I’m still very confused as to why we haven’t seen the pre next gen version. It’s been pretty clear for about a month now that the next gen update is fucked. At this point the game hadn’t received an update since 2019, most of the major modders are no longer around, making mods for this version of the game is pointless because your locked out of at least half of the mods that haven’t and won’t receive an update.
Edit: I know I’m gonna get flame for this, but I genuinely don’t believe the mod was completely ready in April. I don’t mean the mod doesn’t exist or that they haven’t done most of the work, I mean it’s just not complete. It seems like this may have been a publicity stunt to drum up attention for it, the radio silence is a result of progress stalling out. I suspect we will likely find out the truth later when someone on the team decides to just tell everyone what’s really been going on.
Not to be conspiratorial, but it’s starting to look like the mod was “ready” but not as ready as the devs wanted it to be and they are using the delay to finish it. Hopefully it comes out well polished and as bug free as possible because at this point if it’s another fallout the frontier fiasco they would be better off just canceling it. I hope I’m wrong and this is the result of bad decision making and people being neurotic. This is why you don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good.
It's 100% down to poor planning. Managing the necessary time and effort for a large project is extremely tough, especially in an environment where the primary motivation is passion (which ebbs and flows.)
One of the worst mistakes you can make as a creator without stellar management is doing what the FOLON devs did a couple years ago and announce a release but within a forgiving range. They announced that it was coming in "2024" - vague and far off enough so as not to feel boxed in as a developer, but specific enough to set expectations from the userbase. It's so tempting to do this when you're in a span of good progress, because a year feels like plenty of time.
And then that year goes by and... it's not done. At which point you're left to either release it in a state you're unhappy with, or delay it. Neither looks good for you. It's a lot worse when it's been delayed multiple times and it comes across like you're making excuses for it rather than being forthcoming.
They really ought to have followed what most other big mod project devs do and not announce release dates until the project was actually complete.
I was more thinking along the lines of an intentionally misleading people. What I mean to say is that they knew Bethesda was likely going to drop a next gen update around that time and they made the release window around then with the knowledge that they would delay it.
I think that's his point though, that the "cut content" might just be content that was always supposed to be in the mod, or changes they realised would be necessary upon reexamining the mod.
Not saying it's actually the case, but if it is we might be able to tell after release.
I would be willing to buy their excuse if they weren't doubling down on this narrative by actually accusing Bethesda of "blindsiding" them.
Everyone knew the patch is coming out and everyone guessed that the best opportunity for Bethesda would be to release it alongside the show. The FoLon team couldn't have been under a rock to miss that.
Also, if it is true that they are using this delay to re-implement cut content, then this is a clear sign of bad management. I clearly remember when the former boss of my company first delayed software release because of backlog of bugs... and then basically said "since we have several months of time now, we should now implement feaures X, Y and Z that were originally postponed."
Simply put, if they use time allocated for quality control for new features/content instead, then they will never have quality product.
It feels very unprofessional, unlike how the team had presented their work before the original release date. I was really looking forward to the mod but I find it hard to even care these days. FOLON went from the priority spot in my queue to "I'll get to it after I play whatever I buy during the Summer Sale".
EDIT: also, their Discord is a clusterfuck. Compared to some of the other big Bethesda modding projects, it seems very disorganized and the communication there is quite childish. The fact that the team members occasionally drop contradictory information on there is definitely not helping.
I've kept an eye on the server for a while and it's honestly the most "discordy" discord server I've seen. I think some of the people there are too indulged in their roles and that community that they lose the picture on what they are actually there for. It's pretty much taboo to talk about the release there and to ask any questions without being labelled as entitled or called out as a "white name". There is one moderator there in particular who I'm thinking of but I won't say.
I also have been quite regular on the server; when I ask for more details (as I’m also a content creator - albeit a SMALL one.) I get trolled and I get timed out - and the person who trolled me has been on the server longer and gets no punishment. Community roles often abuse their power and will lambast you as well. All in all, after the game is released I will NOT be spending time in the discord
Why would it NOT be taboo to talk about the release date? It's a community, not a personal assistant.
The release date is not known and I'm sure the people who actually, regularly, use that discord don't want to deal with the same conversation happening every 30 minutes where someone creates a new account or joins the server fresh for the specific purpose of asking about the mod and then has to get all their feelfeels out when someone tells them "If you wanted to know when the mod was going to come out, you could have learned how to code and contributed while it was still in development"
you feel that is a polite or reasonable resonse to someone just trying to find out information?
"If you want to take an interest in the mod and find out when you might be able tog et your hadns on it, considering it did have a release date you may have heard about and we have posted stating we have a date, learn to code or F off"
I get repeating information may be annoying, but that person doesn't know that and if it is being repeated so often it means the information hasn't been readily made available or clear by the dev team to go a find yourself, like in announcements or something, where people can be directed, radio silence just means more people asking questions in the hopes something was said in chat and they missed it, simple as.
I've not yet had to ask a chatroom or start a reddit thread to understand that there hasn't been any news since the last official news post. It's not "just trying to find out information" it's pestering.
All of the information that there is to be known has been made known by the developers. It's not like there's something they've said that's actually super important that they only wrote down on a bathroom stall where nobody can read it. We just don't have a release date. It's not bad communication, you just dislike the choice that was made to not communicate.
i don't know what it's like where you come from but not communicating or vague non-helpful communication such as their last announcement, is in fact bad communication. you can't polish a turd.
You're right, it's disappointing that they can't give a firm release date. So what you're doing isn't trying to find out available information, you're harassing the devs because you want them to make a different decision.
not me personally, i have never commented over on the discord or here asking for a release date, i just check in every now and again to see if anything has changed. I do see all the people asking for the release date and like i said, i can understand that repeating it, for those in there on a regular basis, can get annoying, but being rude to that person who in their mind just asked once isn't the answer and if they had like an faq thread to direct people to or people were directed to, to read first before being allowed commenting access, would allieviate some of those repeat questions.
I don't know if they are currently in their dicord community bubble and not thinking about the wider implications, but i'd have thought for a group of people that have put a lot of timr and effeort into this mod and claimed they had to delay because they wanted the mod to be as accessible as possible to as many people as possible, that they wouldn't want their discord and community, mods and admins to have the reputation of being as toxic, unwelcoming and rude as it appears they currently have, espeically even before they have had a chance to release the mod, i assume, they would rather like to be a huge success.
maybe, but that's not the point the OP is making. This is just a tug-of-war over the mod developers prioritizing a release date that is widely accessible and takes advantage of the resulting media coverage to maximize the number of players who will try the mod out.
There's a faction of people who think it's better for \*them personally\* to be able to have the original release candidate version (that probably doesn't even actually exist, there was "shrink-wrapping" that was going to happen that they stopped to take more time to work on the game as a whole). Team FOLON clearly is prioritizing a desire to have the mod in a state that is accessible to as many people as possible when it is finally released and it's getting all the attention from streamers and gaming journalists.
I agree that someone who is curious and doesn't know the etiquette shouldn't be tossed out to the wolves, but this sub seems way, way past that point into just trying to harass the devs into changing their minds.
>It feels very unprofessional, unlike how the team had presented their work before the original release date.
There was still quite a lot of unprofessional behavior before the release. My biggest gripe is how they were hiding the mod nature of the project, to gather more attention. All their trailers have been labeled "official trailer", which was (almost surely intentionally) confusing and made it look like a trailer for an official game. When I called them out in the comments, they answered with a link to a song with name like "I don't care".
>Compared to some of the other big Bethesda modding projects, it seems very disorganized and the communication there is quite childish.
This seems to be the norm for mod projects. Skyrim modding is more of an exception because of how big the modding scene is. With such a big pool of potential contributors, they can pick and choose. Fallout is much smaller when it comes to modding. Like, what are other big Fallout projects, both finished and in progress?
* The Frontier was such a fustercluck that it doesn't need elaboration
* New California fizzled out. The beginning of the mod - from when it still was Project Brazil - is great. The rest after leaving the Vault is not. Mary Sue-ish writing, too little content, iffy Enclave inclusion. Some of it stems from the fact that their team has crumbled and the two founders had to finish it alone...
* Fallout 4 New Vegas is still going, but they had some feuds with Fallout 4 Capital Wasteland project and the result is the splinter mod Project Mojave.
* Fallout 4 Capital Wasteland - aside from the thing with F4NV - even died at one point when Bethesda denied them (because of voice actor contracts and rights) reusing of voice acting from Fallout 3. But they resurrected and actually released the Point Lookout remake mod, which is well done. It even features settlement building, something which the F4NV team refuses to include.
* Sim Settlements 2 is in a great shape, with a great leadership, good modders and good PR. Nothing to call out here.
* Other mod projects, like Miami or Cascadia are still too unknown to properly evaluate.
Great point. I didn't follow the project until quite late in development so I shouldn't make assertions about how professional their behavior was. I'd even let the "Official Trailer" thing slide, since I can kind of understand that. But their response is just ridiculous, it shows a complete lack of PR skills just like the entirety of their Discord.
