Hello guys,

I must admit the current status of guides and also of some youtube videos is somewhat unapplicable because literally everyone is giving instructions on how to install the mod in a vanilla PC situation which in my opinion is by far the less spread scenario over there because the vast majority of people do have F4 already installed on their systems.

Now considering that my Fallout installation is fully managed by Vortex I chose to buy the GOG version to have a double installation of the game hoping guides will cover that scenario: no one is covering that, just to be clear.

It's up to you to change your Steam installation or having only the GOG one: if you want both? There is no way the game can start. The guides won't even report a note concerning the current My Documents/My Games situation: IF you have a double game installation you should rename/put away the F4 directory in My Games, just a memo because literally no one is telling you that. You don't do that? You'll find yourself in a F4 launched from GOG with the Steam saves (a lot of people reported that and the reason is this one). I know it may appear obvious but I must admit from a GOG buy-and-easy install out of the box I'd expect something else (please consider that I'm a Linux user so I'm well disposed to try configurations gizmos).

Even doing that directory manual fixing REQUIRED for everyone not having a vanilla system, there is a debate about the version of Steam: even having installed the GOG one, should I downgrade the Steam version? Just to report: the FOLON installer on my PC starts in a wonderful black window no way to make that thing works. Of course I've followed the guides but in my system I definitely have an already existent F4 installation and conflicts (I guess) are everywhere.

The forum is full of crash and black screen: I wouldn't be surprised if part of those is to be associated with double installs of the game considering no one is describing how to properly manage that scenario (which in my opinion is actually covering the vast majority of cases).

So to me GOG has made some mistake with this release: simply turning the key on this mod won't make the engine start. I'd loved to support the guys but instead I've just requested a refund. Furthermore if you look at the reviews a lot of people are complaining about issues hence a probably 4 out of 5 stars mod is getting instead 2. That's for me is at least partially due to the guide which basically is covering just the basic scenario of a system.

Just another quick note: having requested the refund I uninstalled the games from GOG (F4 and FOLON) and in GOG I had received an error :) I know I know: probably it was caused by having removed F4 before FOLON but again it shouldn't be the user to look after himself when he/she chooses GOG because GOG should be out of the box... and to be honest guys please a new mod just added adding a check on the installation constraints/dependency it shouldn't be too difficult with a custom proprietary launcher ;)

Anyway currently I'm completely disappointed: the management and the installation guides of Sim Settlements 2 are definitely another planet if not another universe. In my system it seems that London, as they chose after all, it will remain out of Europe even in the Fallout world.

Good luck to everyone.

Sorry to hear that you're having problems with FOLON. I had a ludicrous amount of time spent troubleshooting F4 and the mod last night and only just got the whole thing to work this morning. I'm currently using the Steam GOTY edition. The only thing I can think of doing it that might be different to you is that I uninstalled my Steam version of F4, deleted pretty much everything in the main Fallout 4 folder, then redownloaded the game again (which took several hours btw), then used the downgrade patch program, then installed FOLON on a fresh new install. This seemingly all worked fine after loading up Fallout 4 to tune the graphics settings (that are currently on lowest).

However I did encounter a bug where it required the Script Extender (that doesn't work anymore?) but manually installed the latest version, then ran the game, or tried to. Wouldn't run! So reinstalled FOLON by going through the update option on the FOLON game card (through the GOG launcher), and it downgraded the script extender to the proper version, loaded up a game, and now it works fine. You can use the GOG launcher for FOLON even if you have it only through Steam, OR, you can use the f4se_loader.exe instead for a quicker way. Still using lowest graphics settings at the moment but I don't care about graphics if the gameplay and settings are good. One last thing if you do go through all this again, or chose to, make sure Weapon Debris in the graphics setting is turned off as that will make the game crash to desktop the moment you enter London proper.

Hope some of this helps.

Everything helps even the kindness Lykan :) so I must thank you for your suggestions.

Basically my whole point is... well about polishing of the whole package by GOG. I mean: one day I can return from work and I may choose to spend the evening installing some mods hence I can equip myself with patience, ready to read read.me files and so on.

If instead one day I choose to opt for a GOG release, basically I didn't expect to spend hours trying to understand mysteries of fate: it should simply work.

I really thank the guys who made FOLON possible and I'd like even to send my thanks to GOG which is a sponsor of the thing but in these days I needed something like the GOG guide pretend it is.

I've no doubt in the future I'll play FOLON without issues: for sure not from GOG anymore but as soon as my Steam version will be ready (i.e.: as soon as I finish Sim Settlements 2 ;) ).

Just one more thing: I've tried to manually launch F4SE too but it tries to go full-screen then one second black screen and it returned to Win... not sure though but I'm just recollecting that F4SE may have some incompatibilities with some dependency mod of Sim Settlements 2... maybe I'm wrong but not in the mood to double check now... pretty sure anyway that to find the information we should check on SS2 site, definitely not on GOG where 2 mouse clicks will do the magic, yeah sure ;)

Anyway to me each mod deserve it's time to be properly installed: trusted GOG doing that for me, not worked at all. To be honest anyway to fix the issue GOG should just add a disclaimer-like statement saying something like: 'please note the guide is considering a vanilla system without any previous F4 installation OR that you choose to use FOLON on a Steam version. If you already have F4 with mods and mods manager and you install the GOG version too there may be issues not covered here.'

I'm just sad that a wonderful mod - because I'm sure it's wonderful - is getting bad votes - not from me of course - in the review section just because the installation procedure was underestimated.

Well I guess everyone will survive anyway :)

Have a nice evening and thank you again.