Fallout 3 Thread

[newconroer]

My single 4850 destroys this game with 8x AA 16x ASF solid 60fps at all times. Trust me you wont want to touch cod after a good 5 hour session in this game.

He's being a bit exxagerative, though it's not too far off the truth.

4X AA without Edge Detect and 15(not 16) using the game's own AF system, will yield primarily 55-60 fps(even outdoors) in about 85% of the game world. There are times, when looking out over a long distance where it can drop into the 40s. However, it's not sluggish.

If you want to really enjoy the game, I would wait several more months until both the DLC(official released content additions) and the third party mod community packs are released, and then play it.

I only suggest this so you can enjoy it more, as the texture resolution is kinda sub-par, the LOD system is pea-soup like Oblivions was, and the main quest can go rather quickly.

Otherwise, I do highly recommend it, and it's my vote for GOTY.

True it's well optimized, even me on an older machine can run at medium to high with some tweaking.. XD and no slowdowns very addictive!

I don't think that's a fair description. People use that term way too often and way too losely. They think because something runs well that it's 'optimized.'

Oblivion runs smashing for me nowdays..but that's nowdays..because of the hardware available. Yet it's still coded like ass.

Fallout 3 is sorely lacking in three things that can crunch the numbers on a CPU and a GPU.

1) LOD detail, object count and scaling
2) Texture resolution
3) Shaders

In reality, it's a slimmed down, but also crisper version of the GameBryo engine. It's true, they have improved it slightly, but it's the lack of visual demand from the game itself that is the primary reason for it's performance; not because it's "well optimized."

I don't think at the end of the day it really matters, however it is good to share the truth with people when they are prospecting something. If anyone was falsely given the impression that Fallout 3 was producing Crysis like graphics, than they'd be sorely dissapointed. However if you said "think Oblivion in a suburban wasteland" then, you've given them something much more appropriate to go on.

 

[TheMailMan78]

I noticed the resolution on the textures seem rather low. Even on the highest settings. The game is beautiful but can these be increased via an .ini file?

 

[Mussels]

I noticed the resolution on the textures seem rather low. Even on the highest settings. The game is beautiful but can these be increased via an .ini file?

possibly a leftover from the game being designed on consoles. i'm curious too, if its possible to raise that.

Interlaced rarely looks superior to progressive when lots of movement is on the screen, even if the res is higher imo, especially on a flat screen. I take 720p over 1080i most of the time. I can't wait until they figure out better technology for the flat screens, I hate pixel composition.

Laser screens are on the way. Save that for another thread

 

[TheMailMan78]

possibly a leftover from the game being designed on consoles. i'm curious too, if its possible to raise that.

That sucks. In honor of how much that sucks I made this.

 

[newconroer]

The main theory is that they used lower resolution imaging for the consoles and kept them for the PC version so they could fit it all on one disk.


No ini. file adjustments will increase them.

Furthering that, a lot of the LOD parameters seem to do very little, with exception to UGridscount, but that tears away performance without proper scaling, and also can introduce visual anomalies.

Currently, you can find a few of the textures, in higher resolution here :
http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/dload.php?action=file&file_id=1200

I don't know if the author states it in the readme, but he has stated in the forums that the 1024 (Ultra) resolutions, were actually scaled down, so not really 1024 at all. He then went on to produce one at 2048.

I expect someone will do this with a lot more of them, as Qarl did with Oblivion.

As for LOD adjustments and detail increase, I have seen nothing, nor heard of anyone working on it.

Having said that though, with fully scaled 2048 textures, and increased LOD, I bet we'd see the frames drop from 55-60, to more like 40-45 on everage, maybe even worse; and thus the 'well optimized' engine won't seem so optimized anymore.

 

[Widjaja]

You clearly have not expereinced gaming at 19xx on a 28 inch screen .

Yeh one of the reasons why I didn't get a big monitor.
My brother on the other hand refuses to play any less than 1080i on his 24" widescreen.
So of course he doesn't play oblivion.

 

[ste2425]

So of course he doesn't play oblivion.

why wont he i dont understand

 

[psyko12]

Well "optimized" or not it is still a good game, rofl, so many "picky" gamers here...