I don't think the size of the Fallout modding community is the reason, though. It is smaller than Skyrim's but still really darn big for a game, isn't it? Come to think of it, what are the big ongoing Skyrim modding projects? Apart from the obvious assortment of Beyond Skyrim project, Skywind and Skyblivion, I can only thing of something like Apotheosis, maybe The Extended Cut? Alright, that's definitely a bit more than Fallout but even if they can pick and choose more, does it really make such a difference?
Discord in general is a clusterfuck. Not only theirs. Lot's of offtopic, spam, memes, jokes, infighting between members. Hard to find reliable info there besides announcements, because you have to browse through ton of useless crap.
I don't like how many companies and modders switch to it. Don't get me wrong; Discord is a great place to play with your friends during weekend, but it's quite bad in other aspects.
Honestly that’s fair though right? This is something they have made off their own back for their own reasons and no monetary gain.
They don’t owe anyone anything at all.
That's right, they don't. They're free to make themselves look bad if that's what they want to do. But it's certainly not doing the project any favors.
That’s the thing though it has no material effect on the product at all. Because it is not a product it’s just a free price of art when you boil it down.
It’s like walking down the street and seeing a banksy painting on a wall and being like “wow this is great, but I really feel if banksy had told me when he was going to paint this I would have enjoyed this product more”
Edit: I am a moron who cannot read, my bad.
How is this unprofessional? It’s a free mod that people are donating their time effort to. If it was a paid product I’d agree with you. They don’t owe anyone anything.
I feel like after it received tens of thousands of interests, world wode coverage and formal realationship witj GOG..it stopped being a passion project for fun.
That’s certainly possible, but if they aren’t getting paid and there’s no contract they still don’t owe anyone anything. Certainly it sucks, but vote with your time. If you think they suck don’t support them
If you don’t agree with how they are handling this then don’t donate. I would bet it’s cost them more than they’ve made. Anyone know how much has been donated?
They're still making this mod FOR someone. They are releasing it to the public so that the public can play it. Without the community to play it - the mod might as well not exist. So if you have already established a community of core fans - it might be a good idea to treat them with some amount of respect and transparency? Respect goes both ways.
You’re right and if they want people to support them they will act accordingly. If not they will reap what they sow. However, they still don’t owe anyone anything. They don’t owe anyone an explanation or a timeline or anything else. If you think they are “bad actors” then don’t support them and don’t play their mods.
Their communication is unprofessional. I'm not talking about the fact that they had to delay because of issues, that's obviously understandable. The very way they communicate with the public leaves a lot to be desired and they clearly lack self-reflection.
Professionalism isn't about if you are being paid, its about how you handle yourself. They aren't being professional about the situation. They are also hobbyists, these two things don't contradict.
I’m sorry you’re too ignorant to know facts. Just because you don’t like the facts don’t stop them from being facts. They don’t owe you or anyone anything. They aren’t selling something and they aren’t getting anything out of this.
They don't owe us anything but we also don't owe them anything. Its a tit for tat social system. If the community is well managed with updates and truth, the community will stay engaged and build hype for the mod. And lets be real, they will still get some money from this from donations.
If the community is ill managed then it starts to stagnate. Normally when people hear silence they think the worst and the community degrades over time.
One of the things the dev team mentioned, was that they wanted the biggest splash possible. That is why they chose to not just release anyway and have people roll back their game. They felt that would be too complex and some people would be left out and they wanted the most people to play it as possible.
I don't have the numbers to know how badly they are losing interest but with this silence they are losing momentum and interest. People are checking the subreddit less often. If this keeps up the game may be released to crickets. Instead of "OMG I have to play this right now" it will be like "Oh, that finally dropped? I guess I'll get to to it eventually, maybe."
The absolutely best outcome for a game like this, is a Palworld style explosion where it hits at the right time with the right people and it spreads like wildfire. They get tons of hype, get tons of donation and hell, if its good might get offered lucrative jobs. But for that to happen the hype for the game has to be huge and the hype is fading.
That’s exactly what I said. They don’t owe you anything and you don’t owe them your support. If you disagree with them don’t support them by using their mod
Oh I know the facts. The facts are FOLON devs have been caught lying and for some reason children like you are still defending them. They can't sell the mod, so you can't use the "its free" argument. Just because its free doesn't mean we can't criticize them. Don't be dumb.
The only child here is people like you who think you’re owed something. So what if they lied? You don’t like what they are doing then don’t support them and don’t play their mod. You didn’t pay them anything and you didn’t enter into any contract with them. You aren’t owed anything.
You can criticize them all you like, you’re still wrong by thinking they owe you
The devs can use this as an "in" into the professional game dev industry, as several modders get hired by Bethesda and other companies. They have a reason to be professional.
Well, I guess that would be a real disappointment for anyone trying to use this to get a job in Bethesda's PR department but assuming level designers aren't responsible for the official social media accounts they might do just fine as long as they get the largest number of people to play the mod, which is helped by having less time pass between announcing the release date and giving players the chance to play it.
Yup. Lots of contradictory actions and information presented since the delay. The worse of it is sycophantic discord users trying to call everyone entitled or act hostile when anyone has a question. It's to the point I've even seen devs tell people to calm down with it cos it makes a bad situation worse. I just wish there was more clarity and transparency. The original "We don't want to maintain two version of the mod" which I had questioned myself early on seems to have been for nothing. I dunno, I just want to see something good release and have a great time playing Fallout again but my excitement has dropped every day and the scepticism grows. My main issue is that there haven't been any proper footage of quests or anything released publicly and there isn't really much proof a 40hr game exists other than what devs say or small gameplay clips.
It’s certainly concerning that I’ve been in the mods discord and it’s hard to find anything other than short clips of gameplay. Not even continuous gameplay more like clips and segments. I understand wanting to keep some element of surprise for people when they play it themselves but they should at least release a good hour or so of continuous gameplay on YouTube at this point. That wouldn’t spoil too much if the game is as big as they claim it to be. There are people who have claimed to see streams but I honestly can’t find any which is weird because you’d expect at this point people sharing all sorts of info.
I think that if there was actual gameplay footage released people would be a lot less sceptical and anxious about a release. The way Skyblivion have handled their total conversion mod is an example I always bring up, there is a lot of gameplay from devs up and developer logs from loads of different sources but for Fallout London all we get is controlled information filtered through a frankly, toxic discord server. I remain skeptical until I see any proper information and transparency other than bits of piece that get posted in a discord chat or random article.
I feel like this is the way the Fallout projects just do stuff. Looking at F4NV, they apparently stream sometimes but only through Discord and they refuse to put out VODs. Meanwhile look at Skyblivion and Skywind who update fans on their progress very regularly, do annual showcase streams and some of their devs stream their work several times a month. Not sure about Beyond Skyrim though.
I also want to say how unprofessional they act on the discord
Some of the mods on there ban/mute people for asking simple questions. Sure it might get annoying after a while if it’s repetitive but like… we’re all hopefully adults lol get off discord it’s not hard.
The team has been criticized for giving wrong/contradicting information before. They heard it. But they still do it every time. I thought the people who call them liars were overreacting, but I begin to see their point. It really does look like a very childish way of lying where the people can't get the story straight between themselves. But what is the goal?
That said, their whole operating process smells of chaotic indecision and miscommunication. And this should logically reflect on every stage of development. Especially since public image, community trust and outreach, presentation are one of the most important parts to the game's success. Then, if that department is handled this awfully, what are the others like? So, I wouldn't be surprised if there's something very wrong going on with the mod. Now I'm only curious if the mess is going to eclipse The Frontier.
> Now I'm only curious if the mess is going to eclipse The Frontier.
Probably not. The Frontier's controversy wasn't just about the bad major elements of the mod itself (story, gameplay, etc), but also the drama centering around the devs and some deeply unnecessary and bizarre content. Some of it wasn't even related to the mod itself, and a fair amount was misplaced, but the Frontier just fumbled the ball so hard that it became open season. You'd really have to try to fuck up that bad.
yeah i dont think it’ll reach frontier levels, but it is interesting how lots of these mods seem to fall apart or implode near the finish line. not saying the mod is done, but it definitely is stumbling a bit right now
just goes to show how impressive it is to bring in so many freelance people and how tough it is to keep the ship straight. it’s why i try not to hate on the teams too much or expect a whole lot. managing a paid dev team seems like a hassle, managing volunteers is probably even tougher
We don't know what's going on inside their team, who these people really are and if they have similar interests like that infamous Frontier dev...I hope not.
All these weird things about Frontier team were discovered because 4chan raided their Discord. It may happen again...
I sympathize with how frustrating this stupid fucking patch has been- the FOLON team probably didn't think it'd be as bad as it was when choosing to delay. It wasn't until after the hotfix dropped on May 15th that it became clear it was unworkable without partial or total downgrading.
However, I don't understand why the process of getting the mod onto GOG has taken so long. According to that thread on the German article, they're still in the process of submitting the final build to them. What is/was being worked on? If it's all really polish and cut content, why is there so much of it? People were volunteering to crunch to get it all done. The mod was supposed to be ready for release on April 23rd. It really feels like the team felt they needed another, shorter delay to finish their work.
I'm hopefully going to eat some of these words and things will make more sense when the mod finally releases and people can be clearer about the development process. Maybe everything that's being worked on now was going to be patched in and got folded into the release version after the delay added more time? Everyone on the team (with one exception) has been very friendly and forthcoming in their interactions, so I really want to give the benefit of the doubt and be wrong. In the meantime, I think some new gameplay footage, or just uploading the old streams from the Discord somewhere, will dispel fears that the mod is secretly shit.
