UBOAT News

Hello Sailors!

It's our pleasure to announce that update B122, the one we posted at the unstable branch couple of weeks ago, is finally going live for everyone! This is very exciting because we understand that there are only a handful of things more important on long voyages than atmospheric music. You now have the possibility to use your very own tracks while playing the game whether you wanted to listen to Das Boot soundtrack or you decided that Billie Eilish somehow fits the cold, steely insides of your underwater vehicle (we're not judging).

There are also plenty of other fixes and changes, all of which are listed below:

• It's now possible to add custom music to the game. Please read README file in "(GAME_FOLDER)\UBOAT_Data\StreamingAssets\Packages\custom-music" to learn where to place your music files.
  
• Various modding improvements for summer's modding SDK introduction. Added support for raw audio and texture files and support for datasheet overrides in mods.
  
• U-boat fuel capacity is now set to a historical value and usage is expressed in UI as liters per km and per minute. Diesel compressor and engines have historical consumption rates.
  
• Item's mass and stack limit are now displayed in the storage UI.
  

• Pausing or disabling time compression on the map was causing random camera movement.
  
• Sink ship objectives were sometimes duplicated.
  
• Increased fuel usage to achieve historical range only with some bonuses from an engineer working at the engines and/or leader at the navigator's station. It was very hard to run out of fuel on B121.
  
• A vacation could be bought without sufficient funds and cause the budget to dive below zero.
  
• Faster completion bonus of HQ tasks from a vacation (like Eagle's Nest) wasn't applied to tasks that were started before a vacation.
  
• Vacation notification had missing localizations.
  
• Reputation points count label in reputation purchases screen was often displaying a wrong value.
  
• Added sound effect for reputation purchases.
  
• Fixes for the most common errors automatically reported to us. They could have an impact on performance and cause random issues in the gameplay.
  
• Amount of water inside the compartment was always displayed as infinity during the transport.
  
• If any problem occurs during time skipping, associated UI would remain indefinitely on the screen.
  
• There was a random bug due to which saving of game states was failing.
  
• It was possible to do two research tasks with the same officer. It was also possible to work on the same task two times.
  
• Fixed bug that could prevent from loading certain game states.
  
• Officers were sometimes not returning from a vacation.
  
• NPC groups were moving faster than it would result from their actual velocity.
  
• Batteries weren't recharging inside areas and fuel wasn't consumed.
  
• Batteries are now recharging considerably longer for better balance and historical accuracy.
  
• Canceling torpedo loading was often moving torpedo that was being loaded into a completely wrong place.
  
• Time compression was intensifying hull creaking above the normal level.
  
• Resource depletion estimations are now always estimated in real-time instead of in-game time as it's usually closer to what user wants to know.
  
• Resource tooltips are now refreshed each second to make countdowns look more natural.
  
• Getting out of upper bed in FPP was causing that all caps and other objects that shouldn't appear in FPP were visible.
  
• It was possible to duplicate items by moving them onto a slot that was during transport.
  
• Characters were taking more items into a backpack than ordered if certain steps were followed.
  
• Fixed changelog margins in the main menu.
  
• Fixed a few minor game state issues and one looping error that could affect performance.
  
• It's now possible to skip dialogues by clicking.
  
• Improved hitbox for some map markers.
  
• Officer alone couldn't provide reliable operation for the engines.
  
• Changed font style on activators to a sharper one.
  
• Various fixes to vacations. Undocking before the whole crew returns from vacation no longer places all remaining characters at one spot on the deck.
  
• Officers no longer think that long between automatic actions when time compression is enabled.
  
• Torpedo being warmed up by an engineer was occasionally invisible.
  
• Mission list was occasionally not appearing in Kiel.
  
• If the player ordered carrying items to opened storage instead from it, it would lead to erroneous behavior of characters carrying out this order.
  
• Carry progress label in the storage UI was often off.
  
• Cancellation of torpedo loading or warming order wasn't properly handled if the compartment became flooded. That was causing some aesthetic problems later.
  
• Fixed minor issues, if a player left to the menu during time skipping animation.
  
• Leaving to the menu by clicking the exit button on the defeat screen was causing various serious issues later in the game.
  
• German and polish localization fixes.
  
• Leaving to the menu after launching torpedoes could cause performance problems for some time.
  
• N-A1 freighters are now flammable.
  
• Balanced a bit of damage applied to NPC ships. N-A1 freighters are much easier to sink.
  
