys.
Given the realism in the interface, one area I found strangely gamey, was how to direct other destroyers in your convoy. Basically, you click on them on the map, and then click where you want them to go and how to direct their sonar: just seems too easy and precise. Maybe this will become more realistic as the game matures
One nice thing. The game is forcing me out of a gaming comfort zone that has been forged over many destroyer simulations going back to the days of my C64; while the subject matter is familiar, the mechanics make the gameplay fresh.
I still need a bunch more time with the game to really judge it however...but as I said, initial impression is good.
Can't rebind keys. EDIT; I decided to hold on to it.
The interface is a bit weird. You can use the mouse to control most functions on the interface with WASD acting as a backup but if you use WASD, you have to confirm any inputs by pressing ENTER.
The game is still early access and needs some more polish. The area that I've really noticed it so far is in sounds. There just isn't a lot there at the moment and it feels a bit sterile. Hopefully they'll add more effects in.
Gameplay-wise, I've only played a bit. I've got a lot of time in with the Silent Hunter series, the app driven board game UBOOT, and Dangerous Waters so most of the systems felt familiar enough that I was able to jump in without much difficulty as far as the interface went (as far as my performance, that's another story).
Overall, I like the look and feel of things. Hunting a submerged contact is tough yet engaging. Having said that, I felt like a had a good initial fix on a U-boat. I picked it up on radar and charged after it. Got a few rounds off with the deck gun as it submerged but didn't hit anything except ocean. Picked up the sub on sonar a few seconds later. This it where things got weird. The speed at which the sub appeared to be moving while submerged was ridiculously fast. Like Soviet K-222 speeds fast. I could barely keep the sonar beam aligned with the sub as it was moving so fast, let alone turn my destroyer to intercept. Posts on the forums show that others have noticed this as well. One guy crunched the numbers and thinks the U-boat is sometimes moving at upwards of 60 knots.
Destroyer escort AI. I had an AI controlled destroyer working alongside me to protect our little convoy. This guy was a madman. He was able and willing to avoid collisions with ships in the convoy, but not with me. He nearly rammed me2-3 times during my little playthrough session. Again, others have noticed this behaviour as well and some have said they've lost more scenarios due to friendly AI collisions than from enemy action.
Thanks, everyone. This one is looking more and more like a buy now.
Quote from: Silent Disapproval Robot on September 30, 2022, 12:17:20 AM
Destroyer escort AI. I had an AI controlled destroyer working alongside me to protect our little convoy. This guy was a madman. He was able and willing to avoid collisions with ships in the convoy, but not with me. He nearly rammed me2-3 times during my little playthrough session. Again, others have noticed this behaviour as well and some have said they've lost more scenarios due to friendly AI collisions than from enemy action.
I lost the tutorial due to a collision with an allied vessel. I didn't even know there were allied vessels in the scenario.
Is this something I want to get now, or should I wait until it goes on sale ? (10% isn't much of a discount).
Having said that, Daedalic is one of my favorite publishers. They generally don't produce simulations but do produce good quality games. I'm especially fond of what they did with their Aventuria games (The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav, Memoria, and the two Blackguards games, warts and all) and the Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun series. The downside is that sales are not all that frequent.
Daedalic paid quite a lot to secure this deal (several times my own budget) so I wouldn't expect them to squander any opportunity to get an extra buck. At the current rate they will need many months to break even with their original investment, or at least the number was made public about it.
Fortunately they're backing a game obviously made with much love & expertise when it comes to the contents & the history, I do sincerely wish everybody the best of luck & success in the months to come :bd:
Starting to get the hang of the TRR sonar/depth charge targeting system (even though I still don't fully get how the speed gauge point in the bottom right is supposed to function.)
Managed to sink all subs with zero convoy losses.
I set up a scenario where it was my lone destroyer trying to protect 4 merchants from a single U-boat during a rainy night. I find I'm able to drive him under and keep him there without too much trouble but scoring hits with depth charges is very difficult. You need to create distance in order to line up a run at a good angle but creating that distance takes too much time and he might be able to get some torps off at the convoy in the interval. I fund I'm constantly coming in at garbage angles and dropping nuisance spreads just to force him to make turns to avoid until I run out the clock.
Much easier with a corvette buddy and some air assets.
