UBOAT Console Review

Styling itself as a spiritual successor to the popular Silent Hunter series, UBOAT is a World War II submarine sim that places you in command of your own crew, patrolling the North Sea. Developed by Deep Water Studio, it offers a rich, detailed simulation that, like most games in the genre, comes with a steep learning curve with many plates to spin. Console players will also have to contend with inherently awkward controls, sifting through menus and action screens that were clearly designed for keyboard and mouse.

You can jump into one of several campaigns, each taking place during different flashpoints as the war rages across Europe. This timeline will determine several factors, such as the occupation of various ports and territories, as well as the availability of more advanced torpedoes. Whatever campaign you choose, and whichever submarine you start with, there’s no option to change your faction. As the name implies, UBOAT is focused on the Kriegsmarine, which naturally means playing from the perspective of Nazi Germany.

UBOAT wants you to develop an intimate knowledge of the vessel under your command. Actions that sound relatively simple, such as mapping a course, scanning for enemies, or firing a torpedo, each require several steps to complete, with various factors and resource checks determining their success. For example, attempting to track down another vessel in the North Sea will require assigning a crewmate to listen for contacts, using the hydrophone to triangulate a location. You’ll need to then assign another crew member to man the periscope and manually identify any vessels that come into sight, all while trying to keep a low profile. This is all done while keeping an eye on not just your fuel, but electric power, morale, and air quality too.

Even on its most casual difficulty setting, UBOAT throws players in at the deep end. It’s just that kind of game. Fans of hardcore simulations will revel in the game’s immersive web of overlays, dials, gauges, and menus, while newcomers may want to pare back many of these features, offloading and automating tasks such as setting daily schedules for each crew member. If you’re a total maniac (or just so happen to be a submarine boffin) you can go the opposite way, micromanaging to your heart’s content and engaging in the most authentic, most rewarding UBOAT experience.

The tutorials do a decent job of explaining core concepts, though it will take a long time before you feel adept at handling engagements with other ships. Launching torpedoes is where the real action is at, though these set pieces take a lot of preparation to pull off, calculating the size, range, speed, and bearing of a target before lining up a missile perfectly. Again, for those playing on harder difficulties, this process is a lot more involved, as you use rulers and protractors to work out your calculations, even whipping out a stopwatch to monitor how fast an enemy ship is moving while monitoring them via the periscope.

Those moments of practiced ingenuity, narrow escapes, and unexpected scenarios will form an emergent narrative as you progress through the campaign. Not only will your knowledge of the game’s systems grow over time, your crew will also advance and learn new skills as you unlock various submarine upgrades, allowing you to tackle tougher assignments.

Bringing such a dense simulation game to consoles wasn’t going to be the smoothest of transitions. While it’s perfectly playable using a gamepad, there is a constant sense of unwieldiness as you cycle between the various icons and menus, using a combination of button shortcuts and the on-screen mouse. This is very much a PC-first game, and although UBOAT only hit version 1.0 a year ago, the game spent half a decade in early access being tweaked and refined for players who favour keyboard and mouse.

The visuals aren’t exactly pushing console hardware to the max, either, though it’s hard to poke too many holes in UBOAT’s presentation. The menus and UI manage to streamline a wealth of information in a way that’s easy to process, even under pressure. There’s nothing uncanny in the way crewmates look or move around the submarine, though you’ll usually be seeing them from a distance, focusing more on the carefully recreated vessels themselves.