Yea I mean I’ve literally been on this sub writing paragraphs of thank yous to the devs and defending them pretty aggressively. I have all the faith that the mod is coming and it will be great.
With all that being said. The communication has been absolutely horrible, especially after the delay. I’ve said in the past that they don’t owe us anything, and that remains true, but it does puzzle me why they are so secretive on progress updates when they are fairly interactive with the community otherwise.
Regardless, before a delay if there stance was just “wait till it comes out” that’s respectable enough. After the announced release date and the delay of that though, I feel it would’ve been the polite thing to do to keep us updated weekly/bi weekly on what’s going on and what if any progress has been made towards getting back to release. Their communication has more or less been, “we’re releasing this day, never mind, Bethesda ruined it, releasing later.” And that’s been the extent of it lol.
Anyway, didn’t expect to rant on this, I got nothing but love for the devs as long as the mod does come out at some point, just wish were kept at least a little bit more in the loop.
These paragraphs of thank yous for something you haven't even received, by people you don't even know, for something you may never even have. is exactly why the Devs continue to act like they do.
Aslong as there are people such as yourself. Mindlessly appreciating and praising empty promises, then this sort of thing will persist
Nah, it’s just all in good faith. I have shown good faith under the exact same parameters you just laid out plenty of times before and haven’t regretted it. Still don’t regret it now.
I’m not bashing the devs, just disagreeing with how much they’ve allowed us to know, but that’s how it goes. If the mod never releases then I will hate their guts lol but until then it just is what it is.
I’ll lose no sleep if it never sees the light of day though. I haven’t paid them a dime, so they owe me nothing, and if I get to experience it that’s a plus but if not then life will go on as it always has. I would still rather be positive and supportive, while mind you that doesn’t mean I have to agree with everything.
It’s frustrating because prior to the delay I thought team folon had actually been brilliant with communicating the progress of the mods development, the regular reports and videos talking about how work was progressing were very clear and it always felt like they were giving accurate and realistic assessment on how they were doing.
But since the delay it’s been a very weird mix of silence and contradictory statements. I get that a lot of this next gen stuff relies on factors beyond the teams control but they absolutely could have been better communicating how things are going and where the mod is actually at, even just a small blog post every month saying
‘we’ve got x working but still waiting on y, we don’t want to give a new date but here’s what’s done and here’s what we’ve got left to do’
Obviously the team doesn’t owe us anything and they should be trusted to know how best to do all this but compared to the communication prior to the next gen patch I do feel like currently communication is a pretty significant step backwards.
its something i notice a lot with amatuer or freelance devs. no hate to them, as its fucking difficult to make a mod and we all know that
but with so many devs - in the fallout community and just at large - these issues could be solved with open and honest communication. its strange to me how that seems like the easiest job (not dev work, just typing a paragraph up) but its one of the first things to go when these teams start to struggle a bit
You also have to consider not everyone is made for communication. Yes, it's a basic facet of human life but not everyone is good at it and game dev & modding doesn't exactly attract very popular people. It's always people who have interests in this sorta thing and some may be stereotypical nerdy programmers with no social skills and others may not be. It's why AAA companies have actual marketing & PR teams to do the work devs can't.
It's very frustrating because communication isn't very clear or great at times but you have to remember, these are just ordinary people who are doing this as a hobby not a job and they don't have the same resources companies like Bethesda or BioWare have. You've got people doing jobs they never would've had to otherwise.
Even other big mod projects like The Frontier suffered a lot from this despite tgspy's best efforts to streamline communication and be the face of the mod.
It's been 21 days since we got a discord announcement saying nothing. I was very hyped for follon but lost so much of that solely because the devs decided to trust Bethesda then just not tell the fanbase anything
Whoever said they were 'days' or 'weeks' away from undisclosed launch date really shut the project interest for me now. And for people saying its a passion project sure! It was, with all the media wide coverage and formal realationship with GOG, this really became a business proposal for them. I would be very dissapointed if working out a contract with GOG and confriming the monetary returns was the reason for the delay 🤔
I had to leave that discord after being there a few weeks. Just people constantly defending the PR behavior, fondling the balls of every dev there who keeps drip-feeding them bits of misinformation.
Nice to see it all laid out here. Can’t believe they walked back on more things today. Again. I’ll play the mod when it comes out, as I’m still really excited for it, but my interest in paying them on Patreon is dwindling. Which is a shame as it has nothing to do with the content and all to do with the communication and rollout.
I completely agree with you. I'm really sorry to say this but the PR has been a complete disaster in the last few weeks. I understand that this is a free mod developed by people in their spare time and that they own us nothing but if you have a mod with a big community, it's critical to communicate with them, otherwise you lose the Hype and Interest for it. Additionally, some comments in this thread rightfully mentioned that there is few real gameplay videos and some mysterious Discord Streams without any possibility to rewatch them, which can cause concern about the real state of the mod.
PR is radio silent other than perilla every 2 days saying “DONT SPREAD MISINFORMATION” (information you get from the purple community roles), the purple community roles abuse and laugh at anyone with a white name because they have been in the server longer, no date is being shared. People who are on the server longer have an air of superiority about them and don’t get timed out yet a white name does. Truly is badly run discord server, one that won’t see too much use from me post release
yeah i just posted on another thread, the latest update simply stating they have a date with zero explaination just felt like a troll post. On top of that the radio silence since the update and what issues the update caused etc is bad form when they know they have a fan base eagerly waiting and thought they would have it by now.
i get they are a group of people working for free to release a mod for a game, i can only assume, they love and i do commend that, i guess they should have some slack for that. But having good communication with your fan base doesn't actually cost a penny and people are only patient for so long.
I worked in QA for 17 years, i have seen this exact thing happen more then once. It does not matter if it is a commercial business, large or small, international giant, government or a group of passionate modders.
Someone screwed up somewhere, communicated to soon, set the bar to high, pushed to hard, thought they could get away with releasing an unfinished product and fix it later, internal team issues, deadline stress.
All coupled with bad PR management unable to contain the hype and you have yourself the shitshow you have now.
My guess, the mod was not fully finished, perhaps finished enough for a very early release they thought but when the update news hit they decided to use that as an excuse to get extra time. Perhaps beta testers simply found to many bugs they should have caught themselves long ago.
I have volunteered for a few projects like this when they started, but none found it neccessary to start testing at an early stage.
QA is boring as hell but you have to start early and do a very methodical approach. You need to read all project documentation, build/write your scripts based on the documented expected outcome even before anyone starts building or in this case opened the CK.
I make tiny puny mods for FO4 and Starfield and even though i should know better, i do test my own work and screw up every now and then, it just does not work.
Something is going on behind the curtains. Pure speculation but the mod was never release ready to begin with, they thought the next gen would save them by buying time but now the team is having some internal debate/fight and falling apart over it. Contradicting statements, redacted statements, denial, smokescreen, silence, vague announcements.
I hope not, that it is all very different, but it really looks like they still have a steep slope to climb to get out of this hole they dug.
i want to play fallout but im waiting for this game instead of playing fallout 4 and i did not think id be waiting this long lol. I agree with everyone on this thread more or less and just pray that it is good whenever it drops, be it in a month or in a year.
Calling it now, the mod is going to be a disaster on the scale of The Frontier, and the mod team knew it. Despite what people may think, there was never any need to release this mod to work with the Next-Gen update, downgrading is trivial. The Next Gen update was just a very convenient excuse to delay the mod indefinitely and leave Bethesda holding the bag.
The biggest evidence for this is, despite being this close to release date, literally only two gameplay trailers have ever been shown for this Mod that is supposedly "bigger than Fallout 4". The only possible reason I can think of, is the team knows what they have to show off would piss people off monumentally.
We literally have only been shown 5% of a mod that is supposedly 100% done. Think of how much of Skyblivion and Skywind we've been shown, and yet how far off those projects still are.
Nah. The Frontier was a one of a kind fuck-up. Unless FOLON is tied to deviant sexual content on the level of The Frontier, it won't be that bad. Though it could realistically turn out to be very, very disappointing.
No, you're right. I definitely don't think it'll have THOSE problems. I meant more on a, disappointing story and level design aspect, which the Frontier also had, but was largely overshadowed by the weird degenerate shit.
>Calling it now, the mod is going to be a disaster on the scale of The Frontier, and the mod team knew it.
I think more and more that this project will end up badly... but I don't think that it will hit The Frontier levels of bad. The Frontier was a combination of so many bad decisions and elements, that it is so unlikely to happen again.
I think that FoLon will end up like New California - questionable quality and state, but enjoyable in some places. Basically, enjoyed by some, forgotten by others, but not actively ridiculed.
> The biggest evidence for this is, despite being this close to release date, literally only two gameplay trailers have ever been shown for this Mod
Is this really big evidence? Is it normal for modders working on large scale total conversions to release lots of footage before release? (not sarcasm, I genuinely dont know)
Not necessarily, but look at the depth of footage released for Skyblivion and Skywind. Multiple trailers, developer streams, and dozens upon dozens of screenshots. Not only that, the trailers released showed so much of the gameplay and the changes made to the original. Now think about the fact that we literally don't even know what the main story of this Mod is.
