Fallout Cascadia, pretty much fallout 4.5

[Varithina]

Never modded FO4 (no interest) but I can say from experience that modding Skyrim isn't fun.  Since the script language and CKs are similar that translates to modding FO4 as not being fun.

 

Imagine making a new world space with a small village in it.  Have to do all of the exteriors and interiors, link doors and activators, multiple quests and scripts for the most basic things in the game, create NPCs, do dialogue, and on and on and on.  Just doing something small would take one modder probably a month if modding is all they did in their free time.  That's why these total conversions for Skyrim take so long and why they usually end up being bugfests for some users, that is if they get completed.  This isn't necessarily the fault of the modders but the game itself.  Before Skyrim, modding a Bethesda game wasn't a chore.  Now it is and it's very easy to get disheartened and quit working on projects.

 

From what I have seen the fallout 4 ck is worse than the skyrim one, they look the same but the way things are done is much different.

 

I tried to make in effect the magic bag from skyrim to fallout, trying to use the ingame modding system to get the upgrade from say +10 to +20 carry capacity, in the end I gave up, the keywords, cross linking of item mods/constuctable objects and what not, and without any real ck wiki help on how its done.

[Kendo 2]

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

[Love Space]

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

The game gives you 4 options which sums to. It was done because voice acting, toomany options would be bad for the devs.

Yes, Yes, Sarcastic (but Yes), and No (I have to go). 

Either way, I can deal with it. It's a fun to play and this mod will be fun to play to.

Edit: Because I'm starting to see comments about it now. I don't want to discuss this off topic no longer, I was only asking if the mod will include more dialogue because the main character wont probably speak for obvious reasons.

[Kendo 2]

Not gonna talk about the pros and cons of FO4 since they're subjective. I played the game and gave it more than a fair chance.  That's all I have to say.  

[Kimy]

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

 

Because a console controller has four buttons. Seriously, there can't be a sane reason for that other than that. If you even call forcing a genre on a platform clearly not designed to run this type of game "sane". I don't. RPG games are stuck with laughably clumsy UIs and dumbed down simplified gameplay for ages now - for no reason other than their makers wanted to additionally cash in from console ports. It's sad, really.

[Sigmund Fried]

There are some areas where modding FO4 is easier than Skyrim and others where it's much harder and super convoluted. The greatest pain in FO4 is the dialogue system. It's hands down the worst of its kind I have ever seen. Every single dialogue is a scene now, and the player has always -exactly- four options. No more, no less. You need five options? No go! You need just 2? No go! It's four or bust. For that reason it's impossible to merge your dialogue choices with what the vanilla game or other mods provide. Also, every single branching option needs a new scene. No, I am not kidding. And all that garbage just because the game needed to run more smoothly on consoles. Gah!

 

I also had to laugh how stupid hard it is to make a custom weapon in FO4. You have to use a combination of leveled lists, formlists, several mods and even a start enabled quest to put a unique weapon into the world. It's laughably dumb and a good example for how needlessly complicated CK is. Sometimes I have the feeling that they added stuff without any greater plan or vision of what they actually wanted the engine to be able to do. CK feels like features got constantly added by interns over lunch break because some designers needed them in 30 mins. If you compare CK to Bioware's Aurora engine, where everything just made sense and looked thought through, it's a major letdown.

 

But the biggest obstacle is creating levels itself, really. Just open any existing level and have a look. Yes, it's as complicated as it looks. The world editor is an absolute pain to use and I bow my head in awe to anyone able to create a good looking interior level with it. Skyrim was bad already, but FO4 world creation requires some masochist tendencies.

 

On the plus side, FO4 Papyrus is much more powerful than its Skyrim equivalent. You can actually do a lot of things without script extenders these days, or having to write super dirty code to get it done. Yay!

 

Let's not forget that FO4 already stretches CK to its limits - and anything that tries to run the damn game.

 

I can run Skyrim heavily loaded with mods on my baked potato of an HP laptop. Sure, it runs hot enough to attract Sidewinder missiles, but apart from a few brief freezes and stuttering in densely packed areas, it runs fine. Fallout 4? Forget it. I could grill a steak well-done on the graphics card just being in the same cell as most of Boston.

