A submarine simulator is usually a

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedback ...

in which the player commands a

submarine A submarine (or sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability. The term is also sometimes used historically or colloquially to refer to remotely op ...

. The usual form of the game is to go on a series of missions, each of which features a number of encounters where the goal is to sink

surface ship Surface combatants (or surface ships or surface vessels) are a subset of naval warships which are designed for warfare on the surface of the water, with their own weapons and armed forces. They are generally ships built to fight other ships, subma ...

s and to survive counterattacks by

destroyer In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed ...

s. Submarine simulators are notable for the highly-variable pace of the game; it may take hours of simulated time to get into position to attack a well-defended

convoy A convoy is a group of vehicles, typically motor vehicles or ships, traveling together for mutual support and protection. Often, a convoy is organized with armed defensive support and can help maintain cohesion within a unit. It may also be used ...

, and sub simulators typically include an option for players to adjust the ratio of real time to simulated time up and down as desired. Most submarine simulators use

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

as the setting; its submarine warfare was lengthy and intense, the historical material is extensive, and the limited capabilities of the period's submarines place a high premium on game playing skill. Games usually feature either US submarines in the Pacific Ocean, or German

U-boat U-boats were naval submarines operated by Germany, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Although at times they were efficient fleet weapons against enemy naval warships, they were most effectively used in an economic warfare ro ...

s in the Atlantic Ocean. Another popular category is modern

attack submarine An attack submarine or hunter-killer submarine is a submarine specifically designed for the purpose of attacking and sinking other submarines, surface combatants and merchant vessels. In the Soviet and Russian navies they were and are called ...

s, especially those of the also known as "688s" after the hull identification number of the first vessel of the class. Game displays generally include an overhead map or "radar" view, showing the submarine and any ships whose position can be detected, the

periscope A periscope is an instrument for observation over, around or through an object, obstacle or condition that prevents direct line-of-sight observation from an observer's current position. In its simplest form, it consists of an outer case with ...

view if the sub is close enough to the surface, a set of gauges showing depth and course, and a boat plan showing

torpedo A modern torpedo is an underwater ranged weapon launched above or below the water surface, self-propelled towards a target, and with an explosive warhead designed to detonate either on contact with or in proximity to the target. Historically, ...

availability, damage to various subsystems and other in-game issues that may arise. The first submarine simulator available to the civilian public was Thorn EMI's '' Submarine Commander'' of 1982.

Titles

The adventure game '' Codename: ICEMAN'' (1989) by

Sierra On-line Sierra Entertainment, Inc. (formerly On-Line Systems and Sierra On-Line, Inc.) was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genr ...

contained a submarine simulator portion. The vehicle simulator game '' Naval Ops: Warship Gunner 2'' (2006) by

Koei Koei Co., Ltd. was a Japanese video game publisher, developer, and distributor founded in 1978. The company is known for its ''Dynasty Warriors'' games based on the novel ''Romance of the Three Kingdoms'', as well as simulation games based on p ...

features submarine hulls & puts the player through several submarine piloting missions, though several other missions are also restricted against submarine use.

AUV simulators

There are also a number of simulators available for underwater

robots "\n\n\n\n\nThe robots exclusion standard, also known as the robots exclusion protocol or simply robots.txt, is a standard used by websites to indicate to visiting web crawlers and other web robots which portions of the site they are allowed to visi ...

such as

AUV An autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is a robot that travels underwater without requiring input from an operator. AUVs constitute part of a larger group of undersea systems known as unmanned underwater vehicles, a classification that includes ...

s. These simulators are commonly used by research institutes for testing robot control and coordination algorithms before or during the development of a submarine. One of them is UWSim, the Underwater Simulator, which was developed in the IRSLab for marine robotics research and development. UWSim started with the RAUVI and TRIDENT research projects as a tool for testing and integrating perception and control algorithms before running them on the real robots and has continued its development until today.

References

External links

Subsim.com, a comprehensive information and review siteIRSLabUWSim
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