Development Info Van Buren tech demo

[Calis]

Tags: Black Isle Studios; Fallout 3 (Van Buren)

Straight from the "Things that could have been" department, <A HREF="http://www.nma-fallout.com" target="_blank">No Mutants Allowed</A> have asked their former BIS contacts to kick the dead Van Buren horse one more time, which has resulted in them getting their greasy hands on the Van Buren tech demo code. In case you're wondering, Van Buren was Black Isle Studios' last attempt at making Fallout 3 before licensing (and subsequently selling) the IP to Bethesda.
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<A HREF="http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=35970" target="_blank">Go here for more info</A>.
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Since this is a pre-alpha thingamajig, don't expect a lot in terms of gameplay or stability. In fact, I wouldn't recommend torturing yourself by downloading it at all, but I'm going to anyway.
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<strong>NMA requests that other sites wait a couple of days before mirroring this file</strong>. However, since the 3DDownloads waiting queue seems to be around 20 minutes now, you may want to ask around on <A HREF="http://www.rpgcodex.com/main.php?id=irc">IRC</A> to see if anyone can hook you up.
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If you're in line waiting, here's some more Van Buren to depress you:
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<A HREF="http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=35934" target="_blank">Video</A> (low-res YouTube link is your best bet)</A>
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<A HREF="http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=35922" target="_blank">Screenies</A>
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Thanks <strong>Kotario</strong> and <strong>Brother None</strong> (formerly known as Kharn) for pointing this out.

 

[Brother None]

<strong>NMA requests that other sites wait a couple of days before mirroring this file</strong>. However, since the 3DDownloads waiting queue seems to be around 20 minutes now

Yuck, so it is.

Sometimes I wish we weren't obligated to use that file server, but oh well...

 

[Jason]

Holy shit! I was going to mock you for posting that VB demo video 2 days late, but this is the actual demo!

18 minutes to go.

 

[Kingston]

I hate you, Herve. I hope you get hit by a train, you monster.

 

[Calis]

Since I'll be in town drinking beer, someone else will have to do the hooking-up on IRC, let's get this thing spread like wildfire. :D

 

[Hellraiser]

The dead deserve respect and rest damn it. Not exhumating them to have sex with the corpse.

 

[Jason]

Not when I'm in a "romantic" mood they don't.

 

[katzenjammer]

No kidding. I don't know about you folks, but I'm gonna cop a feel of this corpse.

 

[Surgey]

So, is it legal to take this and make a full game from it?... like, unofficially?

 

[Jora]

The demo is very buggy and unfunctional but it has a great Fallout atmosphere. It would have been an awesome game.

 

[Brother None]

Looks like not everyone was interested in my request. Ah well, it's their funeral.

You can download it here, now

 

[hiciacit]

So, is it legal to take this and make a full game from it?... like, unofficially?

Would be great if a decent (mod) team could get their hands on the source code and assests, finish the game, and release it for free.


I can dream right?

 

[Globbi]

Would be cool but still it's illegal I think. Bethesda bought everything that was done for VB together with license. But maybe they would let someone use it as they don't use the engine nor anything else.

 

[Hellraiser]

I knew that falllout fans were masochists and glittering gems of hatred but necrophiliacs? Now thats a new low.

 

[Nedrah]

I'll not even touch that one.
Playing the "good old games" gets me depressed enough, I don't need to play what could have been a real FO, thanks a lot.

 

[Thrym]

It seems cool, but the first thing that struck me was that corporal shouting about commies. What the fuck? One of the things about Fallout was that it didn't pick sides, I mean the enclave may have been sucky capitalists holding on to their blown apart country, but at least I didn't have to pretend throughout the whole game I was "fighting the capitalist pig" or some shit. So where the fuck were they going with this "My parents were commies who didn't pay attn to the siren and were bombed" theme? Cause that's not Fallout.

 

[Kotario]

The demo was a segment of what was going to be the F3 tutorial. The tutorial was supposed to be an "educational film" called "After the Bombs Fall: Moving into Your New Vault". In it, you played a young woman who comes home with her brother to find that her parents were wasted by Commie insurgents. The bombs are starting to fall, and you and your brother have to make your way to a vault with the help of GMC Cpl. Armstrong. It would have taught you how to move, look at your character sheet, use the world map, fight, etc.

The segments in the demo are the last two portions of the tutorial, obviously with the "real" F3 Protagonist-type character instead of vault younglings.

 

[Pegultagol]

They should have released this on the date of Fallout 3 release.

 

[Thrym]

Ok, I rescind the piece about your parents being commies, but the point still holds that there was never a mention of a political demographic in either Fallout. The point being that you weren't already assigned a predisposition, such as it seems to be in this one where the main character seems to already have a reason to pick sides.

 

[Roqua]

Wouldn't pre-apocolypse sides be irrelevant in a post-apocolypse game? Regardless, FO 1 and 2 were staged in the US, who else would have got us in the 50's? The hippies or the jews? It wasn't mentioned because it was so obvious. ANd neither FO 1 or 2 had any ingame pre-apocolypse game play. Once you add it in, you have to give it a little perspective.

 

[Thrym]

I never gave the matter a second thought in FO, because the assumption was the world was nuked, no one gave a damn anymore. Yeah, you've got a point about pre-apoc stuff, I didn't actually know that section was even a tutorial or a pre-apoc story bit when I played it. Still all I can say is I prefer the feel of a game that doesn't involve "commies vs. capitalists". Backstory is nice, but the appeal of the Fallout (to me at least) was that you were practically nameless. The first one pulled that off better obviously since you weren't the chosen one, but even that is less obnoxious than if Fallout 3 pits you against the "evil" - insert ideology -.

 

[Shoelip]

Pay a little attention.

The demo was a segment of what was going to be the F3 tutorial. The tutorial was supposed to be an "educational film" called "After the Bombs Fall: Moving into Your New Vault". In it, you played a young woman who comes home with her brother to find that her parents were wasted by Commie insurgents. The bombs are starting to fall, and you and your brother have to make your way to a vault with the help of GMC Cpl. Armstrong. It would have taught you how to move, look at your character sheet, use the world map, fight, etc.

The segments in the demo are the last two portions of the tutorial, obviously with the "real" F3 Protagonist-type character instead of vault younglings.

 

[Hellraiser]

Now thats an interesting tutorial concept. It definitely fits the retrofuture 50s setting of fallout.

 

[Bloodlust]

Playing that tech demo brings back many nice memories and feelings.What a great game that would heve become!

Really buggy,in the true fallout way,though. :patriot:

I've played it 5 times and never managed to get inside the vault before the game crashed.

 

[Morgoth]

Surprisingly, it only crashed once so far. They also got the low-perspective "2D" isometric angle in the 3D engine right. Man, I wish Obsidian will one day get the chance to create a real Fallout. That's the best one can hope right now.

And fuck Bethesda!