• Saving a game state immediately after vacation ended, would produce a game state in which some officers would be permanently gone.
  
• Improved loading times from the main menu by a few seconds.
  
• Fixed a few issues with certain actions staying on the order list despite that they were overridden by another order.
  
• Pressing SHIFT key while moving the camera in the section, orbit or map view speeds up the camera movement.
  
• Access to the items placed on the deck was hard in the section view.
  
• Actions whose target was despawned were causing occasional issues.
  
• Activator hover effect is now animated instantly.
  
• Vacation discipline gain modifiers were far greater than declared in the description.
  
• Russian localization fixes.
  
• Probably all cases of the crew moving out of the moveable area are now fixed.
  
• Fixed problem with torpedo mechanic instantly appearing on the upper deck during warming up of the torpedo, if the most intense time compression was used.
  
• Character smoking on the conning tower could get stuck and stay there after submerging.
  
• Aircraft are now usually spotted from a greater distance (up to 8 km for the default observators and up to 16 km for the officer with maxed out crew). Radar detectors are still considerably more reliable and less labor-intensive though.
  
• The officer assigned to the targeting sight is able to spot groups from a bit greater distance than before.
  
• Increased "Naxos" radar detector detection range.
  
• The crew could occasionally get stuck behind the stern and bow torpedo room bulkheads.
  
• Research progress bars weren't reliably updated in all cases.
  
• Sink ship missions should now have their targets chosen more wisely.
  
• It's no longer possible to order drinking a coffee without having any officer selected.
  
• Torpedo warm up order now works correctly when ordered without having any officer selected.
  
• Starting a vacation could instantly complete current HQ tasks.
  
• Arrows that represent resource changes over time could be pointed in the wrong direction in case of electricity when the ship was on the open sea.
  
• Various fixes to transport orders.
  
• Line of sight for periscope was sometimes blocked without reason and units weren't detected by it.
  

We've also wanted to thank you all for an astonishing amount of support in translating the game! We're still looking for those who are willing to help us in this endeavor!

Sailors! Dismissed!

Yours,
Deep Water Studio

To all International Sailors,

We need your help! We are adding new content to the game, and with that comes new text. Since you are experts in submarines, we thought you could help us out. Here's the list of languages we need assistance with.

• French
  
• Italian
  
• German
  
• Spanish - Spain
  
• Russian
  
• Korean
  
• Simplified Chinese
  
• Turkish
  

If you are interested in working with us on better translations, please send me a private message. You can also add me to friends. I'll provide some more details then.
https://steamcommunity.com/id/Korvettenkapitaen/

Let's be in touch!

Take care,
Korvettenkapitän


___________________________________________________


Once again thank you for all the help and comments. We have most of the languages covered. We need some more help in Russian and Turkish. If you would like to help in one of those languages, add me to friends, please.

I canceled all the previous friends' requests, as I was full :) So it is nothing personal! If you still want to talk to me, add me again.

Take care,
Korvettenkapitän

Hello Kriegsmarine,

We just release the biggest patch so far with lots of changes and already have a new one for you to test. We hope you'll enjoy it and leave some feedback!

• It's now possible to add custom music to the game. Please read README file in "(GAME_FOLDER)\UBOAT_Data\StreamingAssets\Packages\custom-music" to learn where to place your music files.
  
• Various modding improvements for summer's modding SDK introduction. Added support for raw audio and texture files and support for data sheet overrides in mods.
  

• Pausing or disabling time compression on the map was causing random camera movement.
  
• Sink ship objectives were sometimes duplicated.
  
• Increased fuel usage to achieve historical range only with some bonuses from an engineer working at the engines and/or leader at the navigator's station. It was very hard to run out of fuel on B121.
  
• Vacation could be bought without sufficient funds and cause the budget to dive below zero.
  
• Faster completion bonus of HQ tasks from a vacation (like Eagle's Nest) wasn't applied to tasks that were started before a vacation.
  
• Vacation notification had missing localizations.
  
• Reputation points count label in reputation purchases screen was often displaying a wrong value.
  
• Added sound effect for reputation purchases.
  

Talk to you soon!

Yours,
Deep Water Studio

Hello Sailors,

Thank you for your patience. We know it's been a while since we posted B121 at the unstable branch. Now, properly tested, we are giving it to all the players waiting. This is the biggest update so far. Lots of changes, plenty of fixes. We went to extremely deep waters with it for you. Without further ado, please take a look at the changes.

