Dear Skippers,

We are back with the next major update to UBOAT. This one is probably the largest update to the game so far. If you haven't tried it by now on the testing branch, then hopefully it will surprise you in a good way!

We already described the first features of this update when it hit the testing branch for insiders:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/494840/announcements/detail/1612779851182114038
During the testing it became even bigger though, so let's discuss the new features one by one.

BRIEFING

Assignments are now selected in a new way that gives you a much cleaner overview of the objectives and area of operation.

MISSION CONTENT

You can expect new challenges like a battleship presence in the area of operation as well as some twist to existing missions. Sometimes a war correspondent will join your crew, while in other times you may be given a task to test experimental torpedoes.

Some of the objectives and rewards for existing assignments were also reworked.

DECORATIONS

All your officers will collect points toward decorations of various types. They are awarded for notable bravery in combat or veterancy.

MISSION SUMMARY

New mission summary presents a much more cleaner overview of completed objectives, collected rewards as well as a log from the patrol.

MODDING

Talented modders from the community already created mods that draw attention. Since this version is now going public, Steam Workshop now also becomes publicly available.

If you would like to start modding for yourself, check our guide on the game's wiki:

https://uboat.fandom.com/wiki/Modding

OTHER CHANGES

Aside from that, there was a few other notable additions:

• Sea near Bergen is now much more deeper and much closer to the real world bathymetry maps.
  
• It's now possible to move in FPP on the step at the front of the conning tower like the crew does, to clearly see what's in the front of the u-boat.
  
• Collision damage and sounds.
  
• German localization was updated (warm thanks to Ruby for providing it).
  

TROUBLESHOOTING

This update adds a considerable amount of new content and thus memory usage had to go up a bit. We implemented new optimizations to the game to offset that, but it's still going to be 10% - 15% higher than before. It probably won't affect most systems.

If your system is low on memory though or you use a software that consumes a large part of RAM you can increase the page file in Windows like described in this article to avoid problems (12 GB should be more than enough):

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/how-to-manage-virtual-memory-pagefile-windows-10,36929.html

Also, if you would experience any sort of crashes, please verify game files integrity in Steam by entering game properties, going to "Local Files" tab and clicking appropriate button there.

Yours,
Deep Water Studio