Naval Warfare Games, 2018: What's good?

Noticed GOG had some naval games on sale and it made me remember I used to enjoy those (Played Harpoon back in the dark ages, and the wonderful folks at Jane’s actually let me tour a Los Angeles class sub in my game writing days for Jane’s 688), but I haven’t played one in a decade.

The games first game on sale is Atlantic Fleet. No way in hell I’m playing this: You play as the Nazis attacking commercial shipping. Given that my grandmother came over on a ship in a convoy chased by a U-Boat in WW2, I have zero desire to play a game as those fuckers, given they almost made me not exist. Wish they’d simulated both sides. It’s a $10 game, though, so it’s probably pretty simple.

Cold Waters is the other discounted game. Looks like a modern take on Red Storm Rising, which was super-fun back in the day, even if it was a bit simple. Any players here?

Anything else good in the past couple of years that y’all enjoyed? Any modern take on Silent Service or 688? Anything good turn-based? (Man, I’d love a good Midway game.) Does Harpoon 4 have a ship date yet? :)

They do.
It’s a phone game port, hence the price (they kept the parity between platforms). It has got pacing issue, and I think it is more of an elaborate version of the MS BASIC Gorilla, or even the naval battle paper game, but it’s pretty nifty.

As for Cold Waters, we got a thread.

Rule the Waves is a very cool naval-themed strategy game, although the aspects that appeal to me the most in it are those that remind me of what I loved about designing ships in EVE Online, so you may have to go elsewhere for historical flavor… Or maybe EVE Online, however its current state, qualifies as well, then?

For tablets, there is Silent Depth, WW2 US subsim, but I thought this one had a lot of issues when it was released. I don’t know what its current state is.

Edit: I am so drunk, Crash Dive is Uboat, thus not for you =)

Thanks! The intro to Atlantic Fleet on the GOG page just made it sound like you could play as the Kriegsmarine.

Thanks for the heads-up on Cold Waters. It’s on sale for $31 and sounds worth it. (It makes me so sad to see everyone complaining about $40 retail PC games. This is why we can’t have nice things. I paid $50 for Carriers at War in the 80s, people. That’s like a quarter million dollars now.)

I personally enjoy Cold Waters a lot for the ambiance, but I find it lacking vs RSR in the very basic fact there is no replay and no truth setting, making for sometimes saddening experience when I have no idea what hit me.
Also, still no in-mission saves (and those missions can be time-consuming!), as @rhamorim reported on today.
But still… wow, hours fly in the immersion of those subs!

I had no idea CW had no in-mission saves. Thanks for saving me the money. Off my wishlist.

U-Boot is due out this year though again you play the bad guys so might not be up your street.

This looks good…

Despite no in mission saves (which never bothered me) Cold Waters is great and they keep adding to it. While it doesn’t have the technical depth of some of our old sub games, it really hits the sweet spot for easing you into playing. The modding scene is quite active so if you’ve played through the campaigns a few times there’s a lot of new subs and missions to play (and an online quick mission generator).

Over the last few weeks they made changes to the campaigns to make them more varied and surprising, added oil derricks, whales are finally a thing, new ships, and also neutral vessels.

There’s a lot of potential here and it sure is pretty. But if you want Fleet Command or Sub Command 2.0 it will seem shallower.

I fondly remember playing Task Force 1942. The history of the surface battles (especially the night engagements) around Guadalcanal is really amazing. Anything more recent but covering the same battles/time frame?

Dangerous Waters is about 15 years old, but I’ll mention it in case you missed it when it came out. It’s the last realistic modern sub sim that I know of. Also, you get to control frigates, helicopters, and P-3s.

It’s not so much playing the bad guys – I’ve flown plenty of Messerschmitts, Focke Wulfs, and MiGs over the years – it was the specific goal right in the first sentence of the listing of attacking Allied commercial shipping. Which I know DID happen on all sides. But I feel different shooting at someone who’s trying to shoot me, vs. trying to sink a ship that may be full of civilians who are just trying to get away from England because V-1s keep landing in their neighborhood. I know it’s just a game and real war is terrible for everyone, but it as the soldiers-vs-civilians slant in the marketing as compared to soldiers vs soldiers that left the poor taste in my mouth. Again, personal. Hey, if it wasn’t for Hitler, I wouldn’t exist, because my Canadian grandfather wouldn’t have met and married my English grandmother so… um… yeah, sub games!

I’ll pick up Cold Waters for sure, and look at the other stuff y’all have mentioned!

I feel similarly DennyA. I have a very hard time enjoying playing U Boat games because, you know, they were trying to kill & starve my family. I imagine many Germans might feel the same way about allied bombing games.

Anyway Atlantic Fleet is VERY good. Genuinely one of the few good games that allows you to play the Battle of the Atlantic from the allied side.

Denny and Rod. Not to derail this post, but I’ve made a few posts about this subject. Not being able to play some games because of how they make you feel. Prison Architect did that to me as well. Especially in the time of the Evil One running this country, I can’t imagine playing on the bad side in a game anymore.

Yeah its very interesting! I actually made STAVKA/OKH in part to explore it. I probably should revisit the subject at some point. Its still relevant.

Yeah the tutorial of this game has stopped me ever progressing any further with it.

What’s wrong with CMANO?

I’d love for you to derail this thread about that subject! Please make a thread, as it is a matter I find incredibly interesting.

Holy crap! You can still buy this game?! It was one of my first PC games and I remember it was soooo buggy. I think also remember getting patches from Microprose for it via floppies in the mail.

I really liked the game, but I do remember the ships could not hold formation worth a damn (among all the other bugs I likely can’t remember).

Just a heads up, that lot of people (including me) have found that Dangerous Waters will not load on Windows 10. There are some workarounds, but in my experience they all introduce significant new problems.

Yeah, I can’t remember exactly what happened but I think I had some trouble running it on Windows 7 too. It might be one of those games from around 1995-early 2000s that are a nightmare to get running now.