No offense meant here.

BTW:

There are some mods already out but which ones did you guys tried or used. Recommend a good one. Some of it replaces textures as mentioned above, others fixes or changes UI and such. Can any1 here who have used a mod suggest a good 1. Thanks. I'm on my 3rd playthru, as a bad girl

 

[ShadowFold]

Doesn't geck come out tomorrow?

 

[psyko12]

Well there are mods out already... I dunno if they're made from GECK or other editor... There are UI/Pipboy mods and some armor skins... found on No Mutants Allowed forums and Fallout nexus.

This one for example modifies the game alot so it balances stuff here and there, and also implements the old game play style of needing AP to access pipboy etc. Also adds slow leveling, I my self have not yet tried this out but upon reading the description it changes the game play and some perks on FO3 vanilla.

Fallout 3 Compendium

 

[CDdude55]

Should i get Fallout 3 or is there a better PC game out i could get? I hear Farcry 2 is crap.

I am not sure if Fallout will run its best on my system(expecally my GPU)

 

[farlex85]

Should i get Fallout 3 or is there a better PC game out i could get? I hear Farcry 2 is crap.

I am not sure if Fallout will run its best on my system(expecally my GPU)

It won't run it's best but it should be relatively smooth at medium settings low res I would think. Did you like Oblivion? If so, definitely give this one a shot. If not, well, I'd still try it, but it may not be your cup o tea (unless the main thing you didn't like about oblivion was the midevil stuff).

 

[AphexDreamer]

Should i get Fallout 3 or is there a better PC game out i could get? I hear Farcry 2 is crap.

I am not sure if Fallout will run its best on my system(expecally my GPU)

You can run it. If not Fallout 3 which was shorter than I expected, then you could consider Left 4 Dead. Best game I've played all this year. Then its Fallout 3.

 

[CDdude55]

It won't run it's best but it should be relatively smooth at medium settings low res I would think. Did you like Oblivion? If so, definitely give this one a shot. If not, well, I'd still try it, but it may not be your cup o tea (unless the main thing you didn't like about oblivion was the midevil stuff).

Oblivion was pretty good, and i do like medevil syle games.

Even tho i am not a big fan of Stalker with all the talking and walking. Is it like that?

 

[CDdude55]

You can run it. If not Fallout 3 which was shorter than I expected, then you could consider Left 4 Dead. Best game I've played all this year. Then its Fallout 3.

My brother is going to buy Left 4 Dead(loved the demo and we share same steam account)

Was going to get Farcry 2 but everyone is saying to me that is not worth it. So the next good game i could think of is Fallout 3.

 

[ShadowFold]

My brother is going to buy Left 4 Dead(loved the demo and we share same steam account)

Was going to get Farcry 2 but everyone is saying to me that is not worth it. So the next good game i could think of is Fallout 3.

Farcry 2 was one of the biggest disappointments ever for me. Terrible game, fell flat on its abysmal ass. Fallout 3 on the other hand reminds of Fallout 2 in a good way even tho it doesn't have as much in common with F2 its still amazing and GECK is coming out this month so people are going to be making a ton of awesome mods for it!

 

[CDdude55]

Farcry 2 was one of the biggest disappointments ever for me. Terrible game, fell flat on its abysmal ass. Fallout 3 on the other hand reminds of Fallout 2 in a good way even tho it doesn't have as much in common with F2 its still amazing and GECK is coming out this month so people are going to be making a ton of awesome mods for it!

Thanks for the info, i waiting for Farcry 2 for a while but i can pickup Fallout 3 instead.

 

[erocker]

Far Cry 2 was decent for me, but that's about it. I played through it and haven't returned to it since. It will be a good game to pick up on a sale rack or something.. Fallout 3 on the otherhand I've beaten twice and still play it. Great game.

 

[newconroer]

If you played Fallout 1 and 2, and was a real nerd about it ;anal retentive; about the details and lore, then Fallout 3 might rub you the wrong way.

If you didn't, then there's no problem.

If you liked Oblivion, and it's 'feel' or 'style,' then Fallout 3 will be right up your alley. And I feel most people liked the ability to have projectile weapons as opposed to melee only as in Oblivion (I know there was magic for projectile, but it's not quite the same thing...)

