First off I am no programer but I think I figured out why some people are having problems and others are not. When you run autosave the game saves every time you go to a new area, rest or go in and out of buildings. I havent played Fallout on my 360 for some time now so I can not comment on my 360. But on my PC when I save the game its lighting fast, it takes 1 or 2 seconds to save. On the PS3 on the other hand it takes a lot longer to save 30 seconds to almost 1 minute depending on your file size. This is where my theroy kicks in and why only some people are having problems and others are not. Lets say I fast travel to the alien homing beackon and right away beam up. Well autosave never got a chance to finish before I beamed up. Now I am not sure if it starts writing errors or if it stops the first save stops and starts on the second save.

But what I do know is it will currupt your save file. Now lets say I beam up and I quit playing for the day and dont save. Now the next day when I hit continue I am playing off the currupt save. It may not look like its currupt but the save has errors on it. Now compound this over time and before long your save file is a mess. I am going to test my theroy tonight, no special turn this or that off to make your PS3 run better. The only change I am going to make is turn off auto save. I will update this thread and let you know when I get the first crash.


P.S. I think the reason why some people are having no problems is because they take their time in game and do not use fast travel, ect. Which gives autosave plenty of time to save before the next auto save. And I think the reason why some of these other methods work is because it gives the game more processing power when your not connected to PSN to process the errors on the currupt file.

My theroy FAILS I got my first freeze (sorta) in 1hr 57minutes with out using autosave. The game got stuck loading the next area forever. But the playstation wasent frozen.

EDIT: forgot to menton this was a new game and I cleared the game data before i started. I am going to play some more and report back!

Ok, I played another 8 hours straight with no problems and then the PS3 started to get laggy. If you ask me this is normal, I can not run my PC for 8 hours stright playing a game with out a reboot. I played another hour after the reboot with no problems. So grand total for today is 11 played hours with 1 loading problem 2 hours into a new save. I did some googleing and the loading problem happens on PC as well. Its just a glitch with the game. Right now my save file is 4mb I will not have enough proof to know if this is working or not until my save file hits the 10mb mark. But so far so good, I didnt experience 1 freeze in 11 played hours!

you are right that it appears that the save game , and especially it's size matter

however, I have wifi on, downloads on, auto save on and i never have problems because I

- WAIT when the HDD light is on (= waiting to load the scenery)
- restart the console every 3-4 hours (clears the cache)
- WAIT when it "freezes" ( it usually continues after 20 s - 1 min)

I only had 1 freeze that I couldn't get out of , and then I was playing for 8 hours straight.

I also noticed that LAG only happens when in a NEW area (that needs to install) , and when not waiting for it to be done (except the shack in PL .. that always lags .. )


i'm just fearing for later , as my save game will increase in size
I haven't explored even 25 % of the map so ..

but basically the playstation is a computer .. so give it time i suppose

As I stated I think the reason why these big save files get currupt. IS because a 15mb file takes like almost a minute to save. So if you exit a building and fast travel to mega ton it never got a chance to finish autosaving. Before it starts to autosave again and then currupts the save file.

16hrs into the new game and still not a single freeze. Unless something crazy happens from now until the 30hr mark. Then I dont see any need to update this thread again unless some one has a comment or questions. If I remember right I hit the 10MB file size around the 60hr mark. Thats not going to happen until some time next week. And then we will know for sure if auto save is the problem or not.

Don't play Operation Anchorage until your save file approaches 15MB and you reach Level 30. No matter what you do, no matter how careful you are, I'll bet you freeze in part 2 after leaving the command tent. If you are able to play through Anchorage under these conditions, please post your stats: Level, filesize, hours of play (mine was 472.2.54 just before stepping into the sim pod), #notes in inventory, #items in misc, #locations discovered, and any other stats you have time for.

Thanks.

Perseus921

472hrs is a ton of hours, did you at any point in the game use auto save? I am over 22hrs played and a 6mb file and I havent experienced 1 hard lock up. About the worst I experienced so far is game lag. Yesterday it happened around the 8hr mark and today it happened around the 6hr mark. And like I said my PC will do the same thing. Once I reboot the PS3 the lag is totaly gone even in point lookout.