• Fast travel mode was removed from the game and replaced with a stronger time compression mode which functionally is pretty similar, but without forcing perspective, unnecessary cheating and added the possibility to use it at all times.
  
• Travel system was streamlined and no longer speeds up units depending on the current sea size etc. The time needed to pass X km on the world map should be just as expected. Please note though that time will still pass faster than normal even without time compression when the game is in the travel mode. We will probably add an alternative, realistic travel system at some point, but the current one will always be the default one in the game. With this update, it should be much closer to what simulation games community wants, while still being user-friendly.
  
• Officers gain and loss fatigue much more slowly.
  
• Fixed very numerous physics problems that were appearing at newly added high time compression level.
  
• Script optimizations for smoother performance when time compression is being used.
  
• Electricity consumption in travel mode was reworked.
  
• U-boat's range on diesel engines now matches the real values.
  

• Moving large quantities of goods from port and refitting u-boat is no longer instant and requires some off duty period.
  
• Crew gets weary over time when being very long on the sea and gains discipline penalties.
  
• Crew can be sent on a vacation to reset their mood, while u-boat is undergoing maintenance work.
  
• Added game mechanic for quickly skipping long periods of time while u-boat is off duty.
  
• U-boat upgrades now also require off duty time to be installed.
  

• It's now possible to open storages and torpedo storages to view their contents and issue transport/loading orders without having any officer selected. Such orders are later completed by officers with certain roles and their helpers.
  
• Added progress bars and labels to the storage UI that indicates, which items are currently being moved somewhere else.
  
• Transported items are now always dropped in a storage slot chosen by the player instead of the first free slot.
  
• Characters will carry items in both ways to save time if there are orders to transport goods in two directions between storages.
  
• It's now possible to buy shells directly into ammunition storages.
  

• Assignments are now completed after talking with the leading officer. They cannot be completed on the sea like before. This change, among other things, allows the player to report all events normally after completing the main objective of the assignment.
  
• Orbit view camera was improved to better present ship's bobbing/elevation changes while moving through the waves.
  
• Added new action icons on portraits: blowing ballast tanks, flooding ballast tanks, wounded, treatment.
  
• Fixes and improvements to many port textures.
  
• Reworked navigation table. It's no longer possible to get lost soon after navigator had worked for a substantial time at it.
  
• Added research for sonar decoys. Removed sonar decoys from the starting equipment.
  
• UI sound effects are now stereo panned and most of them are quieter by default.
  

• Crew's RAM and VRAM usage was considerably decreased.
  
• Generation of character meshes was rewritten to be as asynchronous as possible on the current version of the engine. It should fix the most common hiccups in the game occurring during weather changes, boarding crew, etc.
  
• Texture compression tasks are now asynchronous.
  
• Physics should run more smoothly near ports.
  

• Sun lens flare could be visible under water during sunsets. It could also be visible in some fogs.
  
• Fixed clearly visible boundary on the sea at some distance from the ports.
  
• Injured characters could get some automated orders.
  
• Font fixes.
  
• Camera could orbit target that was no longer visible.
  
• Buoyancy force is additionally stabilized when physics precision is decreased. It fixes exaggerated bounce of a few ship types on time compression.
  
• Rudders sway much less to the left and right when traveling forward with enabled time compression.
  
• Ambient occlusion was incorrect on lower levels of detail for characters, making the transition clearly visible.
  
• Sandbox could start with loading popup still on the screen.
  
• Characters were flickering after transitioning between the port and the deck.
  
• Diesel engines range estimation was off and didn't consider the engineer's skills.
  
• Time compression is becoming disabled after entering or leaving the travel mode.
  
• Player could enter land areas without seeing any notification aside from the paused time.
  
• Reflections on the sea were too foggy.
  
• Transfer count slider in the storage UI now takes into consideration remaining capacity of the target slot. It's no longer possible to declare transfer larger than possible.
  
• Leo Loris wasn't working on the actions queued in the global queue.
  
• Various fixes to torpedo storages bugs.
  
• Fixed exploit that was making instant torpedo loading possible.
  
• Torpedo loading tasks in the global order queue are now performed only by engineers following the torpedo mechanic role.
  
• Global order queue could hold only one non-ending action. It's no longer a case.
  
• Electric engines battery drain was lowered.
  
• Certain transport tasks could become stuck at 100%.
  