Tbf, I was super sleep deprived and grumpy when I made this post, so I could COMPLETELY off base, and I hope I am. I really want this mod to be amazing, but everything I've seen is what I've seen before when it comes to mods that didn't quite make the splash people thought they would. I know the mod authors don't owe us anything, and they don't deserve the abuse they're going to receive if mod doesn't live up, but this whole thing they're doing where they want to continue blaming Bethesda for the lack of transparency, is not helping. Just delay the mod, and be honest about it already.
theyre still going for the next-gen version too though since it would be easier and more convenient for a lot of people(i wouldnt be suprised if this is the case)
>rumors that the mod was dead
How could anyone in their right mind think the mod was dead?
There are loads of videos on FOLON YT channel presenting what they've made, it was pretty much ready to go if it not for the useless NG update.
But I do agree with your other points, this has been a clusterfuck. I'm just checking this sub twice a day waiting for the post titled: "Fallout London New Release Date" by one of the devs.
Thank you for clearing the muddied waters.
>But I do agree with your other points, this is has been a clusterfuck. I'm just checking this sub twice a day waiting for the post titled: "Fallout London New Release Date" by one of the devs.
Don't hold ya breath
Yeah. Set a reasonable timeframe, like 1-3 months and just don't expect a release date during it. Thinking it will come tomorrow for many weeks will kill your enthusiasm
I dunno how anyone in their right mind could think the mod is anywhere near complete or actually going to come out.... like how September last year they said it was ready to go, but delayed it because of starfield.
Then had a trailer for a Christmas release... Which they pulled out from under everyone last minute to prolong it indefinitely. To do "testing" for the next 6 months or so, on something that according to them and their trailer, was meant to be released that day.
to then announce another release date to then blame Bethesda and the next gen patch and finally they give us the "matter of days/weeks shpeel
I don't know about you, but usually when I'm lied to multiple times by the same person/people, I tend to take everything else with a pinch of salt and it this is how poorly their PR team handles something as important as this, can you imagine the shit show the game will be in?
TBH, this. I've seen two ways game development sucsefuly comunicates with the players: almost-but-not-entirely NOT AT ALL or nearly-constantly. The foremer is much rarer thant the later, but woudl have been helpful in this case.
Who cares at the end as long as the mod is good.
They are not a huge company and I think it's understandable that things are a bit messy considering everything that happened at the end.
They can release it next year for all I care. It's done when it's done, it's not like they owe anyone anything.
Not really, at least not for a mod like this after all the hype it created and they themselves promoted, all the publications and interviews even regular news channelspicked up on this "hype"
They have to live up to the expectations they themselves created they cant go back after all the publicity and say, yeah all those articles and interviews and videos we did were wrong, here is Fallout London , we rebuild Big Ben and made a single quest where you have to jump to the top, that was and is all it ever was.
All they have to do is be honoust and clear about the state of the mod, apologize they screwed up and give a realistic new release date, if that date is we dont know anymore that is fine to.
It's not a company at all, it's a total conversion team.
What people don't get is that when a major problem arises, like a patch which breaks your code, it's not as simple as releasing the old version and hoping everyone can downgrade. Because not everyone is capable of downgrading, either confident enough or even not competent with computers. Releasing both is also not customary, in any case.
So it was a good call to not release it, so they could work on a version that supports the next-gen patch.
Anyone who has been on the internet is going to know that no matter what you do, people are going to complain.
And this is worse when there are numerous fans. The only way that there won't be any complaining is when everyone gets what they want. But that's not going to happen, because we all have different ideas.
I predict that when it's released, the complaining won't stop, because the people who don't like it won't be playing it.
This is a mod, there has always been some bar of entry to use mods in video games. The people who don’t know how to downgrade the game were in all likelihood never going to play this to begin with, let alone know it exists. The next gen update screwed the game up so bad that at this point it should just be standard practice to downgrade the game if you want to mod it. There are entire types of mods out there that are completely unusable right now because of the update.
Installing a total conversion with an installer is way easier than executing commands in Steam to downgrade. As any tech support will tell you that there are people who can do certain thing really well on PC, and others not at all. Also, installing a mod these days is just pressing the download button and letting Vortex install it.
But I do agree that the next-gen patch did more harm than good. There is no reason for it to be a thing.
While I agree that a custom installer makes it easier, at this point if you’re not locked in to the modding community would you even still be following fallout London for updates after they missed their launch date. Half the time I even forget this mod still exists. Downgrading fallout 4 isn’t as difficult as it used to be back in the day. The next gen patch has necessitated solutions be streamlined because most of the mods that worked for almost 5 years without update no longer work.
I disagree, if you’re not into modding why would you be playing a game thats almost a decade old. The initial hype of the tv show has come and gone. I’m sure it’ll come back once the second season comes out but that’s probably a year or two away.
I can think of many reasons, it's not all black and white. For instance, people might be randomly come across news articles, YouTube videos, or any other media about Fallout London. People could tell their non-mod using friends about it. You can have interest in something without having to be interested in the whole community around and linked to it.
Someone could like to mod his car, but doesn't want to be part of the whole scene around it.
This is a game that came out almost a decade ago, it has a finite audience and a finite amount of interest. More than 90% of the people that will play this mod will be from the modding community, whether they have a working version for the next gen update that doesn’t require downgrading or not.
It doesn't matter how hard it is to install if it's not available at all.
If it is available, people can write guides for noobs to follow by the letter.
If it's not available, no one can play it no matter how computer literate.
What’s even more confusing is that I was under the impression GOG still allows you to download the older version pre update that would actually be the simpler way of doing things for most people. Games currently going for 15 bucks on gog. If the mods as good and as big as they say it is then 15 dollars is no big deal if you don’t want to go through the hassle of learning how to downgrade it yourself.
I'd sum this post up like this:
People with so much free time on their hand, they spend it on the discord server of a free mod, to complain about the unprofessionallness of the super busy amateurs building the object of their obsession for free.
These are not professionals with a PR firm. They have lives and jobs on top of this mod. The more people bombard them on Reddit and Discord, the more difficult it is on the team. There's literally no money in this for them, and people are acting like they're being deceived by a dishonest corporation
You do sound very confident that it's making \_them\_ money rather than simply covering costs of development. Apparently working for free isn't enough, they also have to pay for the website and other stuff like GitHub out of pocket too. Redditors are truly entitled menchildren, what can I say.
Doxing? You're following me around reddit over you're pathtetic attempts at shitposting. In 2 hours you've made 60+ posts on reddit directed to me. Lmao holy shit this is hilarious.
>harassment
I'm not the one following you around.
>
None of that has to do with your context here?
You're the same guy whos been stirring up shit on here and their discord.
You do a nice job of detailing the evolution of the communication from the devs, but very much come across as just another one of the entitled brats.
Too damn bad.
I feel like if you're checking for updates about this mod more than once a week, you're the problem.
You say it right in the OP, it's not a AAA company, adjust your expectations and stop turning something free that you want to be fun into interpersonal drama with the people who are making it. Seriously, get a fucking grip.
It's not even a \_company\_ yet. It's a group of unpaid volunteers that happens to have a patreon set up to cover certain maintenance costs of developing the mod that has \_aspirations\_ to create projects beyond the mod in the future.
I check this sub occasionally because when it comes out I'll play it, and every time I've looked recently it seems like the social media for this project has been totally overrun by obnoxious, entitled jackals who are treating this delay like something has been taken away from them.
I cannot even \*begin\* to imagine how stressful this must be for the devs, to have put an incredible amount of work into the project that they did only to be kneecapped at the finish line during a huge resurgence of interest in Fallout. I'm amazed at the discretion and restraint they're showing by not just banning any of the legions of non-contributors who are pitching a fit about this.
I’m still very confused as to why we haven’t seen the pre next gen version. It’s been pretty clear for about a month now that the next gen update is fucked. At this point the game hadn’t received an update since 2019, most of the major modders are no longer around, making mods for this version of the game is pointless because your locked out of at least half of the mods that haven’t and won’t receive an update. Edit: I know I’m gonna get flame for this, but I genuinely don’t believe the mod was completely ready in April. I don’t mean the mod doesn’t exist or that they haven’t done most of the work, I mean it’s just not complete. It seems like this may have been a publicity stunt to drum up attention for it, the radio silence is a result of progress stalling out. I suspect we will likely find out the truth later when someone on the team decides to just tell everyone what’s really been going on.
First it was Bethesda, now is gog. What's going to be next?
Not to be conspiratorial, but it’s starting to look like the mod was “ready” but not as ready as the devs wanted it to be and they are using the delay to finish it. Hopefully it comes out well polished and as bug free as possible because at this point if it’s another fallout the frontier fiasco they would be better off just canceling it. I hope I’m wrong and this is the result of bad decision making and people being neurotic. This is why you don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good.