I believe there's more 'dungeons' to explore in Fallout 3, and they are easier to run into, as opposed to Oblivion's caves, that were constantly hidden under some ledge of shrubbery and very easy to miss while exploring.

As previously mentioned, the only real downside is it's lacking a bit visually and the main story is too short. Most other minor issues are just that, minor, and can be mostly assauged through a mod of some sorts.


So far I haven't seen a good realism MOD. The one that's currently out there seems more like a penalty MOD. It reminds me of the scaling of difficulty in most shooter games. There's easy/novice, which is for really old people, the dyslexic, possibly the mentally handicapped, and eight year olds. Then you have medium/normal flavor, which is usually the sweet spot in regards to AI/realism; followed by hard/difficult or 'nightmare' or whatever they want to call it, and this isn't any more difficult in an AI or technical sense, rather it's just an overwhelming amount of enemies, who have super amounts of resistances and health and etc.etc.

Hence the current 'realism' mods, seem to go away from realism, and move more towards exaggerated penalties or overwhelming odds against you.

The best thing to do is start the game on normal or hard. When you get to teens levels, when you have some good perks under your belt, and a decent proficiency with a certain type of weapon set, as well as a good amount of ammo with sufficient armor, then you can switch to very hard from within the game's menu(yes, you can actually change the difficult of the enemies without needing a mod or anything special).

This will net you more experience per kill, but enemies take noticeably longer to kill, and are much more resistant to VATS hits.



I definatley recommend it over Far Cry 2. Far Cry 2 is cool because of some of it's features, like the spreading fire, the weapon's maintenance, the amount of Point of View use and etc.; but it's just so damned repetitive, and while I personally like traversing game landscape en route to and from missions, in Far Cry 2, you travel the same landscape over and over and over, with frustrating distances in between.

I played it a lot, and still only reached about 30%, not even reaching the second map. I assume the second map is where it gets slightly better, especially with the unlocking of things like the AR 16 assault rifle(yes such a thing does really exist), but I just cannot be bothered. And besides, I'm really tired of games of any genre, especially progression based games, where you have to wait and wait until a certain level or area before you can finally get something decent that makes the game enjoyable. If the game isn't enjoyable from within the first half hour, then what's the point?

As for Left 4 Dead. It's definatley not what the original project sounded like some years ago. It's fun, I'll give it that, but there's nothing technical about it. It really is just a spray and splatter super arcade fest for online play.
It's definatley not something I'd pay full price for, and wouldn't dare put it in the same league as something like Fallout 3.


Don't forget, Stalker Clear Skies is around. It runs pretty well, especially in Vista, and it's a lot more open ended(despite the Far Cry 2 claim of 'open world' which it's not. Go off the map and you pass out from a sudden sandstorm...) and replayable than Far Cry 2.

 

[ShadowFold]

If you played Fallout 1 and 2, and was a real nerd about it ;anal retentive; about the details and lore, then Fallout 3 might rub you the wrong way.

Only if you cringe and cry in a corner if something changes. I played the hell out of fallout 2 and I was pretty into it and 3 did not let me down one bit. They just adapted it to today's standards.

 

[CDdude55]

If you don't like Stalker much will you like Fallout 3?

 

[ShadowFold]

If you don't like Stalker much will you like Fallout 3?

Its a lot different from stalker

 

[CDdude55]

Its a lot different from stalker

Oh, i have Clear Sky, and its ok i just dont like a whole lot of talking and not enough action.(there maybe more action somewhere at the end)

 

[ShadowFold]

Oh, i have Clear Sky, and its ok i just dont like a whole lot of talking and not enough action.(there maybe more action somewhere at the end)

My gun did a whole lotta talking in both games not sure what you mean tho.

 

[farlex85]

Oh, i have Clear Sky, and its ok i just dont like a whole lot of talking and not enough action.(there maybe more action somewhere at the end)

Fallout 3 is first and foremost an RPG, so be prepared to talk. Although, w/ the amount of freedom the game gives you I suppose you could just go ahead and kill everything that walks, but that isn't always advantageous.