Silent Hunter V: Battle of the Atlantic

Silent Hunter V: Battle of the Atlantic is a submarine simulation for Microsoft Windows developed by Ubisoft Romania and published by Ubisoft.

Overview


Silent Hunter V takes players behind the periscope of a German Type VII U-boat to take on the Allied Forces in battles across the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea. Players command the U-boat as a submarine captain from a first-person view in a campaign that spans 1939-1943.

Key features

 * Ability to walk through all of the submarine in first-person view.
 * Direct crew interaction and a simulation of the tension and fear of the crew.
 * A new objective-driven dynamic campaign mode
 * Allied ships will respond to players advances and new locations, upgrades and resupply will alter the campaign dynamically.
 * A brand-new user interface supporting a beginner mode and a mode where the player can control the whole submarine on their own.
 * Improved graphics and realism.
 * A DRM-system which requires a constant connection to the Internet.

Reception
GameZone's Steven Hopper gave the game a 5 out of 10, saying "The game offers some deep elements, but the overwhelming interface and steep learning curve make it very difficult to get into. The campaign missions are fairly low-key, with quick missions not really matching the depth of the gameplay. Many bugs and performance issues will also bog down your ability to enjoy the game."

DRM restrictions
In January 2010, Ubisoft announced the Online Services Platform, which forces customers to not only authenticate on the first game launch, but to remain online continually while playing, with the game pausing if the network connection is lost. This makes it impossible to play the game offline or resell it, and means that should Ubisoft's servers go down, the game would be unplayable. Silent Hunter V uses this DRM solution.

Within 24 hours of the games release, pirated copies turned up on torrent and newsgroups sites with the activation disabled but not fully removed, allowing users to copy and play only a portion of the game without needing an active internet connection. On March 7, Ubisoft's servers experienced an outage, rendering the game temporarily unplayable for around 5% of users. The server failure was caused by a Distributed Denial of Service attack. Ubisoft also released a statement via Twitter on March 8, stating that Silent Hunter V remains uncracked. On July 12, a new crack for Silent Hunter 5 was released. Gaming news sites have not yet commented on the crack.

Server Downtime
On the 7th of March 2010, at approximately 8pm GST, Ubisoft's DRM servers for Silent Hunter 5 and Assassin's Creed 2 were taken offline and kept down for nearly 24 hours. Ubisoft claimed that this was a result of the number of users attempting to access their servers to play. As a result of this downtime, legitimate owners of both games were unable to log in and play them in any form. Ubisoft later released a statement claiming that hackers were attacking the DRM servers, retracting their previous claim. The servers were attacked again on the 9th of march, with Ubisoft claiming on their Twitter page that they were attempting to repair the problem.

Germany Recall
The Collectors Edition of the game has been recalled in Germany, after it was discovered that the publisher failed to remove a portion of Silent Hunter 5's World War II symbols, such as swastika flags which wasn't in accordance with German law. German law prohibits the distribution of video games with certain Nazi symbols such as swastikas and SS runes.