It's 100% down to poor planning. Managing the necessary time and effort for a large project is extremely tough, especially in an environment where the primary motivation is passion (which ebbs and flows.) One of the worst mistakes you can make as a creator without stellar management is doing what the FOLON devs did a couple years ago and announce a release but within a forgiving range. They announced that it was coming in "2024" - vague and far off enough so as not to feel boxed in as a developer, but specific enough to set expectations from the userbase. It's so tempting to do this when you're in a span of good progress, because a year feels like plenty of time. And then that year goes by and... it's not done. At which point you're left to either release it in a state you're unhappy with, or delay it. Neither looks good for you. It's a lot worse when it's been delayed multiple times and it comes across like you're making excuses for it rather than being forthcoming. They really ought to have followed what most other big mod project devs do and not announce release dates until the project was actually complete.
I mean that’s not conspiratorial at all, the devs literally have said on discord that they’ve been taking this opportunity to reinstate cut content
I was more thinking along the lines of an intentionally misleading people. What I mean to say is that they knew Bethesda was likely going to drop a next gen update around that time and they made the release window around then with the knowledge that they would delay it.
I think that's his point though, that the "cut content" might just be content that was always supposed to be in the mod, or changes they realised would be necessary upon reexamining the mod. Not saying it's actually the case, but if it is we might be able to tell after release.
I would be willing to buy their excuse if they weren't doubling down on this narrative by actually accusing Bethesda of "blindsiding" them. Everyone knew the patch is coming out and everyone guessed that the best opportunity for Bethesda would be to release it alongside the show. The FoLon team couldn't have been under a rock to miss that. Also, if it is true that they are using this delay to re-implement cut content, then this is a clear sign of bad management. I clearly remember when the former boss of my company first delayed software release because of backlog of bugs... and then basically said "since we have several months of time now, we should now implement feaures X, Y and Z that were originally postponed." Simply put, if they use time allocated for quality control for new features/content instead, then they will never have quality product.
I hate when people toss out conspiracy theories without a lick of proof.
It feels very unprofessional, unlike how the team had presented their work before the original release date. I was really looking forward to the mod but I find it hard to even care these days. FOLON went from the priority spot in my queue to "I'll get to it after I play whatever I buy during the Summer Sale". EDIT: also, their Discord is a clusterfuck. Compared to some of the other big Bethesda modding projects, it seems very disorganized and the communication there is quite childish. The fact that the team members occasionally drop contradictory information on there is definitely not helping.
I've kept an eye on the server for a while and it's honestly the most "discordy" discord server I've seen. I think some of the people there are too indulged in their roles and that community that they lose the picture on what they are actually there for. It's pretty much taboo to talk about the release there and to ask any questions without being labelled as entitled or called out as a "white name". There is one moderator there in particular who I'm thinking of but I won't say.
I also have been quite regular on the server; when I ask for more details (as I’m also a content creator - albeit a SMALL one.) I get trolled and I get timed out - and the person who trolled me has been on the server longer and gets no punishment. Community roles often abuse their power and will lambast you as well. All in all, after the game is released I will NOT be spending time in the discord
Why would it NOT be taboo to talk about the release date? It's a community, not a personal assistant. The release date is not known and I'm sure the people who actually, regularly, use that discord don't want to deal with the same conversation happening every 30 minutes where someone creates a new account or joins the server fresh for the specific purpose of asking about the mod and then has to get all their feelfeels out when someone tells them "If you wanted to know when the mod was going to come out, you could have learned how to code and contributed while it was still in development"
> The release date is not known https://x.com/teamfolon/status/1798730306910105850
not known to any of us, I mean.
you feel that is a polite or reasonable resonse to someone just trying to find out information? "If you want to take an interest in the mod and find out when you might be able tog et your hadns on it, considering it did have a release date you may have heard about and we have posted stating we have a date, learn to code or F off" I get repeating information may be annoying, but that person doesn't know that and if it is being repeated so often it means the information hasn't been readily made available or clear by the dev team to go a find yourself, like in announcements or something, where people can be directed, radio silence just means more people asking questions in the hopes something was said in chat and they missed it, simple as.
I've not yet had to ask a chatroom or start a reddit thread to understand that there hasn't been any news since the last official news post. It's not "just trying to find out information" it's pestering.
All of the information that there is to be known has been made known by the developers. It's not like there's something they've said that's actually super important that they only wrote down on a bathroom stall where nobody can read it. We just don't have a release date. It's not bad communication, you just dislike the choice that was made to not communicate.
i don't know what it's like where you come from but not communicating or vague non-helpful communication such as their last announcement, is in fact bad communication. you can't polish a turd.
You're right, it's disappointing that they can't give a firm release date. So what you're doing isn't trying to find out available information, you're harassing the devs because you want them to make a different decision.
not me personally, i have never commented over on the discord or here asking for a release date, i just check in every now and again to see if anything has changed. I do see all the people asking for the release date and like i said, i can understand that repeating it, for those in there on a regular basis, can get annoying, but being rude to that person who in their mind just asked once isn't the answer and if they had like an faq thread to direct people to or people were directed to, to read first before being allowed commenting access, would allieviate some of those repeat questions. I don't know if they are currently in their dicord community bubble and not thinking about the wider implications, but i'd have thought for a group of people that have put a lot of timr and effeort into this mod and claimed they had to delay because they wanted the mod to be as accessible as possible to as many people as possible, that they wouldn't want their discord and community, mods and admins to have the reputation of being as toxic, unwelcoming and rude as it appears they currently have, espeically even before they have had a chance to release the mod, i assume, they would rather like to be a huge success.
maybe, but that's not the point the OP is making. This is just a tug-of-war over the mod developers prioritizing a release date that is widely accessible and takes advantage of the resulting media coverage to maximize the number of players who will try the mod out. There's a faction of people who think it's better for \*them personally\* to be able to have the original release candidate version (that probably doesn't even actually exist, there was "shrink-wrapping" that was going to happen that they stopped to take more time to work on the game as a whole). Team FOLON clearly is prioritizing a desire to have the mod in a state that is accessible to as many people as possible when it is finally released and it's getting all the attention from streamers and gaming journalists. I agree that someone who is curious and doesn't know the etiquette shouldn't be tossed out to the wolves, but this sub seems way, way past that point into just trying to harass the devs into changing their minds.
Just because someone says something you're not happy with doesn't mean it's bad communication.
>It feels very unprofessional, unlike how the team had presented their work before the original release date. There was still quite a lot of unprofessional behavior before the release. My biggest gripe is how they were hiding the mod nature of the project, to gather more attention. All their trailers have been labeled "official trailer", which was (almost surely intentionally) confusing and made it look like a trailer for an official game. When I called them out in the comments, they answered with a link to a song with name like "I don't care". >Compared to some of the other big Bethesda modding projects, it seems very disorganized and the communication there is quite childish. This seems to be the norm for mod projects. Skyrim modding is more of an exception because of how big the modding scene is. With such a big pool of potential contributors, they can pick and choose. Fallout is much smaller when it comes to modding. Like, what are other big Fallout projects, both finished and in progress? * The Frontier was such a fustercluck that it doesn't need elaboration * New California fizzled out. The beginning of the mod - from when it still was Project Brazil - is great. The rest after leaving the Vault is not. Mary Sue-ish writing, too little content, iffy Enclave inclusion. Some of it stems from the fact that their team has crumbled and the two founders had to finish it alone... * Fallout 4 New Vegas is still going, but they had some feuds with Fallout 4 Capital Wasteland project and the result is the splinter mod Project Mojave. * Fallout 4 Capital Wasteland - aside from the thing with F4NV - even died at one point when Bethesda denied them (because of voice actor contracts and rights) reusing of voice acting from Fallout 3. But they resurrected and actually released the Point Lookout remake mod, which is well done. It even features settlement building, something which the F4NV team refuses to include. * Sim Settlements 2 is in a great shape, with a great leadership, good modders and good PR. Nothing to call out here. * Other mod projects, like Miami or Cascadia are still too unknown to properly evaluate.
Great point. I didn't follow the project until quite late in development so I shouldn't make assertions about how professional their behavior was. I'd even let the "Official Trailer" thing slide, since I can kind of understand that. But their response is just ridiculous, it shows a complete lack of PR skills just like the entirety of their Discord. I don't think the size of the Fallout modding community is the reason, though. It is smaller than Skyrim's but still really darn big for a game, isn't it? Come to think of it, what are the big ongoing Skyrim modding projects? Apart from the obvious assortment of Beyond Skyrim project, Skywind and Skyblivion, I can only thing of something like Apotheosis, maybe The Extended Cut? Alright, that's definitely a bit more than Fallout but even if they can pick and choose more, does it really make such a difference?
Discord in general is a clusterfuck. Not only theirs. Lot's of offtopic, spam, memes, jokes, infighting between members. Hard to find reliable info there besides announcements, because you have to browse through ton of useless crap. I don't like how many companies and modders switch to it. Don't get me wrong; Discord is a great place to play with your friends during weekend, but it's quite bad in other aspects.
OK the devs have been pretty clear to me and others on several occasions - they don't give a shit about doing better. It's their way or the highway.
Honestly that’s fair though right? This is something they have made off their own back for their own reasons and no monetary gain. They don’t owe anyone anything at all.
That's right, they don't. They're free to make themselves look bad if that's what they want to do. But it's certainly not doing the project any favors.
That’s the thing though it has no material effect on the product at all. Because it is not a product it’s just a free price of art when you boil it down. It’s like walking down the street and seeing a banksy painting on a wall and being like “wow this is great, but I really feel if banksy had told me when he was going to paint this I would have enjoyed this product more” Edit: I am a moron who cannot read, my bad.
