Game Crashing At Specific Area : Fallout 3

» Thu Sep 22, 2011 3:39 pm

Have played the game a fair amount (played through the whole game once) and rarely had any problems, besides the random very rare crash to desktop here and there.

But now I'm having a problem just now at a few specific places that crashes every time I try to go through a door, without fail.

It's in the Anchorage Memorial, in the sewer section (the area where the maintenance door is that you can repair with the parts you find). There is a locked door I can pick to go back out to the wasteland, and every time I attempt to go through it, the game shows the loading area screen for a half second, then CTD. I can go to the other end of the memorial and safely load out into the wasteland, but this crashing at this door worries me.

I was wondering if anyone knew why this would be happening at this exact spot, and if it is a warning that this may start happening in other spots too. After doing a bit of looking, I've seen that a few other people have fixed random crashing by clearing extra save files. I have 6 save files: one with over 1100 saves, another with over 1100 saves, one with over 900 saves, another with over 900 saves (I save far more than a healthy amount), one with a few saves from beginning of a game, and the autosave. Could that have anything to do with it also or not?

Some specs:

Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_gdr.110622-1506)
System Manufacturer: Compaq-Presario
System Model: AY030AA-ABA CQ5320F
BIOS: BIOS Date: 01/07/10 11:37:11 Ver: 5.17
Processor: AMD Athlon™ II X2 240 Processor (2 CPUs), ~2.8GHz
Memory: 3072MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 3072MB RAM
Page File: 1316MB used, 4824MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7601.17514 32bit Unicode

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: ATI display adapter (0x954F)
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_954F&SUBSYS_24621682&REV_00
Display Memory: 2297 MB
Dedicated Memory: 1017 MB
Shared Memory: 1279 MB
Current Mode: 1600 x 900 (32 bit) (59Hz)
D3D9 Overlay: Not Supported
DXVA-HD: Not Supported
DDraw Status: Enabled
D3D Status: Enabled
AGP Status: Enabled

My sound is Realtek High Definition Audio, normal USB keyboard, mouse, bla bla.

Any help appreciated.

edit - The only thing different from the last playthrough where I could go through this door, is that I have patched to the latest 1.7 version with all the DLC. And I've now found another door that leads out to the wasteland that crashes also. I can still go out of the door I came in to the compound from.

» Thu Sep 22, 2011 8:02 am

You are running too high of a screen resolution, IMO, for such a weak and slow video card. Lower that setting quite a bit and see what happens after that (or upgrade to a real gaming card).

» Thu Sep 22, 2011 2:23 am

That resolution is my normal windows resolution, the recommended setting.

Fallout 3 is running at 1152x864. I have no video issues whatsoever save for a rare drop in framerate in heavily drawn areas. The game runs quite well. Not sure why you would equate video performance to this situation. Like I said, have gone through the whole game without any problem, but now am getting a problem in this situation.

Well, it appears unless I can figure out what happened and fix it, my playthrough is over. Now whenever I go to any new area, the game crashes. I would try a different playthrough save and test loading different areas, but in trying to fix the problem I removed all other playthrough saves. :sadvaultboy:

Apart from re-installing the game, or starting a new game and testing loading between areas, I am out of ideas. Anyone have any? I guess in the meantime I'll start a new game and go through all the annoying beginning Vault 101 crud until I can finally get outside and load to different towns. :swear:

» Thu Sep 22, 2011 11:32 am

Hurray, I fixed it! :celebration:

Turns out, like I suspected, my save file became corrupt somehow. And when loading to new areas, I had auto-save when travelling on, and this would cause the game to crash when moving between areas.

So I turned off auto-save when travelling and tried this: http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/918428-fallout-3/48807630/534710171

Okay, having had this issue of saving corruption several times and nearly freaking out each time, I hadn't found any solution yet. While prowling through old posts here, I finally found a breakthrough posted by a poster named Waxfruit.

It's completely stupid, and bizarre that it works, but it has restored every file that had save corruption for me. All my old files from months back I gave up on, my more recent characters that also bugged out. So I'm begging everyone else, help get this stickied some other PC users with the same problem know what to do.

The cure: blow yourself up. I know, I know, sounds insane. But do it. Turn off all auto-saving if you need to, so you can reach your Fat-Man or whatever you want, but go blow yourself to pieces. Upon reloading your last file, it'll undo whatever causes the save corruption.

Special thanks to Waxfruit from figuring this out originally, you're my personal hero.

So glad all my progress is not gone.