SDR, that was even a raging debate within the escort groups themselves. "Am I there to hunt U-boats, or to protect freighters?" By mid-1943, I think the strategic thinking had shifted to the latter, but good ASW commanders still developed a feel for when to prosecute a contact versus just forcing a U-boat to run and hide. There was definitely at least as much art to it as there was science.
Oh, I want to prosecute them until they're nothing but oil slicks on the surface. It's just that lining up for a run and trying to guess which way they'll turn is very tough to do. I'd guess my ratio of depth charge runs vs. hits is 40:1 or worse.
Quote from: Silent Disapproval Robot on October 03, 2022, 11:41:36 PM
Oh, I want to prosecute them until they're nothing but oil slicks on the surface. It's just that lining up for a run and trying to guess which way they'll turn is very tough to do. I'd guess my ratio of depth charge runs vs. hits is 40:1 or worse.
Based on your post, I was wondering how effective depth charge attacks were in real life.
I found this very interesting official US Navy report. Some really cool info in here:
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/rep/ASW-51/ASW-11.html (http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/rep/ASW-51/ASW-11.html)
Yeah. The British gathered some pretty extensive statistical evidence on how far apart depth charges should be spaced to maximize your chances of damaging an enemy sub, and even that was a hotly debated topic for the first several years of the war.
This was a particularly relevant topic in the ranks of air-based ASW forces, as they typically had (many) fewer depth charges to deploy in a single instance than a DD or a DE might.
The math was certainly in the sub's favor for avoiding any single depth charge. Of course, you can usually say the same thing about the odds being in the soldier's favor for any given bullet. :(
Quote from: FarAway Sooner on October 04, 2022, 01:46:54 PM
The math was certainly in the sub's favor for avoiding any single depth charge. Of course, you can usually say the same thing about the odds being in the soldier's favor for any given bullet. :(
"I'm not worried about the bullet with my name on it. I'm worried about the ten thousand others that say 'Occupant'!" -- Larry Hama
Quote from: JasonPratt on October 05, 2022, 09:40:53 AM
Quote from: FarAway Sooner on October 04, 2022, 01:46:54 PM
The math was certainly in the sub's favor for avoiding any single depth charge. Of course, you can usually say the same thing about the odds being in the soldier's favor for any given bullet. :(
"I'm not worried about the bullet with my name on it. I'm worried about the ten thousand others that say 'Occupant'!" -- Larry Hama
According to the report I gave the URL for above, a 'volley' of nine depth fused charges from side or stern drops only had a 6% chance of killing the sub (see Table 4 in the report).
Interestingly, hedgehogs (forward shooting) and proximity fused charges had an effectiveness of over 20%.
Quote from: ArizonaTank on October 05, 2022, 12:44:45 PM
Quote from: JasonPratt on October 05, 2022, 09:40:53 AM
Quote from: FarAway Sooner on October 04, 2022, 01:46:54 PM
The math was certainly in the sub's favor for avoiding any single depth charge. Of course, you can usually say the same thing about the odds being in the soldier's favor for any given bullet. :(
"I'm not worried about the bullet with my name on it. I'm worried about the ten thousand others that say 'Occupant'!" -- Larry Hama
According to the report I gave the URL for above, a 'volley' of nine depth fused charges from side or stern drops only had a 6% chance of killing the sub (see Table 4 in the report).
Interestingly, hedgehogs (forward shooting) and proximity fused charges had an effectiveness of over 20%.
Hedgehogs were more accurate because they were fired before the submarine entered the shadow zone, so when they were launched, they had both a range and a bearing. Additionally, they didn't have to be set for a particular depth: they detonated on impact, so a 3D problem using depth charges became a 2D problem, and both the the dimensions were known, more or less accurately.
Wow, I feel like a dog chasing my tail. I've set up a scenario with one ship in the "convoy," one AI escort and one sub. I've got a few depth-charge runs at the sub. Crashed into my convoy and my AI escort. I'm still having a blast learning how to operate all the combat trackers. I hear the AI sub is too fast and a patch is incoming. I believe it. Max submerged speed should be about 7 knots. It's acting more like an Akula class.
Finally got a win. Only took 7.4 hours of frustration. Got a good depth charge run, u-boat surfaced, then finished them with the five-inch guns.
I've yet to get one with my guns but I've sunk 8 with depth charge runs. I still haven't managed to repeat my first success when we (me and a Flower class corvette and a Catalina controlled by the AI) managed to sink all 3.
The AI ships have zero collision avoidance. They ghost through all the other ships so they have no regard for what is in front of them.
