“Finding Olivia” - a Fallout 4 Mod

Project Overview

Engine: Creation Kit

Game: Base Fallout 4

“Finding Olivia” is a single player DLC mission for Fallout 4 in a settlement near South Boston called Beacon Hill.  The quest centers around looking for the quest giver’s missing daughter using the environment and other clues to information about her where she may have gone.  The quest gives the player multiple choices to make throughout and encourages a variety of playstyles including stealth, melee combat, ranged combat, and skills like lockpicking and hacking.

“Finding Olivia” gives the player the choice to learn as much - or as little - as they want about Olivia, Tom, and Beacon Hill.

• Optional objectives give the player the chance to learn more about Tom, Olivia, and their history in Beacon Hill.

• Within Tom’s House there are notes and diary entries the player can find if they use lockpicking and explore every room. When enough clues are found, Tom will give his full backstory.

• Tabitha reveals more information about Tom if the player has found all clues about his past in his house.

• Terminals in both Tom’s House and the final vault reveal how Olivia’s disappearance was planned and executed.

Highly Polished Exterior and Interior Spaces

“Finding Olivia” is compromised of one small world and two interior spaces - Tom’s House and Tabitha’s Vault. My goal was to make each area feel unique and like they belonged in the larger Fallout 4 world.

Beacon Hill

• Trash and clutter are sprinkled through the areas to fit within the feeling of a world recovering from nuclear disaster.

• Buildings and trees outside the fence imply that Beacon Hill is part of a larger world.

Tom’s House

• Cleaner than many other homes in Fallout with hints of his past with random circuitry and electronics strew around.

• Olivia’s room is messier, with walls decorated with random pictures.

Tabitha’s Vault

• Run down and hastily abandoned with little in the way of supplies.

• Whoever was in the vault before Tabitha left in a hurry.

Every character in “Finding Olivia” has their own voice and history. They are based on easy to understand tropes so the player can identify them, their motives, and sympathize with their struggles quickly.

• Tom is the classic father who felt he lost everything when his wife died, so he will do whatever it takes to bring her back. He still dotes and cares for his daughter, but it is obvious he has secrets he is hiding from her and everyone.

• Olivia is the classic dreamer daughter who wants to go out and make a difference in the world. She was easily manipulated and tricked.

• Bianca loves Tom and Olivia like she was her own. She struggles with understanding who she was, especially with strange dreams and memories. Overall, though, she just wants her family to be healthy and happy.

Check out a dialogue sample here!

Design Conventions

Conveyance

• Tom’s House and the diner both have landmarks near them to help guide the player to them quickly.

• All of Olivia’s notes have empty Nuka Cola bottles near them to help draw the player’s eye and help them to recognize it is a clue.

• Use of lights and shadows to help draw player's eye to important spaces and where to go next.

Postmortem

What Went Well

• Geometry was figured out and implemented early. With the exception of the final room in Tabitha’s Vault and the width of Beacon Hill, my geometry was solid and in a good, fun scale from my first milestone. This allowed me to iterate and improve gameplay throughout and really polish the spaces.

• Simple story that had a big impact. Play testers were able to follow the story and understand it quickly. They were delighted when it went in directions they weren’t expecting and enjoyed helping reunite the family.

What Went Wrong

• AI packages did not always respond as expected. There were several times when scripted events and behaviors had to be changed or cut because they did not have the impact I wanted and detracted from gameplay.

• Combat with synths became repetitive. Although there is not much combat in “Finding Olivia”, I found that having synths attack the player, even different types of synths, got repetitive quickly. Varied enemies that could fit the story would have worked better.

What I Learned

• Keep it simple and then expand. By getting in the minimum viable product across the entire level, I have more time to test, refine, and really find the fun in all elements.

• Cut early if it doesn’t positively effect gameplay. Originally, there was a scene present where the player could intervene in a dispute between the people of Beacon Hill. It was meant to help show the attitude of the town. It was buggy and never worked quite right, but it was not cut until late into development. If I had cut sooner, I could have used the time I spent bug fixing that encounter to help polish other parts of the level.