Fallout 3 on Windows 7.

[smarteyeball]

I did, and it doesn't seem to work.

That method worked for me with the x32 version, but I'm just trying it and it's not working for me in x64.... catalyst is failing to detect the hardware and the installer is 'just sitting there'. Perhaps it's a similar detection issue with Nvidia.

I'm going to give driver sweeper a go.


EDIT:

Phew, talk about an uphill battle getting Catalyst 8.12 Drivers to install.

Unfortunately it made no difference. FO3 is still hanging....

At least it *may not* be a driver issue. Then again, I can't even play it in window mode.

 

[Chuki]

I hope this helps someone.

I ran into problem similar to whats mentioned in this thread, where I would launch the game and would just get stuck in a loop with the launcher. Well it turns it if you start adding, removing, changing the location of your documents, and your library settings, the launcher loses track of where "My Games/Fallout 3/" Directory is, and doesn't seem to recreate it, just gets stuck in a loop.

So double check all those settings, change or move your "My Games/Fallout 3" directory and you should be good to go.

 

[johngalt]

What about those that *don't* have it moved?

 

[Chuki]

thats just worked for me, when I was stuck in a launcher loop.

Another thing is check to make sure permissions are set correct. Give the My Games and Fallout 3 full read write permissions to Everyone. Beyond that I have no clue.

 

[smarteyeball]

Chuki, your a champ It was a permission problem. It would hang at the point where it would've been writing to the save game. No write access=hang.

I took ownership of the C:\Users\*YOURNAME*\Documents\My Games\Fallout3 folder and gave my username full read/write privileges. I Started a new game and it was past the hang. Save games from Vista work too


It's a similar issue to the Vista / S.T.A.L.K.E.R save game problem that occured in one of the patches. The game kept crashing because of write permissions.

 

[Chuki]

Glad I could be of assistance, I was just googling my own problem and found this thread, and then finally fixed my problem. It was a mix of relocating folders in the library and the move from Vista to Win7 did something to the permissions as well.

 

[trevortom]

Ok,I've got the same launcher crash out as chuki et al,but my Fallout 3/My games file is read-only no matter what I do;ownership change,permissions changed and the GENERAL tab jumps back to read-only next time I open it no matter what it says in the SECURITY tab.Any ideas?

 

[Chuki]

Right your Documents folders, go to security make sure Administrators, and Users, have full access, then go to the My Games folder do the same, then fallout 3 folder and do the same.

If that don't work backup the Fallout 3 Folder, delete and see if the game can recreate it. If that works just cut and paste your saves.

 

[reallyfatwalrus]

Ok, I ran into the fallout 3 launcher loop thing. I first messed around with my documents to the point where I couldn't even find it. I made a new profile on windows, and reinstalled the game.

I'm still having trouble with the launcher loop thing. Other games are working fine. Every time the launcher comes up, it does the hardware configuration check and resets everything to the "High Quality" level.

So far I have

Deleted "my games" folder (I moved my saves to a different place, but even if that doesn't work I'll just start anew).
It just creates a new "my games" folder on start up, and continues the loop.
Checked the security tab on each folder and ini file to make sure there is full read/write privileges.
Nothing changed, loop still there.
Checked the security tab for the game and launcher, gave all privileges of read/write.
Nothing changed, loop still there.
Reinstalled the game
Nothing changed, loop still there.

I currently am out of ideas of how to get this game running. Chuki, what is everything you have done from getting the problem to running the game properly; point A to B? I have a feeling that you might have done something you might have thought was trivial at the time, but actually fixed the problem. I have a feeling I know what the problem is, I just have no clue in how to fix it. Is there any way to change the location of the FalloutPrefs.ini?

 

[DakkonA]

Okay, well this is what we know:

Fallout3.exe punts to FalloutLauncher.exe if FalloutLauncher.exe has never been run before. So, the problem lies in the fact that Fallout3.exe and FalloutLauncher.exe always think that this is the first time its been run... hence the Launcher loop.

So the question is where it is that the Launcher stores the information that it has been run before, and whether the problem is that it can't store that information or can't retrieve that information, or both. Unfortunately, Securom complains if you run Process Monitor while the Launcher is starting. And Process Monitor doesn't yield anything I can detect for Fallout3.exe that might explain it...

 

[Chuki]

Well trying to fix this issue I did reformat and start anew, only to have the problem surface all over again.

My Documents and stuff are all organized similarly on a separate hard drive.

I have

D:\Documents
D:\Pictures
D:\Music
D:\Videos
you get the point.

I change Win7's documents, pictures, etc... location to point to these folders. This automatically updates the library to point here, since the library by default includes C:\users\username\documents, so I just changed the location of that folder.

I do have both versions of win7 installed, and in Win7 64 I didn't have any problems, but in Win7 32 I did. So I knew it had to be something with the 32bit version, I still couldn't figure it out so I reformatted, upon reformat I could get the game launch but I was greeted by a black screen with audio looping, behind that was an invisable error saying the app had crashed.

I'd relaunch into 64bit and again it worked fine, this is when I started checking file permissions. I simply logged back into 32bit, and set the security tab permissions for the "Everybody" group to full control. I checked each individual file in the My Games/Fallout 3 directory since then I haven't had any issues in 32 or 64bit.

