I have been a fan of Fallout since 1997. The game options on the early Macs were pretty limited, and MacPlay ported a lot of great Interplay games over to the Mac. Fallout was the last one of these, and just a captivating experience. The combination of bleak dystopia with retro futuristic camp was instantly appealing. I was skeptical that this game could transition to the Xbox 360 console, but VATS ended up being a fun way
Fallout and “Bob” Dobbs
The Fallout 1 manual has an illustration of “Bob” and Connie Dobbs in front of a cross-section of a vault. The Church of the SubGenius is a doomsday cult with symbolism and humour that fits in well with the Fallout universe. To suspect that it had an influence would not be unreasonable, images of “Bob” often found their way into pop culture during the 1980s and 1990s.
Applications
The main program at the heart of modding is Bethesda’s Fallout Creation Kit. This is the main program used to create game mods. However, there are a number of other programs that are essential to carry out specific tasks.
Fallout Creation Kit
The Creation Kit is a powerful and versatile tool that allows modders to bring their creative visions to life within the Fallout universe. It allows users to design and customize their own unique experiences, from crafting new quests and characters to building entire worlds.
The interface is not polished. Many functions are not intuitive. I didn’t have the problems with frequent crashing that some users have reported, but it did occasionally crash.
Bethesda Archive Extractor
In order to work with the existing game assets, you’re need to extract the pieces you need. With B.A.E., you can easily extract and explore the contents of Bethesda game archives (BA2 files), allowing you to access the game’s assets and resources. You can download B.A.E from Nexus mods.
Nifskope
The Nifskope application can be downloaded from the NifTools wiki.
Material Editor
Material Editor is a simple program for editing BGSM and BGEM material files. It can be downloaded from Nexus mods.
File Formats
Understanding the relationship between these file formats was essential in building even the simple mod that I was designing.
- DDS (DirectDraw Surface): DDS is a file format commonly used for storing textures in computer graphics. It is widely used in game development, including the Fallout series. DDS files can contain various types of image data, including color, alpha, and compression information. They are efficient for real-time rendering and can support different levels of detail (LOD) to optimize performance. DDS files are typically used for textures in games, including character textures, environment textures, and more.
- NIF: NIF is a file format used in Bethesda games, including Fallout 4. It is primarily associated with 3D models and is used to store and represent various elements of the game world, such as characters, objects, and environments. NIF files contain information about the geometry, materials, textures, animations, and other attributes of the 3D models. These files are essential for creating and displaying the visual assets within the game world.
- BGSM (Bethesda Game Studios Material): BGSM is a file format used to define material properties and characteristics in Bethesda games. It contains information about the visual appearance and behavior of materials, such as shaders, textures, colors, transparency, glossiness, and more. BGSM files are crucial for defining how surfaces in the game world react to lighting and other environmental factors, enhancing the overall visual quality of the game.
Publishing The Mod
The publishing process was mostly straightforward. Once I was reasonably happy with the mod, I archived and uploaded it using my Bethesda account. I ran into trouble uploading screenshots using the web interface, but the rest of the experience was pretty simple. I ended up moving my original .esp file and assets into a separate folder. There may be a way to manage the assets along with the .esp file using Vortex, if so, the functionality wasn’t immediately apparent and will have to be looked at in the future. I mainly wanted to move the assets to a backup location and then switch to using the downloaded mod from Bethesda.
SubGenius Holy Books
Discover the enigmatic underground bunker of Rev. Wayne Gorski, a devoted SubGenius seeking meaning amidst the chaos. Uncover hidden scriptures, lost to the ravages of time, as you decipher their cryptic messages and unlock the secrets of the forbidden sciences.
The mod is a rework of conspiracy theorist Wayne’ Gorski’s cabin, along with 4 books hidden throughout the Commonwealth. Various SubGenius posters and artifacts are also scattered about in various locations. Reading the books increases the primary abilities.
Modding For “Bob”
Back in the 1990s, I created a fair number of game mods, most for the Mac. They are actually all still available on the SubGenius website, but it would take some work to get any of them to run. One in particular was a for game from 1994 called Marathon. The mod was called You Killed “Bob”!!! and mostly replaced the Born On Board civilians with “Bob” Dobbs.
Marathon is available as part of the Aleph One opensource project. I’m not sure if it’s possible to extract the StuffIt archive and apply the patch I created. I would be interested to hear from anyone who gets it working.
Conclusion
Creating a mod using Fallout’s Creation kit was frustrating at times, but pretty fun overall. I was impressed with the results I was able to produce. One of the things I found most interesting is that, like the Marathon mods I created nearly thirty years ago, the tools were incomplete. The cool part is that the community fills in the gaps, building tools to extract data or update parts of the game that have no official support.
My original plan was to create a radio station that played snippets from The Hour Of Slack. I had trouble getting the radio station working, but I left the broadcasting equipment in the house and the radio broadcasting station behind it. Maybe I’ll have a chance to build out the rest of it, or other mods for Fallout, Skyrim or possibly even Starfield.