 

I'm half-tempted to just get it for PS4 so that I can at least play it, but considering how deeply offended I am by the very idea of having fixed character backstories in what is supposed to be an open-world RPG with full character creation (and the whole four dialog options thing), I think I'll just get NieR: Automata or Horizon Zero Dawn instead to satisfy my open-world RPG itch.

[alucrad90]

 

There are some areas where modding FO4 is easier than Skyrim and others where it's much harder and super convoluted. The greatest pain in FO4 is the dialogue system. It's hands down the worst of its kind I have ever seen. Every single dialogue is a scene now, and the player has always -exactly- four options. No more, no less. You need five options? No go! You need just 2? No go! It's four or bust. For that reason it's impossible to merge your dialogue choices with what the vanilla game or other mods provide. Also, every single branching option needs a new scene. No, I am not kidding. And all that garbage just because the game needed to run more smoothly on consoles. Gah!

 

I also had to laugh how stupid hard it is to make a custom weapon in FO4. You have to use a combination of leveled lists, formlists, several mods and even a start enabled quest to put a unique weapon into the world. It's laughably dumb and a good example for how needlessly complicated CK is. Sometimes I have the feeling that they added stuff without any greater plan or vision of what they actually wanted the engine to be able to do. CK feels like features got constantly added by interns over lunch break because some designers needed them in 30 mins. If you compare CK to Bioware's Aurora engine, where everything just made sense and looked thought through, it's a major letdown.

 

But the biggest obstacle is creating levels itself, really. Just open any existing level and have a look. Yes, it's as complicated as it looks. The world editor is an absolute pain to use and I bow my head in awe to anyone able to create a good looking interior level with it. Skyrim was bad already, but FO4 world creation requires some masochist tendencies.

 

On the plus side, FO4 Papyrus is much more powerful than its Skyrim equivalent. You can actually do a lot of things without script extenders these days, or having to write super dirty code to get it done. Yay!

 

Let's not forget that FO4 already stretches CK to its limits - and anything that tries to run the damn game.

 

I can run Skyrim heavily loaded with mods on my baked potato of an HP laptop. Sure, it runs hot enough to attract Sidewinder missiles, but apart from a few brief freezes and stuttering in densely packed areas, it runs fine. Fallout 4? Forget it. I could grill a steak well-done on the graphics card just being in the same cell as most of Boston.

 

I'm half-tempted to just get it for PS4 so that I can at least play it, but considering how deeply offended I am by the very idea of having fixed character backstories in what is supposed to be an open-world RPG with full character creation (and the whole four dialog options thing), I think I'll just get NieR: Automata or Horizon Zero Dawn instead to satisfy my open-world RPG itch.

 

 

NieR is an 1-line rpg with a world you can go anywhere.

 

Horizon...is such a thing too.

 

[Kendo 2]

They also have a small army of writers.  That's gonna be a continuity problem.

[Kimy]

They have 13 concept artists and 2 environment artists.

 

I can't even begin to describe how insane that is.

 

I don't get that either. Tbh, the art assets in FO4 are not bad at all, and for what they have in mind, there will be -very- limited need for original art. They can build Seattle with existing Boston parts pretty easily.

What they need is a train load of level designers (world creation will be the most time consuming element in their plans by a landslide), some programmers, and 1-2 writers, plus a small project management team. That's about it.

[pburnt]

I like the idea but think it's too grand. Better to do an add on like Fusion City. Start small and expand.

[DigitalP]

 

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

 

Because a console controller has four buttons. Seriously, there can't be a sane reason for that other than that. If you even call forcing a genre on a platform clearly not designed to run this type of game "sane". I don't. RPG games are stuck with laughably clumsy UIs and dumbed down simplified gameplay for ages now - for no reason other than their makers wanted to additionally cash in from console ports. It's sad, really.

 

 

 

It comes down to cost. 

 

Assuming Steam as the sole distribution method. 

 

Lets say for arguments sake a game will cost $100,000,000 USD to make. It retails for $50 dollars from Steam. Using Steams 70-30 split Bethesda gets $35 per sale. That equates to 2.8 million titles just to break even. 

 

You then need to effectivly sell 5.6 million copies to be in a position to make another title of the same scope. 

That's the software side. 