• Time compression now correctly stabilizes torque changes from buoyancy to make watching it more comfortable.
  
• Purchasing torpedoes into stern torpedo storage wasn't working.
  
• Carry item orders assigned to officer with helpers were sometimes ended prematurely with a few items left in the source storage.
  
• Quartermaster role wasn't working since 121 Preview 1.
  
• Quartermaster could transport a fractional number of shells to the ammunition storage. He was also never resupplying the storage completely and wasn't re-using slots in the storage.
  
• Displayed item count was often wrong when the slot was a target of a transport task.
  
• Code related to now deprecated skipping calendar dates feature was removed from the game. It had a minor impact on performance.
  
• Time skipping of the resupply at the port was often ended prematurely.
  
• Storage weight limits weren't respected if all items were queued to be moved at once between storages.
  
• Fixed multiple problems resulting from moving one shop item to a few u-boat's storage slots.
  
• Some crew members could start working with a briefcase or a backpack after vacation.
  
• Improved performance during time skipping in port.
  
• Headquarters task duration is now expressed in days, if appropriate, instead of hours to improve readability.
  
• Hydrophone can be now correctly downgraded to GHG at ports.
  
• Localization fixes.
  
• Selling items to the warehouse no longer resets their count.
  
• Items that aren't produced by a given country or are at a low stock are no longer restocked in the warehouses.
  
• Number keys no longer initiate dialogue options when various UIs opened through dialogue are open.
  
• Keyboard shortcuts could stop to work if a player left to the menu during a dialogue.
  
• Torpedo arm distances were adjusted for faster torpedo types (they were noticeably higher than for the slow ones).
  
• It's no longer possible to detect groups hidden behind land by any means.
  
• Various fixes to conning tower observation animations.
  
• One part of the conning tower wasn't being visually damaged by the explosions.
  
• Attempt at fixing Unity's background thread crash after entering HQ.
  
• Map grid could have a gap at the bottom part of the screen after entering the land area.
  
• Lens flare quality improvements. Fixed lens flare flickering every 10 minutes of in-game time.
  
• Ammunition Production I task wasn't doing anything due to a bug.
  
• Failed missions weren't handled properly and the player could get rewards for them.
  
• Espionage assignment fixes.
  
• Fixed Unity's background thread crash after entering HQ.
  
• Console wasn't properly displaying some messages after optimizations from B120.
  
• ON convoys could travel through the land on the way to Halifax.
  
• Physics of the items hanging on the hooks in the stern torpedo room could become permanently corrupted, especially when large time compressions were used.
  
• Torpedo mechanic could get stuck outside of the pressure hull after loading or warming torpedoes. Also, the end of the loading animation was erratic.
  
• Selection of portraits could stop working after performing certain steps.
  
• One part of VIIC u-boats was remaining visible even after losing them from the sight.
  
• Possible fix for duplicated/ghost units which couldn't be reported after sinking.
  
• Diver could become not selectable under certain circumstances.
  
• Leaving tutorial by clicking the button at the end was causing minor issues.
  
• Caps were sometimes visible in FPP.
  
• Minor storage UI fixes.
  
• Minor render pipeline fixes.
  
• Localization fixes.
  
• Underwater effect wasn't working inside flooded compartments since at least a few versions.
  
• Torpedo and hatch animations now respect current time scale. They were moving too fast on a pause and too slowly on a time compression.
  
• Activator banners react more consistently to being occluded by the scene elements (labels were previously unaffected).
  
• Loading screen music now respects current audio settings.
  
• Various fixes to first aid.
  
• Fixes to various path-finding related warnings that probably didn't have any impact.
  
• Multiple fixes to having two torpedo mechanics at the same time.
  
• Propeller audio effects were audible above the surface of the water for up to a few minutes after loading a game state. This problem could affect a few other audio effects too.
  
• Inactive characters that were on a vacation or investigating other ship were coming back to the scene after loading a game state.
  
• Reworked internal compartments of smaller units to make them more easily sinkable.
  
• Added balancing factor to the torpedo damage formula.
  
• Ships evacuated by the crew receive more damage and floodings are more likely to spread to simulate the fact that they lack any kind of direct damage control at such point.
  
• HQ now requires more definite sinkings for a reward.
  
• Font fixes.
  

You must admit, that looks impressive, but let's face it. We would never do it without you and your feedback. Once again, massive thank you for each conversation, each report, each review. You're the best!