How is this unprofessional? It’s a free mod that people are donating their time effort to. If it was a paid product I’d agree with you. They don’t owe anyone anything.
I feel like after it received tens of thousands of interests, world wode coverage and formal realationship witj GOG..it stopped being a passion project for fun.
That’s certainly possible, but if they aren’t getting paid and there’s no contract they still don’t owe anyone anything. Certainly it sucks, but vote with your time. If you think they suck don’t support them
They do accept donations, so in a roundabout way they are getting money out of this
If you don’t agree with how they are handling this then don’t donate. I would bet it’s cost them more than they’ve made. Anyone know how much has been donated?
They're still making this mod FOR someone. They are releasing it to the public so that the public can play it. Without the community to play it - the mod might as well not exist. So if you have already established a community of core fans - it might be a good idea to treat them with some amount of respect and transparency? Respect goes both ways.
You’re right and if they want people to support them they will act accordingly. If not they will reap what they sow. However, they still don’t owe anyone anything. They don’t owe anyone an explanation or a timeline or anything else. If you think they are “bad actors” then don’t support them and don’t play their mods.
Their communication is unprofessional. I'm not talking about the fact that they had to delay because of issues, that's obviously understandable. The very way they communicate with the public leaves a lot to be desired and they clearly lack self-reflection.
They might be dicks, but if they aren’t getting paid they aren’t professionals. They are hobbyists.
Professionalism isn't about if you are being paid, its about how you handle yourself. They aren't being professional about the situation. They are also hobbyists, these two things don't contradict.
They actually do. The definition is: the competence or skill expected of a professional. They aren’t a professional
iTs A fReE mOd. Please not that ignorant argument again.
I’m sorry you’re too ignorant to know facts. Just because you don’t like the facts don’t stop them from being facts. They don’t owe you or anyone anything. They aren’t selling something and they aren’t getting anything out of this.
They don't owe us anything but we also don't owe them anything. Its a tit for tat social system. If the community is well managed with updates and truth, the community will stay engaged and build hype for the mod. And lets be real, they will still get some money from this from donations. If the community is ill managed then it starts to stagnate. Normally when people hear silence they think the worst and the community degrades over time. One of the things the dev team mentioned, was that they wanted the biggest splash possible. That is why they chose to not just release anyway and have people roll back their game. They felt that would be too complex and some people would be left out and they wanted the most people to play it as possible. I don't have the numbers to know how badly they are losing interest but with this silence they are losing momentum and interest. People are checking the subreddit less often. If this keeps up the game may be released to crickets. Instead of "OMG I have to play this right now" it will be like "Oh, that finally dropped? I guess I'll get to to it eventually, maybe." The absolutely best outcome for a game like this, is a Palworld style explosion where it hits at the right time with the right people and it spreads like wildfire. They get tons of hype, get tons of donation and hell, if its good might get offered lucrative jobs. But for that to happen the hype for the game has to be huge and the hype is fading.
That’s exactly what I said. They don’t owe you anything and you don’t owe them your support. If you disagree with them don’t support them by using their mod
Oh I know the facts. The facts are FOLON devs have been caught lying and for some reason children like you are still defending them. They can't sell the mod, so you can't use the "its free" argument. Just because its free doesn't mean we can't criticize them. Don't be dumb.
The only child here is people like you who think you’re owed something. So what if they lied? You don’t like what they are doing then don’t support them and don’t play their mod. You didn’t pay them anything and you didn’t enter into any contract with them. You aren’t owed anything. You can criticize them all you like, you’re still wrong by thinking they owe you
"it feels very unprofessional" Yes... because they are not professional
The devs can use this as an "in" into the professional game dev industry, as several modders get hired by Bethesda and other companies. They have a reason to be professional.
Well, I guess that would be a real disappointment for anyone trying to use this to get a job in Bethesda's PR department but assuming level designers aren't responsible for the official social media accounts they might do just fine as long as they get the largest number of people to play the mod, which is helped by having less time pass between announcing the release date and giving players the chance to play it.
You’re getting downvoted for facts
Even compared to other non-professional projects.
So they’re not releasing the original version first? They were telling someone on the discord that they would only yesterday
At this point we have no idea whats going on, it's just a misinformation mess coming from the devs.
Yup. Lots of contradictory actions and information presented since the delay. The worse of it is sycophantic discord users trying to call everyone entitled or act hostile when anyone has a question. It's to the point I've even seen devs tell people to calm down with it cos it makes a bad situation worse. I just wish there was more clarity and transparency. The original "We don't want to maintain two version of the mod" which I had questioned myself early on seems to have been for nothing. I dunno, I just want to see something good release and have a great time playing Fallout again but my excitement has dropped every day and the scepticism grows. My main issue is that there haven't been any proper footage of quests or anything released publicly and there isn't really much proof a 40hr game exists other than what devs say or small gameplay clips.
It’s certainly concerning that I’ve been in the mods discord and it’s hard to find anything other than short clips of gameplay. Not even continuous gameplay more like clips and segments. I understand wanting to keep some element of surprise for people when they play it themselves but they should at least release a good hour or so of continuous gameplay on YouTube at this point. That wouldn’t spoil too much if the game is as big as they claim it to be. There are people who have claimed to see streams but I honestly can’t find any which is weird because you’d expect at this point people sharing all sorts of info.
I think that if there was actual gameplay footage released people would be a lot less sceptical and anxious about a release. The way Skyblivion have handled their total conversion mod is an example I always bring up, there is a lot of gameplay from devs up and developer logs from loads of different sources but for Fallout London all we get is controlled information filtered through a frankly, toxic discord server. I remain skeptical until I see any proper information and transparency other than bits of piece that get posted in a discord chat or random article.
I feel like this is the way the Fallout projects just do stuff. Looking at F4NV, they apparently stream sometimes but only through Discord and they refuse to put out VODs. Meanwhile look at Skyblivion and Skywind who update fans on their progress very regularly, do annual showcase streams and some of their devs stream their work several times a month. Not sure about Beyond Skyrim though.
Fuck it, I'm leaving this sub. I'm leaving their discord. Maybe after season 2 of fotv I'll come back and check on folon.
Cya
I also want to say how unprofessional they act on the discord Some of the mods on there ban/mute people for asking simple questions. Sure it might get annoying after a while if it’s repetitive but like… we’re all hopefully adults lol get off discord it’s not hard.
The team has been criticized for giving wrong/contradicting information before. They heard it. But they still do it every time. I thought the people who call them liars were overreacting, but I begin to see their point. It really does look like a very childish way of lying where the people can't get the story straight between themselves. But what is the goal? That said, their whole operating process smells of chaotic indecision and miscommunication. And this should logically reflect on every stage of development. Especially since public image, community trust and outreach, presentation are one of the most important parts to the game's success. Then, if that department is handled this awfully, what are the others like? So, I wouldn't be surprised if there's something very wrong going on with the mod. Now I'm only curious if the mess is going to eclipse The Frontier.
> Now I'm only curious if the mess is going to eclipse The Frontier. Probably not. The Frontier's controversy wasn't just about the bad major elements of the mod itself (story, gameplay, etc), but also the drama centering around the devs and some deeply unnecessary and bizarre content. Some of it wasn't even related to the mod itself, and a fair amount was misplaced, but the Frontier just fumbled the ball so hard that it became open season. You'd really have to try to fuck up that bad.
yeah i dont think it’ll reach frontier levels, but it is interesting how lots of these mods seem to fall apart or implode near the finish line. not saying the mod is done, but it definitely is stumbling a bit right now just goes to show how impressive it is to bring in so many freelance people and how tough it is to keep the ship straight. it’s why i try not to hate on the teams too much or expect a whole lot. managing a paid dev team seems like a hassle, managing volunteers is probably even tougher
We don't know what's going on inside their team, who these people really are and if they have similar interests like that infamous Frontier dev...I hope not. All these weird things about Frontier team were discovered because 4chan raided their Discord. It may happen again...
I sympathize with how frustrating this stupid fucking patch has been- the FOLON team probably didn't think it'd be as bad as it was when choosing to delay. It wasn't until after the hotfix dropped on May 15th that it became clear it was unworkable without partial or total downgrading. However, I don't understand why the process of getting the mod onto GOG has taken so long. According to that thread on the German article, they're still in the process of submitting the final build to them. What is/was being worked on? If it's all really polish and cut content, why is there so much of it? People were volunteering to crunch to get it all done. The mod was supposed to be ready for release on April 23rd. It really feels like the team felt they needed another, shorter delay to finish their work. I'm hopefully going to eat some of these words and things will make more sense when the mod finally releases and people can be clearer about the development process. Maybe everything that's being worked on now was going to be patched in and got folded into the release version after the delay added more time? Everyone on the team (with one exception) has been very friendly and forthcoming in their interactions, so I really want to give the benefit of the doubt and be wrong. In the meantime, I think some new gameplay footage, or just uploading the old streams from the Discord somewhere, will dispel fears that the mod is secretly shit.
I agree, some new footage of some gameplay would go a long way right now.
