Silent Hunter® 2

People always say to buy the newer version of the game, but forget that *everything* that UbiSoft makes now has DRM in it. Removing it is horrendously hard and every time that I've had it get on my machine, it bricks my DVD drive, resulting in me having to reinstall it after wiping all of the DVD drivers out of the OS and manually re-installing them(as well as doing the same in the registry). Full hour long process. I have almost thirty games that I bought over the years from EA games, Ubisoft, and others, that are no longer installed on my machine because of their DRM getting out of control. As a result, I am elated at this move by GoG. I'd rather play SH2 without DRM infecting my machine any day over SH3.

Next to Destroyer Command SH 2 was mi first sim I played on PC. Silent Hunter series always keeps high standard and this is best example. Game merges advanatages of it's precursor with high technology standards adequate to beginning of current decade. In game you are captain of U-boat and will fight for glory od the III Reich. Durring work on game developers had great advisor, german submarine ace Erich Topp. When games was released there wasn't any competition for her. Silent Hunter 2 was king of marine simulations. Oustanding graphic, dynamic campaign, single historcal missions (like Gunter Priens raid on Scapa Flow and sinking Royal Oak) oppnents with godd AI, great movie sequences and multimedia presentations. You can't say you know SH series without play in Silent Hunter 2.

Silent Hunter is best submarine simulator series that PC received ever. At first greets you nice splash screen & stirring music inspired by Das Boot and Aces of The Deep themes. Game alows you to play single scenarios with couple of traing missions, histrorica campaigh with many events of U-boat war to participate ( Dunkirk evacuation, Sacapa Flow attack, severe British supply lines to Malta etc.). 3D graphic looks quite nice for it's time. You have free view to any direction, interior look in captain's cabin is nice too (too bad it's only place with interior look). Next thing worth mentiong are impressive sounds. For example electric hum durring raising periscope, awasome explosions of depth charges and german voices of crew rendered with passion. You actually feel like was there. Newbies and casual players will be happy of easy to read zoomable map. Hardcore sim players can turn on 'limited visibility' options or 'limited target data', similar to SH 3&4 realism option. Silent Hunter II replacesd SH I and Aces.. as new king of subsims...

I spent many months playing this game when I was in high-school. I consider SH3 to be superior when it comes to simulation quality but there is one thing I liked better in SH2: career. In SH3 career is 100% realistic, ie. patrol a given area of the map. After doing tenths of patrols it really got boring. In SH2 missions are about doing something special, for example getting into Scapa Flow and sinking Royal Oak. While each mission by itself may be realistic, no single U-Boot commander did all of this during his career. That said I am happy give up on that small bit of realism for a more interesting career mode that is a real pleasure to complete.