 

A business will also have overheads like, real estate, infrastrucutre, insurance, employee benifits/insurance, non software development staff IE the lawyers/accountants/janitors and any licenses required for the development tools used. 

 

Then there is dividends to pay shareholders and any tax liabilities that are owed. 

 

So this all pushes the number of sales needed to consider the game a success close to 10 million which actually fits in with Bethesda last year saying there was 12 million copies available. 

 

From a CNET article I just read 

 

"PC game sales are expected to reach $29 billion around the world, compared with $28 billion in sales for the console market."

 

So that means PC's have 50% of the market to consoles 50% 

 

That's not to say they wouldn't get a return on a PC only sale. But you can see why many developers/publishers are pushing for multi-platform titles. 

[Kendo 2]

Witcher3 plays better with a console controller because of the combat moves, but the game has different amounts of dialogue options; sometimes 2, some times as many as 8.  It isn't min/max 4 like FO4 is. *shrugs*

[Tj412]

 

 

We are taking great pains here at the team to ensure that the shortcomings of Fallout 4 are addressed with Fallout Cascadia. Everything from the stunted dialogue system to the lack of S.P.E.C.I.A.L checks inside the game. We are carefully considering each criticism leveled at Bethesda's game and using the information gleamed to make Fallout Cascadia even better. 

 

Well at least someone is doing it

[Kimy]

 

 

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

 

Because a console controller has four buttons. Seriously, there can't be a sane reason for that other than that. If you even call forcing a genre on a platform clearly not designed to run this type of game "sane". I don't. RPG games are stuck with laughably clumsy UIs and dumbed down simplified gameplay for ages now - for no reason other than their makers wanted to additionally cash in from console ports. It's sad, really.

 

 

 

It comes down to cost. 

 

Assuming Steam as the sole distribution method. 

 

Lets say for arguments sake a game will cost $100,000,000 USD to make. It retails for $50 dollars from Steam. Using Steams 70-30 split Bethesda gets $35 per sale. That equates to 2.8 million titles just to break even. 

 

You then need to effectivly sell 5.6 million copies to be in a position to make another title of the same scope. 

That's the software side. 

 

A business will also have overheads like, real estate, infrastrucutre, insurance, employee benifits/insurance, non software development staff IE the lawyers/accountants/janitors and any licenses required for the development tools used. 

 

Then there is dividends to pay shareholders and any tax liabilities that are owed. 

 

So this all pushes the number of sales needed to consider the game a success close to 10 million which actually fits in with Bethesda last year saying there was 12 million copies available. 

 

From a CNET article I just read 

 

"PC game sales are expected to reach $29 billion around the world, compared with $28 billion in sales for the console market."

 

So that means PC's have 50% of the market to consoles 50% 

 

That's not to say they wouldn't get a return on a PC only sale. But you can see why many developers/publishers are pushing for multi-platform titles. 

 

 

I get the idea that they want to release a game on consoles, no matter how silly the idea is to make a complex game run on a platform that wasn't designed for this sort of games. If people are willing to shell out money for a sub-par experience, fine. They would be silly not to cash in.

What I don't get is that publishers making a game that grossed over a billion dollars in sales cannot be arsed to spend a few 10,000 bucks on redesigning a proper UI for each platform they are launching on. Instead they use the least common denominator. Which is always the console. Inferior hardware. Inferior controls. Inferior everything. No great UI can ever be made for a console any more than elephants will ever learn how to fly. Dumbing down everything to console level is disrespectful to the majority of customers, which does NOT play on consoles.

 

[DigitalP]

 

 

 

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

 

Because a console controller has four buttons. Seriously, there can't be a sane reason for that other than that. If you even call forcing a genre on a platform clearly not designed to run this type of game "sane". I don't. RPG games are stuck with laughably clumsy UIs and dumbed down simplified gameplay for ages now - for no reason other than their makers wanted to additionally cash in from console ports. It's sad, really.

 

 

 

It comes down to cost. 

 

Assuming Steam as the sole distribution method. 

 

Lets say for arguments sake a game will cost $100,000,000 USD to make. It retails for $50 dollars from Steam. Using Steams 70-30 split Bethesda gets $35 per sale. That equates to 2.8 million titles just to break even. 

 

You then need to effectivly sell 5.6 million copies to be in a position to make another title of the same scope. 

That's the software side. 