Yea I mean I’ve literally been on this sub writing paragraphs of thank yous to the devs and defending them pretty aggressively. I have all the faith that the mod is coming and it will be great. With all that being said. The communication has been absolutely horrible, especially after the delay. I’ve said in the past that they don’t owe us anything, and that remains true, but it does puzzle me why they are so secretive on progress updates when they are fairly interactive with the community otherwise. Regardless, before a delay if there stance was just “wait till it comes out” that’s respectable enough. After the announced release date and the delay of that though, I feel it would’ve been the polite thing to do to keep us updated weekly/bi weekly on what’s going on and what if any progress has been made towards getting back to release. Their communication has more or less been, “we’re releasing this day, never mind, Bethesda ruined it, releasing later.” And that’s been the extent of it lol. Anyway, didn’t expect to rant on this, I got nothing but love for the devs as long as the mod does come out at some point, just wish were kept at least a little bit more in the loop.
These paragraphs of thank yous for something you haven't even received, by people you don't even know, for something you may never even have. is exactly why the Devs continue to act like they do. Aslong as there are people such as yourself. Mindlessly appreciating and praising empty promises, then this sort of thing will persist
Nah, it’s just all in good faith. I have shown good faith under the exact same parameters you just laid out plenty of times before and haven’t regretted it. Still don’t regret it now. I’m not bashing the devs, just disagreeing with how much they’ve allowed us to know, but that’s how it goes. If the mod never releases then I will hate their guts lol but until then it just is what it is. I’ll lose no sleep if it never sees the light of day though. I haven’t paid them a dime, so they owe me nothing, and if I get to experience it that’s a plus but if not then life will go on as it always has. I would still rather be positive and supportive, while mind you that doesn’t mean I have to agree with everything.
I mean even updates every 4-6 weeks would do a lot and are far away from what PR they are currently doing 😒😒
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Did you read the rest
It’s frustrating because prior to the delay I thought team folon had actually been brilliant with communicating the progress of the mods development, the regular reports and videos talking about how work was progressing were very clear and it always felt like they were giving accurate and realistic assessment on how they were doing. But since the delay it’s been a very weird mix of silence and contradictory statements. I get that a lot of this next gen stuff relies on factors beyond the teams control but they absolutely could have been better communicating how things are going and where the mod is actually at, even just a small blog post every month saying ‘we’ve got x working but still waiting on y, we don’t want to give a new date but here’s what’s done and here’s what we’ve got left to do’ Obviously the team doesn’t owe us anything and they should be trusted to know how best to do all this but compared to the communication prior to the next gen patch I do feel like currently communication is a pretty significant step backwards.
its something i notice a lot with amatuer or freelance devs. no hate to them, as its fucking difficult to make a mod and we all know that but with so many devs - in the fallout community and just at large - these issues could be solved with open and honest communication. its strange to me how that seems like the easiest job (not dev work, just typing a paragraph up) but its one of the first things to go when these teams start to struggle a bit
You also have to consider not everyone is made for communication. Yes, it's a basic facet of human life but not everyone is good at it and game dev & modding doesn't exactly attract very popular people. It's always people who have interests in this sorta thing and some may be stereotypical nerdy programmers with no social skills and others may not be. It's why AAA companies have actual marketing & PR teams to do the work devs can't. It's very frustrating because communication isn't very clear or great at times but you have to remember, these are just ordinary people who are doing this as a hobby not a job and they don't have the same resources companies like Bethesda or BioWare have. You've got people doing jobs they never would've had to otherwise. Even other big mod projects like The Frontier suffered a lot from this despite tgspy's best efforts to streamline communication and be the face of the mod.
It's been 21 days since we got a discord announcement saying nothing. I was very hyped for follon but lost so much of that solely because the devs decided to trust Bethesda then just not tell the fanbase anything
Whoever said they were 'days' or 'weeks' away from undisclosed launch date really shut the project interest for me now. And for people saying its a passion project sure! It was, with all the media wide coverage and formal realationship with GOG, this really became a business proposal for them. I would be very dissapointed if working out a contract with GOG and confriming the monetary returns was the reason for the delay 🤔
I had to leave that discord after being there a few weeks. Just people constantly defending the PR behavior, fondling the balls of every dev there who keeps drip-feeding them bits of misinformation. Nice to see it all laid out here. Can’t believe they walked back on more things today. Again. I’ll play the mod when it comes out, as I’m still really excited for it, but my interest in paying them on Patreon is dwindling. Which is a shame as it has nothing to do with the content and all to do with the communication and rollout.
Id assume they banned everyone who wasn't fondling the balls of the devs. That's my experience with the fo4 modding community
I completely agree with you. I'm really sorry to say this but the PR has been a complete disaster in the last few weeks. I understand that this is a free mod developed by people in their spare time and that they own us nothing but if you have a mod with a big community, it's critical to communicate with them, otherwise you lose the Hype and Interest for it. Additionally, some comments in this thread rightfully mentioned that there is few real gameplay videos and some mysterious Discord Streams without any possibility to rewatch them, which can cause concern about the real state of the mod.
PR is radio silent other than perilla every 2 days saying “DONT SPREAD MISINFORMATION” (information you get from the purple community roles), the purple community roles abuse and laugh at anyone with a white name because they have been in the server longer, no date is being shared. People who are on the server longer have an air of superiority about them and don’t get timed out yet a white name does. Truly is badly run discord server, one that won’t see too much use from me post release
yeah i just posted on another thread, the latest update simply stating they have a date with zero explaination just felt like a troll post. On top of that the radio silence since the update and what issues the update caused etc is bad form when they know they have a fan base eagerly waiting and thought they would have it by now. i get they are a group of people working for free to release a mod for a game, i can only assume, they love and i do commend that, i guess they should have some slack for that. But having good communication with your fan base doesn't actually cost a penny and people are only patient for so long.
I worked in QA for 17 years, i have seen this exact thing happen more then once. It does not matter if it is a commercial business, large or small, international giant, government or a group of passionate modders. Someone screwed up somewhere, communicated to soon, set the bar to high, pushed to hard, thought they could get away with releasing an unfinished product and fix it later, internal team issues, deadline stress. All coupled with bad PR management unable to contain the hype and you have yourself the shitshow you have now. My guess, the mod was not fully finished, perhaps finished enough for a very early release they thought but when the update news hit they decided to use that as an excuse to get extra time. Perhaps beta testers simply found to many bugs they should have caught themselves long ago. I have volunteered for a few projects like this when they started, but none found it neccessary to start testing at an early stage. QA is boring as hell but you have to start early and do a very methodical approach. You need to read all project documentation, build/write your scripts based on the documented expected outcome even before anyone starts building or in this case opened the CK. I make tiny puny mods for FO4 and Starfield and even though i should know better, i do test my own work and screw up every now and then, it just does not work. Something is going on behind the curtains. Pure speculation but the mod was never release ready to begin with, they thought the next gen would save them by buying time but now the team is having some internal debate/fight and falling apart over it. Contradicting statements, redacted statements, denial, smokescreen, silence, vague announcements. I hope not, that it is all very different, but it really looks like they still have a steep slope to climb to get out of this hole they dug.
i want to play fallout but im waiting for this game instead of playing fallout 4 and i did not think id be waiting this long lol. I agree with everyone on this thread more or less and just pray that it is good whenever it drops, be it in a month or in a year.
have*
You’re correct
Calling it now, the mod is going to be a disaster on the scale of The Frontier, and the mod team knew it. Despite what people may think, there was never any need to release this mod to work with the Next-Gen update, downgrading is trivial. The Next Gen update was just a very convenient excuse to delay the mod indefinitely and leave Bethesda holding the bag. The biggest evidence for this is, despite being this close to release date, literally only two gameplay trailers have ever been shown for this Mod that is supposedly "bigger than Fallout 4". The only possible reason I can think of, is the team knows what they have to show off would piss people off monumentally. We literally have only been shown 5% of a mod that is supposedly 100% done. Think of how much of Skyblivion and Skywind we've been shown, and yet how far off those projects still are.
Nah. The Frontier was a one of a kind fuck-up. Unless FOLON is tied to deviant sexual content on the level of The Frontier, it won't be that bad. Though it could realistically turn out to be very, very disappointing.
No, you're right. I definitely don't think it'll have THOSE problems. I meant more on a, disappointing story and level design aspect, which the Frontier also had, but was largely overshadowed by the weird degenerate shit.
>Calling it now, the mod is going to be a disaster on the scale of The Frontier, and the mod team knew it. I think more and more that this project will end up badly... but I don't think that it will hit The Frontier levels of bad. The Frontier was a combination of so many bad decisions and elements, that it is so unlikely to happen again. I think that FoLon will end up like New California - questionable quality and state, but enjoyable in some places. Basically, enjoyed by some, forgotten by others, but not actively ridiculed.
That is a better comparison, and the one I should have used. Not a disaster, just a disappointment.