Sailors! Dismissed!

Yours,
Deep Water Studio

Hello Sailors!

After silent running with blue lights on for two weeks and working on the next update, we are finally ready to share this version publicly. We try to be as open as possible about the production, but during major work, there is often not that much point in sharing what we have even on the unstable branch as that would be just a pure frustration for you and us :)

Let's move on and talk about the update B121 which is now being released on the "Unstable" branch. If you like to test it, change to it in the game properties from the Steam Library, but keep in mind that this is still a work in progress.


With this version, we overhauled the travel system in the game. The most visible change is that the fast travel mode is gone. We didn't like it, you didn't like it, nobody liked it seems, so we finally got rid of it.

Instead, there is a new time compression available that is 5x as strong as the base one. It allows you to leave areas in a decent time, similarly to the old "fast travel" mode, but it works in a much more cleaner fashion. It can be used at any point in the game without restrictions, while no cheating is involved and all laws of physics are respected. It was a major technical challenge, as physics tend to break easily on such fast time scales and we had to perform many optimizations, fixes and ensure proper handling of edge cases.

Another major change is that long distance travels on the map work differently than they used to. There were many technical changes which translate more or less to such end effects:

• Movement on the map is much slower without time compression. There is much more time to plan an attack on the nearby groups, if you prefer to play real-time without using the active pause.
  
• On the other hand, travel on the map is much faster than before, if the new time compression is used, so this change may satisfy both the patient and impatient players.
  
• All small cheats here and there were removed that translate to more realistic navigation.
  
• U-boat's range is set to real-life values.
  

Those changes address some of the suggestions we were getting from the community since the release. We hope you will like them.


Before this update, there wasn't any decent mechanism that would make it possible to play through the whole war in a reasonable time. We had one solution during the Kickstarter backer beta, namely skipping calendar dates, but it was a confusing solution. We removed it and planned a new system. Finally, we had time to implement that new system. Let's talk about the details.

• Resupplying your u-boat at the port is no longer instant and takes some time to be done. Your u-boat will be moved off-duty until all ordered equipment is loaded inside. You can skip the wait with a click of the button and continue normally. We didn't add any animations for the port workers so far, but we have such plans.
  
• Crew gets fatigued over time and needs a vacation from time to time. We found historical sources about places where u-boat crews were resting and added them into the game. You can send your guys to simply rest in the port city you are currently in or spend some budget and let them relax in a French Chateau or Eagle's Nest.
  
• New travel system ensures that patrols last much longer when it comes to passing in-game hours and days (it's also closer to real-life historical data).
  

These changes ensure that time will progress much faster and potentially allow the player to play through the whole World War II which was always our intention for UBOAT.

We balanced the game accordingly to match these changes. All HQ tasks take much more time to be researched and officers get fatigued much more slowly, which was also a commonly requested change.




To implement the delayed resupply of the ship at ports we had to improve the user interface for storages to make such information readable. It was an unexpected work that lead us to a major change how the storages are used and delayed this update by a week.

Starting with this version it's possible to open storages and plan all logistics without having any officer selected. All transport tasks are later completed by officers with certain roles and sailors under their command.

It's also possible to plan ahead the torpedo loadout and don't let your officer choose it automatically.

All ongoing transport tasks are clearly presented in the storage's user interface.

Another change, is that it's now possible to purchase ammunition directly into a gun's storage.




With this version, we worked on some tougher technical matters that needed some time to be done. The game should generally run more smoothly, with better performance and lower RAM / VRAM usage.

Have you ever noticed lags appearing before and after each rain in the game or after adding new sailors to the crew? They were caused by rebuilding geometry for the characters. Considering that the u-boat is pretty densely packed with unique characters we are displaying them in a very optimized way which has this downside that some CPU work is needed to get it going after each change of the clothing like equipping a raincoat. Starting with this version, it's a fully asynchronous process and those lags won't bother you anymore.


Starting with this version rewards for assignments are received only after talking with the leading officer in the port rather than clicking a button on the open sea. This change keeps the mission open until that point. It allows you to report all sunk ships and other events normally after completing the main objective of your assignment. It was a small oversight in the design that we didn't manage to fix for the initial Early Access version.


You're truly amazing. Thank you for all the conversations we have. We listen to each and every one of you. Your voice is heard and we take it all into consideration. Please play the new patch and let us know what you think.

Yours,
Deep Water Studio