If you notice when you start the game it says the game auto saves at certain points and not to interupt it. When you exit the building and fast travel to the next area (Not saying you did it just using a example) the game dosen't have time to finish auto save. And then it starts writing errors in your game save. I know this because I have first hand experience doing this. I got lazy and turned auto save back on and I exit evergreen mills and fast travled to megaton. And instead of making a new save I just used the auto save. It was a stupid mistake on my park and cost me a 115hr save.

I dont know if I will be able to do your challenge it took me almost a month to get 100 played hours and a 15mb file size. Getting to 10mb is no problem you can do that by completing all the quests. 15mb on the otherhand takes forever, at 60hrs I was at 10mb at 90hrs I was at 14mb. It wasent until I hit 90+hrs close to 100 that I got to a 15mb file size. and 15hrs latter the file size was still 15mb. I think if it dosent freeze by the time I 60hrs and a 10mb file size. Then auto save was the problem! I might be able to hit 60hrs by next weekend depending on what my wife has planned. (I have a lot of free time this week)

24hr mark, something worth noteing. Although I have not experienced a total freeze yet. The game is starting to hitch at certain times when enemys are close, even right after a reboot. Also I got stuck in VATS for 30+ seconds (no more then a minute) at least 4 times now. Here is a little info about my current game.

Leveel 16
24 hrs played
save file size is 6.5mb
locations discovered 30+ (just guessing idk for sure) Not all locations are explored!
Main Quest complete
Point Lookout Main quest complete
The Pitt Main quest and ignot quest complete
2 side quests complete
Tons of ammo
lots of supplys
and a decent amount of guns

I think thats all the important stuff listed. The game is starting to worry me because its starting to act up and its still earily in the game. I will keep pushing until my first total lock up .

Experienced my first freeze today at the 33hr mark. I just finished the last leg of the Broken Steel quest and then traveled to The Pitt and then to Point Lookout. The game froze on me when I was walking around in the swamp. I waited 3 minutes to see if it would unfreeze but it didn't. I was playing for 7hrs today before I got the freeze. Right now as it stands I have 34 played hours and a 8mb file sive, and level 19. 1 freeze in 34 hrs is not bad at all, although I dont think it should freeze at all! I will blame this first freeze in the PS3 not being restarted in 7 hrs. But really there is no excuse for it to freeze, playing for 7 hrs or not it shouldnt freeze.

P.S. unless some one has a question or comment or the game freezes again. Then I am not going to update this thread again until my file size reaches 10mb!

472 hours as measured by the Fallout 3 clock. I think this clock includes wait hours as elapsed time. I did a lot of waiting outside Bethesda Ruins. The raiders respawn every 72hrs and I was trying to force it after planting mines all around the area. Fast traveling there and watching my mines take out all those raiders is big fun.

Perseus921

Your save file has the hours you played the game check there for the amount of hours you played!

Well I had a major freeze today 2 minutes after I started the game. The PS3 wasent even on for 5 minutes. So I restarted the PS3 and the game it was hitching bad and pausing in vats left and right. It was defentaly unplayable! So all it took was 34hrs to totaly make the game crap out. I was so mad that I couldnt play that I ended up taking out the game and watching a movie. During this 34hrs played I never deleted the game data. After I get done with this post I am going to delete the game data and attempt to play. Tonight before I go to bed I will be writing Bethesda a nice letter telling them how unhappy i am and my findings with the game. About to go play wish me luck.............

UPDATE: I deleted the Game Data and I completly played through Operation: Anchorage with no problem. I didnt experience 1 problem in the last 2 hrs. I am guessing that the Game Data folder gets currupt over time which makes the game freeze and currupts the folder even more. I am not sure if once the folder is currupt that it currupts the save file or not. But from now on the start of every day I am going to delete the Game Data folder and see if the game freezes again.