 

A business will also have overheads like, real estate, infrastrucutre, insurance, employee benifits/insurance, non software development staff IE the lawyers/accountants/janitors and any licenses required for the development tools used. 

 

Then there is dividends to pay shareholders and any tax liabilities that are owed. 

 

So this all pushes the number of sales needed to consider the game a success close to 10 million which actually fits in with Bethesda last year saying there was 12 million copies available. 

 

From a CNET article I just read 

 

"PC game sales are expected to reach $29 billion around the world, compared with $28 billion in sales for the console market."

 

So that means PC's have 50% of the market to consoles 50% 

 

That's not to say they wouldn't get a return on a PC only sale. But you can see why many developers/publishers are pushing for multi-platform titles. 

 

 

I get the idea that they want to release a game on consoles, no matter how silly the idea is to make a complex game run on a platform that wasn't designed for this sort of games. If people are willing to shell out money for a sub-par experience, fine. They would be silly not to cash in.

What I don't get is that publishers making a game that grossed over a billion dollars in sales cannot be arsed to spend a few 10,000 bucks on redesigning a proper UI for each platform they are launching on. Instead they use the least common denominator. Which is always the console. Inferior hardware. Inferior controls. Inferior everything. No great UI can ever be made for a console any more than elephants will ever learn how to fly. Dumbing down everything to console level is disrespectful to the majority of customers, which does NOT play on consoles.

 

 

 

That's subjective.

 

In terms of architecture, there isn't that much difference between a modern pc and a modern console when it comes to the core programming. Remember the US airforce rigged up Playstations to make a super computer and in a way it's probably a good thing that they design a program around the computing power of a console because it would open up even more players to the pc title who don't have a console due to the lighter hardware requirenments. Hell before I got my current rig I was quite happy with my Fallout 4 experience and I was playing on a old Samsung with a 650m. 

 

As for the UI. It would have undergone testing and the design decisions they came up more than likely represent what most testers felt to be the best design. Also remember that gaming has changed considerably and there is a lot more casual gamers as opposed to serious gamers. I know from my own experience over the years. I've gone from liking serious simulators and games that required constant hours (EVE: Online, Operation Flashpoint/Armed Assault) to now where fuck it. I just want to fuck around for an hour or so. IE do quest line in Mass Effect/Fallout/Skyrim or play a few games of Warthunder/Warships for my online fix. It's the side effect of computer gaming becoming more popular and mainstream and society in the past 20 years has gone to shit as well. People just can't be fucked fucking around on a serious computer game anymore. 

 

 

As for the Fallout 4 UI/UX It's not too bad. The Pip-Boy app for smart phones for example is fucking awesome. 

 

[alucrad90]

 

 

 

That's an engine limitation so yeah we are stuck with it.

I never really paid attention when I played FO4 but I kinda recall most of the dialogue being 'Yes' 'No' 'Sarcastic' 'Baby Shaun'.  I didn't snap to there being 4 options all of the time but that seems right now that I think about it.  I wonder why Bethesda did that?     Other narrative RPGs don't. 

 

 

Because a console controller has four buttons. Seriously, there can't be a sane reason for that other than that. If you even call forcing a genre on a platform clearly not designed to run this type of game "sane". I don't. RPG games are stuck with laughably clumsy UIs and dumbed down simplified gameplay for ages now - for no reason other than their makers wanted to additionally cash in from console ports. It's sad, really.

 

 

 

It comes down to cost. 

 

Assuming Steam as the sole distribution method. 

 

Lets say for arguments sake a game will cost $100,000,000 USD to make. It retails for $50 dollars from Steam. Using Steams 70-30 split Bethesda gets $35 per sale. That equates to 2.8 million titles just to break even. 

 

You then need to effectivly sell 5.6 million copies to be in a position to make another title of the same scope. 

That's the software side. 

 

A business will also have overheads like, real estate, infrastrucutre, insurance, employee benifits/insurance, non software development staff IE the lawyers/accountants/janitors and any licenses required for the development tools used. 

 

Then there is dividends to pay shareholders and any tax liabilities that are owed. 

 

So this all pushes the number of sales needed to consider the game a success close to 10 million which actually fits in with Bethesda last year saying there was 12 million copies available. 