This looks pretty cool, so I gave it a buy today (along with GHPC).
Opinions please Good Sir.
^+1, I am interested in this too.
Well, take what I say with a grain of salt as ASW is my thing. I just finished a quick mission, small size, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I need to spend a lot more time with it, but I can already tell this is going to be a keeper. I didn't go through the tutorials or anything, just jumped right in. It was pretty intuitive I thought. I can imagine that the larger scenarios are going to be a thorough brain-burn.
For $30 it's a must-buy for me. But I'm really into this kind of stuff.
Let me spend a few more hours with it and maybe I can give more thoughtful impressions.
Alright, another hour in, another convoy unsuccessfully escorted.
I guess my impressions are, this game is pretty much exactly what it says it is. You command a destroyer (and can order the AI destroyer(s)) escorting a convoy against those pesky u-boats. There are a bunch of features I'd like to see, and are on the list of additions. But if the idea of controlling a destroyer hunting u-boats interests you, I don't see how you can go wrong here.
Some things that others have noted: the u-boats are pretty nimble. I understand this will be fixed asap. I had what I think are two bugs: couldn't turn off the searchlight and my air cover received my orders but then just stopped flying where I asked him to go. This game desperately needs some sort of AAR function at the end of a mission so you can see what actually happened.
If you like the subject matter, this is a pretty cool game. When they flesh out the rest of their development roadmap this is going to be a very unique and awesome game. I'm pleased with my purchase.
Are you playing a campaign or single missions?
Only single missions are available right now. The campaign is to come later. There really is only one mission available. You're escorting a convoy. You detect a U-boat or U-boats on your radar and you try to protect the convoy. You have some control over the mission parameters to mix things up a bit. You can select the size and course of the convoy (1-30? ships), the number of AI surface escorts (two different classes to choose from. Flower class and....can't recall the other off hand), whether air support will be available, the number of U-boats you'll face, time of day or night, weather, and scenario length from 1-5 hours.
^Thanks breh
New patch is live!
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1272010/view/3546047018716556080
U-boat underwater speed averages at 4kn.
U-boats more often go into silent running at 2-3kn.
U-boats may achieve a maximum underwater speed of 6kn, although rarely and briefly.
U-boats dive to medium and deep more often, but due to lower U-boat speeds the hit probability has increased significantly.
Minimum turning radius for U-boat evasive maneuvers has been corrected.
Battles have been rebalanced to fit the new U-boat characteristics.
The number of 'stealthy captain' U-boats has increased to allow for more uncertainty and the need for better patrolling and sonar coverage.
We have also improved a wide variety of technical imperfections and applied a few fixes. The full list is available further below.
Longer missions possible in 'custom mission' mode (up to 10 hrs)
Fixed errors occurring whenever surfaced U-boats were eliminated with gunfire
Improved U-boat sinking reports, corrected info in the 'contacts' station
3D objects in 'extras' now allow for better viewing
radar aim corrected and should not get stuck to one target
searchlight corrected and should turn off as expected
I played a 2 subs vs 2 escort mission last night to give the new patch a whirl. Some things I found, in no particular order:
1) Sonar coverage from the AI was more spotty, which is a good thing as it makes things feel more tense and more realistic.
2) With the slower sub speeds, I found I was overshooting a lot and it was a struggle to get my destroyer back into position to make another run.
3) The scenarios start with the subs much closer to the convoy now as a way to offset their slower speed. Danger of collisions is much higher now as it's far too easy to wander into the midst of the convoy while you're busy focused on other screens.
4) The sonar operator on the player controlled ship no longer sticks with his assigned contact. I was prosecuting contact ABLE while my AI counterpart was dealing with BAKER. Whenever I would lose contact with ABLE, my operator would slave the sonar bearing to BAKER and refuse to conduct sweeps to reacquire ABLE. Made things frustrating at times as I'd have to order an off-bearing sweep just to clear the BAKER contact so that I could start searching for ABLE again.
5) Gfx look worse on my machine now. The ships in the convoy all appear as though they have a gauzy, grey filter over them. They look too light for it to be a shadow effect but it blurs out all details beyond the ship's silhouette. I switched the settings through all available options to see if the anti-aliasing settings were the problem but nothing worked. I might try switching time of day tonight to see if that has any effect.
Thanks SDR. :notworthy:
New patch is out. Greatly improves the graphics and adds some more features. I have run into a bug with it though. Sometimes the targeting glass overlay for the TRR tool disappears, making plotting depth charge runs even harder.