Obviously we shouldnt have to jump through hoops to make the game run. There are major problems with this game. It is the worst piece of software I have ever placed into my PS3. Some how something is causing the Game Data folder to get currupt. I am 100% willing to bet that it is the way the PS3 reads and writes to the hard drive. And the reason why the 360 is not having any of the PS3's problems is because the 360 reads off a disk. When you save your game to your hard drive on the 360. I am willing to bet that all it does is makes a image file of the disk. So even though you install the game to the hard drive. Its still reading it like it was reading off the disk.

The PS3 on the other hand installs the game to the hard drive like the way you would install a game on PC. How ever the PS3 can not read or write as fast as a PC can to the hard drive due to the way it stores information. If you were loading a game on pc and fliped the power strip off as its loading the information. Chances are you just cruppt that part of the game. I read the PSM and it said this engine wasent really made for the PS3 which is why its having so many problems. I think the only way your never going to have any problems with this game is for Bethesda to make a patch. So that you can not go in or out of a building or even fast travel or save while the hard drive light is on.

The PS3 reads/writes the information off the hard drive too slow for the game engine to keep up. Which is why when your running enemys will apear to pop right in front of your face on PS3. And when your playing on PC they are preloaded before you get there. I am not going to put total blame on PS3, I think that the game engine for Fallout 3 is out dated. And was hacked and slashed to work with PS3. Games like Uncharted 2 have suppior graphics and play just fine. I think the reason why Bethesda is so silent about a patch. Is because the only way to fice this game on PS3 is build a whole new graphics engine from the ground up. Fallout NV is going to use the same engine as this game. So I am going to hold off on buying it until I know the coast is clear and the game dosent freese like this onw.

In closing there is no good way to run this game. I will how ever keep deleting the game data at the start of each day and keep you updated how its goes. I would love to push this game save to the 200hr mark. But I think it will cruppt again way before i reach my goal. I guess we will fine out soon!

So far I've accumulated 46 hours playing the GOTY edition and other than a few slowdowns in Operation Anchorage and The Pitt I've had zero problems. Guess I'm just lucky. With the original version, I've had a file with 103 hours and experienced a few freezings. With the GOTY edition, nothing so far.

My current save file is almost 6 MB. I've finished Scientific Pursuits and a few other misc quests, and also O:A and The Pitt.

I am just wondering do you use fast travel at all? And also I have completed more things in game then you have. My save file is 8.3MB, I think that even though the game is not making a save file. It still needs time to load the zone before you fast travel. My PC is nothing special its a 2.6ghz x3 Phenom 2 4gb of ram 8800gtx 768mb and a 500GB hard drive. But my PC will load Fallout 3 100% faster then my PS3 will. I have White knight also and you can not do anything with the game until it finishes loading. Which is not instant by the way it takes about 30 seconds for the game to load up. Also you can not do anything when the game is saving.

I think if Bethesda did one of two things it would completly stop the freezing problem with the game. If they either made the game so you couldnt zone or fast travel until the current zone loaded up. Or make the game engine work faster with the PS3. Also they need to make it so you can not zone or fast travel while the game is saving. If they did those two things there wouldnt be any more problems with the PS3.

I know I am repeating myself but if you notice when you play the game. IF you run through a zone enemys will either pop right in front of your face or right behind you. It is because the PS3 is accessing the information so slow that the game dosent have time to load the enemys before you get to the area. How ever if you run through a area on PC the enemys are ready and waiting for you. I wonder how much better the game would run on PS3 if you installed a SSD drive. I guess until the insane prices come down I will never find out!

I try to avoid it but I occasionally use it. I always give the game engine time to process the new location and to perform the autosave.


Well, I think there is zero chance for this to happen. This kind of patch would be redundant, because this is something that the player can do, so why would they waste resources to create something like this? Plus, if they did this, there would be a lot of people complaining about how 'this idiotic game doesn't let you do anything while it is saving or loading'.


To be honest, I never noticed enemies popping up right in front of me or right behind me, but then again I'm a cautious player and never go running into a zone where I think I might find enemies. I try to move slowly and I sneak a lot, even with 'tanks'.