 

From a CNET article I just read 

 

"PC game sales are expected to reach $29 billion around the world, compared with $28 billion in sales for the console market."

 

So that means PC's have 50% of the market to consoles 50% 

 

That's not to say they wouldn't get a return on a PC only sale. But you can see why many developers/publishers are pushing for multi-platform titles. 

 

 

 

Most of the PC market is base on MMOs and games like LOL or DOTA2. Single player 3A games earn almost nothing from PC market.

 

As an example, skyrim sells around 9.5 million copies on PC, 10 million on PS4 and another 10 million on XBOX360.

 

Another example, starcraft2 sells around 4 million while overwatch sells 20 million. With the biggest PC games market (China you know)

 

Console players are gods, while PCers are worse than human, that's all

[alucrad90]

I get the idea that they want to release a game on consoles, no matter how silly the idea is to make a complex game run on a platform that wasn't designed for this sort of games. If people are willing to shell out money for a sub-par experience, fine. They would be silly not to cash in.

What I don't get is that publishers making a game that grossed over a billion dollars in sales cannot be arsed to spend a few 10,000 bucks on redesigning a proper UI for each platform they are launching on. Instead they use the least common denominator. Which is always the console. Inferior hardware. Inferior controls. Inferior everything. No great UI can ever be made for a console any more than elephants will ever learn how to fly. Dumbing down everything to console level is disrespectful to the majority of customers, which does NOT play on consoles.

Hey pal, PC players do not have human rights.

 

We gays, lesbians, lolicons, oedipus complex, NEETs, Nerds, pigs with a brain full of sex are not the target customers but some insects that destory the names of games

[Kendo 2]

OFF TOPIC 

Depends on what game you're playing.  No reason to play Battlefield 1, Hit Man, Witcher 3, Ghost Recon, Assassin's Creed, Shadow of Mordor, etc. on a PC.  Tinker toy Bethesda games...yeah, play them on a PC so you can have mods to fix their broken shit or add stuff to at least make them playable.  That's why I don't get the whole 'mods on consoles' thing.  If I play a game on my 1 terabyte XBox1 there had better not be a need for mods.  Plus I can rent a game from Netflix and if it sucks I won't get burned for $60 by companies like Bethesda or EA.

[Flenarn]

I hope this isn't just a teamed effort fanfic, does anybody know the team size?

Flenarn - project lead here from Fallout Cascadia, there's roughly 85 people on our team right now.

[Flenarn]

ambitious I guess but I hope the leaders have real world project management experience

A lot of our developers have experience from either earlier projects of this scope or come directly from the game development industry.

 

Using Fallout 4's original concept art to promote their mod. Already showing bad signs.

We use no concept art from Fallout 4 to promote our mod, we make all of our art ourselves.

 

They have 13 concept artists and 2 environment artists.

 

I can't even begin to describe how insane that is.

The reason for the big amount of concept artists was that in the early development we wanted to get as many mood boards, character concept, location concept, asset concepts and such out of the way for the rest of the team to move development forward. At this day we have 4 concept artists active, doing smaller pieces when needed. As for environmental artists, they're more so specialized asset creators working with the environmental assets, weather, vegetation and such.

 

They also have a small army of writers.  That's gonna be a continuity problem.

We keep an internal wiki, regular meetings and a "bible" to avoid this exact issue. A lot of writers are needed though as none of them are full-time writers, some work more, some work less. We need to keep production at a steady rate and with the huge amount of writing there is to do, it's necessary.

 

I like the idea but think it's too grand. Better to do an add on like Fusion City. Start small and expand.

A big majority of our team are already established modders, real-life developers and such that the "starting small" phase is already over for most of them. We want to offer the Fallout community something new and refreshing and doing something small will help yes, but, a lot of other fantastic modders already do that. No other group of modders is aiming to do something this grand.

 

I'm Flenarn, the project lead.

[Halstrom]

A big majority of our team are already established modders, real-life developers and such that the "starting small" phase is already over for most of them. We want to offer the Fallout community something new and refreshing and doing something small will help yes, but, a lot of other fantastic modders already do that. No other group of modders is aiming to do something this grand.

 

I'm Flenarn, the project lead.

Welcome to LL, hope it goes well

[VAAlucard]

Is there anyway to volunteer to help with anything?