I'll have to get back into the game. I got pretty good at sinking the u-boats but then Cosmoteer came out.
Another new patch came out. This one adds icebergs.
I set up a quick scenario with my destroyer and once Flower class corvette defending a 12 ship convoy against 2 U-boats in an ice field.
It's quite a challenge! The icebergs clutter your radar return, making U-boat spotting difficult. They also mask sub movements underwater for passive sonar so tracking UBOATs is significantly harder. Collisions are also a real concern. Thankfully, they've made the convoy and escort AI much better and avoiding you and added another lookout who will alert you to possible ice or ship collisions.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52938622001_40679030f5_b.jpg)
and half price right now at 14.99 for those interested...
So is everybody here in agreement that this game is a good one?
I came here to ask and I see somebody has already posted about it being half price.
Single player but pretty unique for what it is... am I thinking of a different game that is supposed to plug into a silent hunter kind of game in multiplayer hunts?
I think it's pretty fun. It's unique.
It doesn't have any MP component, and I don't think (but don't know) that there is MP planned. Obviously it would be epic if you could have human-controlled U-boats, but I haven't heard anything to indicate that's planned. Nor MP with just destroyers.
Right now it's single, quick-action type missions. There is a campaign planned, but not available. The mission generator allows you to scale the size of the mission, so you can do anything from a one hour to multi-hour mission.
It's hard to know whether or not you'll find it interesting. Let me put it this way: it's a good game for what it is. A campaign will make this a very good game.
Hey fellas. Just a head's up: the campaign for this game has been released. I played with it just a bit, so I can't comment too much on it. The campaign starts with a long cut scene as you take command of a destroyer. The first mission is a "tutorial" type mission. After that, you get 7 or 9 additional missions of increasing complexity, more merchants to escort, more destroyers to manage, etc. I can't remember all the details.
Anyway, the game is now in its full-release state. I think it's a fun game and worth a buy if you're into the subject matter.
Nice, just bought it a few weeks ago.
Wolfpack 345 is starting a career on his youtube channel:
And still only $12 at greenman for anyone that still wants to get it
^I'd swear you had stock in the developer or something :tophat:
Quote from: Gusington on December 27, 2023, 09:02:58 PM^I'd swear you had stock in the developer or something :tophat:
Nope, just a friendly reminder, didn't even own it myself until yesterday.
A friend of mine got this game for me yesterday. Was pretty excited to play it actually.
Did the tutorials in which I hit a uboat with depth charges and just went for a single mission right after.
Which resulted in me chasing all the uboats underwater and the convoy pushing away from them while they were underwater. A retreat but no opportunities to drop depth charges.
Really atmospheric and the game itself will be a nice challenge. It's got silent hunter V vibes about it, the art style etc. Everything can be done manually via the instruments if you wish. A very insightful look at DD operations for somebody who has not really played a DD simulator before.
I loved being able to look up from any instrument panel to see the crew all around as per the screenshots below.
One thing I noticed is that you do not seem to be able to man the AA guns, just the main guns.
I loved the movie Greyhound and have no problem whatsoever with somebody bothering to make a game to capitalise on it. Thank goodness somebody did.
Disclaimer: I got this game for free. lol.
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I believe this is part of this months (March) Humble Choice games. Granted the AAA title is shit (the new Saints Row).
Edit: although Nioh2 is a pretty solid second offering there along with a WH40k game.
This is a solid game that does exactly what the developers said it would do. It's very, very well done! I highly recommend it if you're interested in this type of warfare.
I'll echo what Toonces says: This is a fun game and captures the "Greyhound" vibe. While the rate of Uboat sinkings in the game is far faster than it was historically (the Germans lost 0.378 Uboats/day over the war, as opposed to the 3-5 Uboats per hour you can kill in the game), the fact is that an absolutely accurate simulator of WWII ASW (termed "Awfully Slow Warfare" by its practitioners) would not be a lot of fun. Destroyer: U-boat Hunter accurately portrays many on he procedures involved in WWII ASW, but makes the execution of them somewhat easier. I highly recommend it.
I bought Destroyer at early access release and saw a great game. It went 1.0 well after I last played. I've got to give this one another look.
It's also available as part of a build-your-own-bundle deal at Fanatical right now.
https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/prestige-collection-build-your-own-bundle (https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/prestige-collection-build-your-own-bundle)