Posted February 15, 2013
One of the easter eggs in Fallout is that, instead of Vault Boy, the icon is a picture of a man's face. This man is Tim Cain, designer and lead programmer of the game. Because Fallout was released for Windows 95, this extra icon wasn't visible in normal use, so people generally only saw Vault Boy unless they specifically fiddled with the .exe file.
Except now, everyone can see it in normal use, which is a bit of a pain - unless you're into that sort of thing!
Many of you will be alright with this, because you can simply change the shortcut icon in Windows and it'll work for all intents and purposes. But for Steam users, it isn't quite so easy: changing the icon shoves a big shortcut arrow in that fills up a quarter of the available space. The following is a simple way to avoid both Tim Cain's face and the shortcut arrow in Steam (and potentially other programs).
Step 1
Download Resource Hacker from the following: angusj.com/resourcehacker/
The download is right at the bottom of the page. Install it, then right-click on falloutw.exe. There should be an entry that says "Resource Hacker". (See image 1)
(I would recommend making a backup of falloutw first, in case something goes awry.)
Step 2
Change the icon by going to Action > Replace Icon, then go to "Open file with new icon". I used GFW_high.ico, which comes with the game, but you can use whatever icon you wish - even this handy Vault Boy icon from Fallout 3.
Once you've sorted your icon, hit Replace at the bottom. Check by going to Icon Group > 99 > 0 in the left pane; your new icons should show up on the right.
(See image 2)
and [url=http://www.gog.com/upload/forum/2013/02/ab7ef2e8e0943d46f1d946e45f2d59d68dd422e2.PNG]after
Step 3
File > Save. If all went to plan, you should have a new file - falloutw_original - alongside your renewed falloutw. It should look a bit like this.
The icon for falloutw might not change right away - restarting your machine should do the trick.
And that's your lot! All that's left is to add falloutw to Steam, and you won't have Tim Cain staring at you every time you want to explore the wastes.
Except now, everyone can see it in normal use, which is a bit of a pain - unless you're into that sort of thing!
Many of you will be alright with this, because you can simply change the shortcut icon in Windows and it'll work for all intents and purposes. But for Steam users, it isn't quite so easy: changing the icon shoves a big shortcut arrow in that fills up a quarter of the available space. The following is a simple way to avoid both Tim Cain's face and the shortcut arrow in Steam (and potentially other programs).
Step 1
Download Resource Hacker from the following: angusj.com/resourcehacker/
The download is right at the bottom of the page. Install it, then right-click on falloutw.exe. There should be an entry that says "Resource Hacker". (See image 1)
(I would recommend making a backup of falloutw first, in case something goes awry.)
Step 2
Change the icon by going to Action > Replace Icon, then go to "Open file with new icon". I used GFW_high.ico, which comes with the game, but you can use whatever icon you wish - even this handy Vault Boy icon from Fallout 3.
Once you've sorted your icon, hit Replace at the bottom. Check by going to Icon Group > 99 > 0 in the left pane; your new icons should show up on the right.
(See image 2)
and [url=http://www.gog.com/upload/forum/2013/02/ab7ef2e8e0943d46f1d946e45f2d59d68dd422e2.PNG]after
Step 3
File > Save. If all went to plan, you should have a new file - falloutw_original - alongside your renewed falloutw. It should look a bit like this.
The icon for falloutw might not change right away - restarting your machine should do the trick.
And that's your lot! All that's left is to add falloutw to Steam, and you won't have Tim Cain staring at you every time you want to explore the wastes.
Post edited February 15, 2013 by phlum