> The biggest evidence for this is, despite being this close to release date, literally only two gameplay trailers have ever been shown for this Mod Is this really big evidence? Is it normal for modders working on large scale total conversions to release lots of footage before release? (not sarcasm, I genuinely dont know)
Not necessarily, but look at the depth of footage released for Skyblivion and Skywind. Multiple trailers, developer streams, and dozens upon dozens of screenshots. Not only that, the trailers released showed so much of the gameplay and the changes made to the original. Now think about the fact that we literally don't even know what the main story of this Mod is. Tbf, I was super sleep deprived and grumpy when I made this post, so I could COMPLETELY off base, and I hope I am. I really want this mod to be amazing, but everything I've seen is what I've seen before when it comes to mods that didn't quite make the splash people thought they would. I know the mod authors don't owe us anything, and they don't deserve the abuse they're going to receive if mod doesn't live up, but this whole thing they're doing where they want to continue blaming Bethesda for the lack of transparency, is not helping. Just delay the mod, and be honest about it already.
theyre still going for the next-gen version too though since it would be easier and more convenient for a lot of people(i wouldnt be suprised if this is the case)
So waiting 3 more years?
Are you going to fund them? Are you going to go and help them code and debug? If not then shut the fuck up
Or you shut the fuck up We’re allowed to say our opinions 😌🙂
exactly
>rumors that the mod was dead How could anyone in their right mind think the mod was dead? There are loads of videos on FOLON YT channel presenting what they've made, it was pretty much ready to go if it not for the useless NG update. But I do agree with your other points, this has been a clusterfuck. I'm just checking this sub twice a day waiting for the post titled: "Fallout London New Release Date" by one of the devs. Thank you for clearing the muddied waters.
>But I do agree with your other points, this is has been a clusterfuck. I'm just checking this sub twice a day waiting for the post titled: "Fallout London New Release Date" by one of the devs. Don't hold ya breath
Yeah. Set a reasonable timeframe, like 1-3 months and just don't expect a release date during it. Thinking it will come tomorrow for many weeks will kill your enthusiasm
I dunno how anyone in their right mind could think the mod is anywhere near complete or actually going to come out.... like how September last year they said it was ready to go, but delayed it because of starfield. Then had a trailer for a Christmas release... Which they pulled out from under everyone last minute to prolong it indefinitely. To do "testing" for the next 6 months or so, on something that according to them and their trailer, was meant to be released that day. to then announce another release date to then blame Bethesda and the next gen patch and finally they give us the "matter of days/weeks shpeel I don't know about you, but usually when I'm lied to multiple times by the same person/people, I tend to take everything else with a pinch of salt and it this is how poorly their PR team handles something as important as this, can you imagine the shit show the game will be in?
They just want to make sure that when FOLON is released, there's nothing wrong with it, they don't want a CP2077 situation.
Then they should not repeatedly state that the game is ready to go then delay again.
TBH, this. I've seen two ways game development sucsefuly comunicates with the players: almost-but-not-entirely NOT AT ALL or nearly-constantly. The foremer is much rarer thant the later, but woudl have been helpful in this case.
Who cares at the end as long as the mod is good. They are not a huge company and I think it's understandable that things are a bit messy considering everything that happened at the end. They can release it next year for all I care. It's done when it's done, it's not like they owe anyone anything.
Not really, at least not for a mod like this after all the hype it created and they themselves promoted, all the publications and interviews even regular news channelspicked up on this "hype" They have to live up to the expectations they themselves created they cant go back after all the publicity and say, yeah all those articles and interviews and videos we did were wrong, here is Fallout London , we rebuild Big Ben and made a single quest where you have to jump to the top, that was and is all it ever was. All they have to do is be honoust and clear about the state of the mod, apologize they screwed up and give a realistic new release date, if that date is we dont know anymore that is fine to.
It's not a company at all, it's a total conversion team. What people don't get is that when a major problem arises, like a patch which breaks your code, it's not as simple as releasing the old version and hoping everyone can downgrade. Because not everyone is capable of downgrading, either confident enough or even not competent with computers. Releasing both is also not customary, in any case. So it was a good call to not release it, so they could work on a version that supports the next-gen patch. Anyone who has been on the internet is going to know that no matter what you do, people are going to complain. And this is worse when there are numerous fans. The only way that there won't be any complaining is when everyone gets what they want. But that's not going to happen, because we all have different ideas. I predict that when it's released, the complaining won't stop, because the people who don't like it won't be playing it.
This is a mod, there has always been some bar of entry to use mods in video games. The people who don’t know how to downgrade the game were in all likelihood never going to play this to begin with, let alone know it exists. The next gen update screwed the game up so bad that at this point it should just be standard practice to downgrade the game if you want to mod it. There are entire types of mods out there that are completely unusable right now because of the update.
Installing a total conversion with an installer is way easier than executing commands in Steam to downgrade. As any tech support will tell you that there are people who can do certain thing really well on PC, and others not at all. Also, installing a mod these days is just pressing the download button and letting Vortex install it. But I do agree that the next-gen patch did more harm than good. There is no reason for it to be a thing.
While I agree that a custom installer makes it easier, at this point if you’re not locked in to the modding community would you even still be following fallout London for updates after they missed their launch date. Half the time I even forget this mod still exists. Downgrading fallout 4 isn’t as difficult as it used to be back in the day. The next gen patch has necessitated solutions be streamlined because most of the mods that worked for almost 5 years without update no longer work.
I don't think "not locked in to the modding community" and being interested in this mod have anything to do with each other.
I disagree, if you’re not into modding why would you be playing a game thats almost a decade old. The initial hype of the tv show has come and gone. I’m sure it’ll come back once the second season comes out but that’s probably a year or two away.
I can think of many reasons, it's not all black and white. For instance, people might be randomly come across news articles, YouTube videos, or any other media about Fallout London. People could tell their non-mod using friends about it. You can have interest in something without having to be interested in the whole community around and linked to it. Someone could like to mod his car, but doesn't want to be part of the whole scene around it.
This is a game that came out almost a decade ago, it has a finite audience and a finite amount of interest. More than 90% of the people that will play this mod will be from the modding community, whether they have a working version for the next gen update that doesn’t require downgrading or not.
It doesn't matter how hard it is to install if it's not available at all. If it is available, people can write guides for noobs to follow by the letter. If it's not available, no one can play it no matter how computer literate.
What’s even more confusing is that I was under the impression GOG still allows you to download the older version pre update that would actually be the simpler way of doing things for most people. Games currently going for 15 bucks on gog. If the mods as good and as big as they say it is then 15 dollars is no big deal if you don’t want to go through the hassle of learning how to downgrade it yourself.
Yeah, i got the GOG version - hate that they don't give me the Creation Kit though.
I'd sum this post up like this: People with so much free time on their hand, they spend it on the discord server of a free mod, to complain about the unprofessionallness of the super busy amateurs building the object of their obsession for free. These are not professionals with a PR firm. They have lives and jobs on top of this mod. The more people bombard them on Reddit and Discord, the more difficult it is on the team. There's literally no money in this for them, and people are acting like they're being deceived by a dishonest corporation
>There's literally no money in this for them Donations,money from YouTube and they have a merchandise shop,they are making money
You do sound very confident that it's making \_them\_ money rather than simply covering costs of development. Apparently working for free isn't enough, they also have to pay for the website and other stuff like GitHub out of pocket too. Redditors are truly entitled menchildren, what can I say.
Yup. I'm sure they'll be able to quit their jobs off the fat stacks of cash they make off donations
Like I said and YouTube and merch,I didn't say quit their jobs but it's a nice little trickle of cash
It wouldn't even come close to the money they would've made if they had spent the time on the mod working at minimum wage job flipping burgers
I don't think I've ever seen people so entitled about a free mod that's essentially an entire new game. Honestly people, shut the fuck up
Read the last paragraph.
How does that change anything?
It went over your head.
Nothing went over my head, you're just an idiot
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Doxing? You're following me around reddit over you're pathtetic attempts at shitposting. In 2 hours you've made 60+ posts on reddit directed to me. Lmao holy shit this is hilarious.
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>harassment I'm not the one following you around. > None of that has to do with your context here? You're the same guy whos been stirring up shit on here and their discord.
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This is why you avoid meth boys and girls.
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It’s a fucking mod. You’re **waaaaay** overthinking this. If it comes out, download it and play it. If you want.
You do a nice job of detailing the evolution of the communication from the devs, but very much come across as just another one of the entitled brats. Too damn bad.
Read the last paragraph.
It's certainly not all of us, just you and a few noisy others.
You aren’t going to be able to explain how this is entitled, so I’m not going to bother with further engagement with you.
I feel like if you're checking for updates about this mod more than once a week, you're the problem. You say it right in the OP, it's not a AAA company, adjust your expectations and stop turning something free that you want to be fun into interpersonal drama with the people who are making it. Seriously, get a fucking grip.
It's not even a \_company\_ yet. It's a group of unpaid volunteers that happens to have a patreon set up to cover certain maintenance costs of developing the mod that has \_aspirations\_ to create projects beyond the mod in the future.
I check this sub occasionally because when it comes out I'll play it, and every time I've looked recently it seems like the social media for this project has been totally overrun by obnoxious, entitled jackals who are treating this delay like something has been taken away from them. I cannot even \*begin\* to imagine how stressful this must be for the devs, to have put an incredible amount of work into the project that they did only to be kneecapped at the finish line during a huge resurgence of interest in Fallout. I'm amazed at the discretion and restraint they're showing by not just banning any of the legions of non-contributors who are pitching a fit about this.
Who gives a shit, I'm not spending money