Ah well that 100% explains why your having no problems and I am. Fast travel is my friend, I do a ton of fast traveling. Although now after the latest freeze I wait for the zone to load up before I fast travel. If I am traveling from one side of the map to the other and I dont use fast travel. I will run the whole way there to save time. Thats when I notice if you run through the zone enemys will pop right in front of your face or right behind you. I am almost at the 10mb file size and I have only had 2 freezes which is really good I think. And I do think it was caused by the way I play the game. I wasent giving the PS3 enough time to load.

Goal reached I now have a 10mb file size. The game did freeze again at the 47.5hr mark with a 9.8mb file size. So to reach my goal of a 10mb file size the game froze 3 times. Before the last freeze I deleted the game data and made 100% sure I waited for the game to load everything before I did anything in the zone. And it still froze! I am going to make a post on the main forums and ask people how often the game freezes for them and what system they are playing on. I can not come to a conclusion with out more data. I will update this thread again soon!

This is my last post in this thread unless someone has questions or comments. Based on the data I collected from the main forum. The 360 freezes as much as the PS3. How ever PS3 users can make the freezing problem worse. By not waiting for the game to finish loading or saving. I have 164hrs played on Fallout 3 PS3. Here are my tips for a smooth game.

1. First thing anyone should do is turn off auto save.
2. Make plenty of save files, the PS3 can make 120~130 save files before you cant make any more. So make sure you make a lot.
3. Wait for the hard drive light to stop blinking before you enter a building or fast travel. (note the hard drive light will keep blinking for a good 30 minutes after you first install the game. So if its a fresh install wait 30 seconds or so before you do anything and you should be fine)
4. If your experiencing a lot of hitching or vats is running in slow motion and pausing your about to freeze. Restart your PS3.
5. IF your PS3 does happen to freeze up delete your game data folder and let the game make a new one. (Do not delete the save data)
6. A good rule of thumb is never save over the same file more then 10 times.

While these are some good tips. The only way to truly experience Fallout 3 99.99% problem free is to run the game on a PC. If you can not afford a good gaming PC (like myself) then follow these tips for the best playable experience!

Ok now I am totaly mad! I know I said I wasent going to post again but this must be said. The PS3 version of this game is totaly FLAWED! The game froze up in 15 minutes after the PS3 was off for almost 1 hour. I also deleted the game data folder before I started. To any PS3 user reading this good luck after your PS3 reaches the 10mb save file size. Because your in for random freezing no matter what you do. From now on I am going to play this game soley on my PC.

thanks for this thread soul , good work. so at the end all ps3 hardcoe players are doomed. no way we can play as long as we want?

It's funny to see a post saying that the game works ok if follow some steps, and the one after saying that the game is a freeze breeding game.
Hope it wont freeze like hell for me.
Just a question, does the cache includes the enemy corps we killed? ...Think not...

I have the GOTY edition. I have played through all of the main story line quests, all the side quests and all the DLC's. I think I averaged about 1 freeze every 20 hours or so once it started happening.

There were 2 exceptions to that. In Broken Steel, for about 2 hours, the game would freeze about every 10 or 15 minutes. It was right around when Liberty Prime gets destroyed. Then it just seemed to fix itself. The other time was near the end of Point Lookout. The game would again freeze every 10 or 15 minutes. It stopped happening when I left Point Lookout.

I have not deleted the game data file ever. I DO NOT FAST TRAVEL EVER.

My character made it to level 29 and my save file was about 13 megs. Granted, I have not explored everywhere, which is why my game file seems so small in comparison to a lot of other people.

I personally think that fast traveling corrupts the save file whether you allow the game to fully load in an area or fully save an auto-save (I turned auto-save off), or not.

I think the freezing is going to happen no matter what, but I think it happens a lot less if you DO NOT FAST TRAVEL.

I don't know why some people can fast travel and never have any problems. I have a friend at work who didn't have any freezing problems whatsoever (I'm so jealous). All I can say is, I have enjoyed the game a lot since I stopped fast traveling. I hope this helps

I made The Pitt and I only froze once. And in Operation:Anchorage, I never froze. YAY!