 

[DakkonA]

My security settings all appear to be set to Everyone = Full Control for those directories and files... Had you moved your directories in that new 32-bit install that it worked on?

 

[smarteyeball]

These are the steps I took to get it working in the default folder location. x64 Version.


Right Clicked on the Fallout3 folder in C:\Users\USERNAME\Documents\My Games\Fallout3 and selected properties>security>edit>add then typed in users and gave both my user name and users all permissions.

You really only need to give permission to the Fallout3 Folder itself. Any files and sub-folders should have the same permission properties.




Even though I have allowed my username and users full access, the read only box remains ticked, yet it's still got access.



Fallout3.exe also needs to be "Run as Admin" in the compatibility tab.

 

[reallyfatwalrus]

I'm going to try the 64bit one, see if it's any better.

 

[johngalt]

thats just worked for me, when I was stuck in a launcher loop.

Another thing is check to make sure permissions are set correct. Give the My Games and Fallout 3 full read write permissions to Everyone. Beyond that I have no clue.

Hmm - weirder and weirder. But this may make sense as to why I have no issues with Fallout 3 - I installed it to a different drive - where the Program Files folder was not restricted - so my permissions may in fact have saved me - but I do this with all my games....

Chuki, your a champ It was a permission problem. It would hang at the point where it would've been writing to the save game. No write access=hang.

I took ownership of the C:\Users\*YOURNAME*\Documents\My Games\Fallout3 folder and gave my username full read/write privileges. I Started a new game and it was past the hang. Save games from Vista work too


It's a similar issue to the Vista / S.T.A.L.K.E.R save game problem that occured in one of the patches. The game kept crashing because of write permissions.

I did not have to do that at all....

But, I have my special folders moved, and I also installed the game itself to the D drive where those folders reside....

Well trying to fix this issue I did reformat and start anew, only to have the problem surface all over again.

My Documents and stuff are all organized similarly on a separate hard drive.

I have

D:\Documents
D:\Pictures
D:\Music
D:\Videos
you get the point.

I change Win7's documents, pictures, etc... location to point to these folders. This automatically updates the library to point here, since the library by default includes C:\users\username\documents, so I just changed the location of that folder.

I do have both versions of win7 installed, and in Win7 64 I didn't have any problems, but in Win7 32 I did. So I knew it had to be something with the 32bit version, I still couldn't figure it out so I reformatted, upon reformat I could get the game launch but I was greeted by a black screen with audio looping, behind that was an invisable error saying the app had crashed.

I'd relaunch into 64bit and again it worked fine, this is when I started checking file permissions. I simply logged back into 32bit, and set the security tab permissions for the "Everybody" group to full control. I checked each individual file in the My Games/Fallout 3 directory since then I haven't had any issues in 32 or 64bit.

Your setup almost mirrors mine- been doing that since Vista after I found out dejectedly that I could not make the installer create those special folders in alternate partitions / drives like XP installer could....

These are the steps I took to get it working in the default folder location. x64 Version.


Right Clicked on the Fallout3 folder in C:\Users\USERNAME\Documents\My Games\Fallout3 and selected properties>security>edit>add then typed in users and gave both my user name and users all permissions.

You really only need to give permission to the Fallout3 Folder itself. Any files and sub-folders should have the same permission properties.

View attachment 2643


Even though I have allowed my username and users full access, the read only box remains ticked, yet it's still got access.

View attachment 2644


I doubt it makes a difference, but I also run fallout3.exe and falloutlauncer.exe as "Run as Admin" in the compatibility tab.

Again, maybe it is because I did not install it to the C:\Program Files or C:\Program Files (X86) directories....

 

[Chuki]

It may have something to do with installing the game to the default directory. I install all my games on my 2nd drive. I.E. all my games are installed under D:\Games

All I did was change the c:\users\username\documents folder to location d:\Documents, 64bit was fine, but I installed it 1st then 32bit, thats when I had problems, once I changed permissions all was well.

 

[johngalt]

Hmmm.

I left the Users folders on my C Drive, but just change the installation path from C:\... to D:\..., leaving all of the rest the same.

My Documents, Downloads, etc (all special folders) are all on D, but the rest of the user folders are all on C - so only thing I can think of is that the permissions were screwed in your case because of the 2 different OSs sharing the drive....

 

[thunderclap]

I've had a little more time to play with it and this is what I've found.

If I try to run the Fallout3 executable the game locks on load. All I get is a black screen. This seems to be the case in Windows XP and Vista compatibility modes also.

If I run the game from the FalloutLauncher the game will start but all I get is audio... no video, just a black screen.

If I change the games settings in FalloutLauncher to Windowed Mode the game boots and plays fine.

I've tried this with the following nVidia drivers: Visa 180.48, Vista 181.20 and the Windows 7 nVidia Beta drivers from the Windows Update page.

So the game works... just not in full screen mode. I do find it strange though that the game CAN load but only from the FalloutLauncher and not the main executable. Weird.

 

[Mark]

Have you installed the Games For Windows Live update, that might help as it worked for GTA4.

 

[thunderclap]

Have you installed the Games For Windows Live update, that might help as it worked for GTA4.

I've installed Games for Windows Live 2.0, if that's what you're referring to. I haven't been able to find a Games for Windows Live Update per say.