For the love of god can someone please tell me how to edit the fov; the max default setting is way too narrow.

Have you tried to edit the "video.scr" file like it's explained on pcgamingwiki?

I had no issue with the FOV, but I remember increasing the view distance in that file following the geforce guide.

Nothing in that guide had any effect in game for the FOV; it remained unchanged; I tried editing that file with and without ()...no difference. FOV does not change at all.

By "that guide" you mean the geforce guide? If so, then sorry for the confusion. I mentioned the geforce guide as an extra, in case you, or anyone else, might want to further increase the view distance.

For the FOV you need to follow the instructions from the "Field of view (FOV)" section on pcgamingwiki, like in the attached pic. If you already did that and it didn't work, then I don't know. Maybe set the video.scr file to read only after you edit it.