Alton, IL- a two year project and a half year project started in March of 2009, and most likely the largest Fallout 3 mod to date. Alton was created by Elijah Houck, alongside a team of numerous and indispensable voice actors, resource creators, beta testers, and even our own composer, the talented Justin Hardin (aka jhardingame).

Alton, IL features an expansive and highly immersive quest in which you not only try to find your way home after ending up in post-apocalyptic Alton, IL, but also choose sides at the brink of all out war between two factions. During your stay in Alton, prepare to be svcked into the lore as you play through the branched main quest, an adventure that will have you choose which faction you will side with for the rest of your stay. Will you side with the Plague, a group of damned vault dwellers seeking revenge, or will you fight with the Underground Railroad, the largest city in Alton?

Alton, IL also includes numerous side quests, dozens of new locations to visit, and a fully explorable world twice the size of Point Lookout, completely separate from the Capital Wasteland. Alton is also easily replayable, thanks to the split halfway through the main quest.

For you fellow modders out there, see this as a new world for you to expand upon. Running out of space in DC for house mods? Feel free to renovate a ruined ranch house and release it as your own mod. Got a cool idea for a farming mod? There's a cornfield in Alton with 2,880 hand-placed dead corn stalk models (I'm not kidding). I only ask that you link to this page and credit me as the author of Alton. Feel free to send me links of what you've created, I'd love to try it out!


Contact Me: Any personal concerns, questions, or suggestions can be emailed to eljhhck(AT)gmail(DOT)com so my PM inbox doesn't fill up .

http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16949
Feel free to comment on either the FO3Nexus page or on here with any problems, suggestions, comments, etc!

http://www.elijahhouck.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/BethModder

I daresay you'll need a time machine if you want to meet an expected release date of "early 2010".

Whoops. Copied/pasted parts from a different forum.
Anyway, I'll post screens soon for those of you that don't feel like browsing the site.

Well this sounds promising

Perhaps put some percent complete bar things, of quests, landscapes, etc, so people can tell how far you've progressed

This looks good. I hope you keep your promise and finalize it. I wish you best luck and a long breath.

Good luck with this project!

Alright, here's my take on this: I just recently moved out of Alton due to breaking up with my Boyfriend. This mod is going to play with my heartstrings like a fiddle. Also, good to hear you're adding the scenic portions of the bluff road. Hope to see a good rendition of the Piasa Bird

If I can find a good texturer, I'd love to do the Piasa Bird. I'm great with the GECK, but when it comes to new textures, I'm pretty terrible.
But it's really cool to meet someone from Alton that'll play through the mod, since it's a town of only 30,000. You can expect most of downtown Alton (down by the Mississippi) to look almost exactly the same as it does in real life, as well as the edge of Godfrey (up by Schnuck's, Walgreens, Imo's, and all that good stuff). A lot of it, like what Beth did with DC, isn't really recognizable. But there are still plenty of monuments, like the Elijah P. Lovejoy statue and the Clark Bridge, that'll be there.

New trailer for everybody-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iByg_yZOk84
I would recommend watching it in HD, since, well, HD is epic.

Okay, wow. Those screenshots are pretty damn impressive.

I can't wait to see this finished.

Thanks . I've been trying my hardest over the past year and a half to get this as close to a Beth-quality world as possible, so your comment means a lot!

This brings a man tear to my eye it's so beautiful. It's amazing, don't stop. I feared you quit a while back, and I'm very happy you've gotten a lot done since then. You should consider getting a small team up to make sure this doesn't fall into the dust. It's hard to imagine someone who's great at everything in the geck, but you have proven your mapping abilities quite clearly. I'll be watching this, and wish you the best of luck.

Thanks a ton . I don't care how long it takes- I'm gonna finish it. I would probably regret leaving it unfinished and unreleased for the rest of my life, or at least for years. Oh, and your username looks familiar- are you a member at the Nexus or F3Underground?

And about a team- to be honest, there isn't much a team could do this late in the game besides voice act and create a world map in Photoshop (the texture for the Pip-Boy). I might put a team together for my next project, but with Alton well over 75% done, it's a bit too late for that.
And I don't want to sound like I'm bragging or anything, but over the course of the mod I've learned how to do everything except make my own models and textures. Anything within the GECK, with the exception of FOSE stuff, I can pretty much do. Although it's definitely slower as a one-man team, I'm a control freak and perfectionist, so for a project that is of my hometown, I kind of like it. And that might be why it's taken so long, but whatever. I can't stop from being who I am .

http://www.elijahhouck.com/emh/blog/

wow! this looks promising. I have a voice like old lady gravel with the nasal NE accent so am not going to volunteer for your voice thingie. Would love to see this though.

I got a lot done over spring break (and have over the past few months as well) and am finally nearing completion of the landscape. After that, it's the last few quests and finishing interiors.
Also, there's been a screenshot or two posted on my site as well as a birthday thing I did for my dad. Enjoy!

This mod looks like it will rock! Keep up the good work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Looks nice

It'll be nice to have a new place to explore, as much as I love FO3 it's to the point (actually been there for awhile now) where I know where just about each and every spawn point is. It's to the point where I even lay mines on the ground in areas where I know creatures/raiders/mutants/talon company will show up long before they actually show up

BUMP to keep this great mod at the top where it belongs.

Thanks, guys. I'm the same way with Fallout 3, Spite- I know waaay too much about it, mostly from modding it for the past two years.
Glad you guys are interested in the project, it's been a long journey, especially for a one-man team (well, besides my awesome crew of voice actors and beta testers). Oh, and for a sense of scale, Alton is over twice as large as Point Lookout.

Haha you gotta be kinddin right? Historic Alton or new Alton present.

If so, ya can't forget grafton, the small river rat town. Really lights up on the weekends.

Anyway good luck, I'll be sure to check it out when it gets finished.

A bit of both, actually. For example, Hopp Hollow, a modern day newish neighborhood, isn't there, and is instead replaced by fields that were once in its place long before I was born. On the other hand, since the bombs weren't dropped until 2077, the town has grown into more of a city. Not huge skyscraqers or anything, but there is more of a city-like feel both uptown and downtown by the river. If you know the area well, you'll recognize the Clark Bridge, Elijah P. Lovejoy Monument, the River Road, Bell Street, State Street, the Godfrey area, and quite a bit more. On the other hand, I've had to make a few changes for a better gameplay experience and shorter build time, for example, part of the border is blocked off by mountains. While Alton is pretty flat, the mountains look good (especially when I get LOD generated) and it saves me from having to landscape a ton of cells that you would see if the mountains weren't there.

Unfortunately, Grafton is a bit too far out for me to worry about. I didn't go that far down the River Road, as that would've added a lot of boring landscape without much to do.

Maybe you can keep adding on in future releases. Just a little at a time.

I haven't decided what to do afterwards. While I love GECKing (a term I've used quite often over the past few years ) quite a bit more than gaming, I think this will be my last Fallout 3 project. Afterwards, I'll likely either port it to New Vegas, which would take a ridiculous amount of work, or simply wait until Skyrim comes out so I can mess with the Creation Engine. I think the latter is much more likely, as this summer and the next school year is going to be pretty busy for me.

Skyrim!!! I like the sound of it!!!