UI problems, 1st time NV player

[cwarren165]

I am playing New Vegas for the first time ever. I currently have NO mods installed, its 100% vanilla. I've got about 42 hours in. At around 30 hours I started having a major bug that is having a very negative effect on gameplay. When I open the Pip Boy menu, a lot of times the user interface just won't work; I can open it but I'm unable to click anything or select anything in it. When this happens, I find that I also cannot save the game or even quit the game- at that point I just have to force the program to stop running, and then start again where I last saved. This is happening every 20 minutes or so, its very annoying. The entire user interface simply stops functioning properly. I am not ready at this point to mod the game heavily, but I would certainly like to fix this problem so I'm writing this message in hopes that someone here can point me in the right direction to get the essential bug fixes and script extenders and UI mods that a person needs to make the game work right.

 

Thanks.

[munnibhai]

could you post any screenshots of the interface? are the things disabled?

[dubiousintent]

Did you install Steam to it's default location? If so, please see the wiki http://wiki.tesnexus.com/index.php/Installing_Games_on_Windows_Vista%2B "Installing Games on Windows Vista+" article for why the original default Steam behavior of installing games to the "C:\Program Files" folder tree was bad (they learned better, and don't do that any more); and why "disabling UAC and running as Administrator" is NOT sufficient, with instructions how to move it. This is the single most important thing you can do to fix and protect yourself against problems in the future. As much of a PITA as that is, it's never going to be any easier than now. Please see the 'Restoring to "Vanilla"' section of the wiki " FNV General Mod Use Advice" article as well.

If you did move Steam out of the default location, then likely any access privilege problem is one of "File and Folder permissions" on the parent "root" folder under which you installed the games. If this is not set correctly to allow at least "System", "Administrators", and "Users" to have "Full Control" then you can't overwrite other files or make changes. You then need to enable the "Properties | Security | Advanced | Change Permissions" setting of the parent folder to enable the box: "Replace all child object permissions with inheritable permissions from this object", so those changes get applied to the existing files and sub-folders.

There are a number of known vanilla bugs which have been fixed by the community as mods. So we don't really recommend a "pure vanilla" game. Please see the 'Maximizing use of memory', 'Third Rule: The Rule of One', 'Essentials for Getting Started', 'Vanilla "Load Order"', 'Game INI files', and 'Restoring to "Vanilla"' entries in the 'First Timer Advice' section of the wiki "FNV General Mod Use Advice" article at a minimum. Even if you wait to install any other mods until later, recommend reading the entire thing first. It's designed to cover those gaps in your knowledge everyone else assumes you know already.

-Dubious-

Edited December 24, 2017 by dubiousintent

[cwarren165]

@ Munnibhai, Nothing is disabled, it simply wont let me click anything. I can still navigate among the three buttons on bottom of the PipBoy, but within those menus I cannot click a thing- I can mouse over them but it just won't register any mouse clicks. Same thing when I hit escape; I can mouse over the options, for example to save or quit the game-- but I cannot click anything I have to ctrl-alt-del to stop the program. I know my mouse is fine, but the stupid UI just stops working for some reason.

 

I took a screenshot in game but when I attempt to attach it as a file to this post it says it is too big... so I'm linking a GYAZO snapshot of it. In that snapshot you see, I am unable to click anything whatsoever on the pipboy screen.

 

https://gyazo.com/15a162fc4d8ab03f0201425e27677fc6

 

@ Dubious, thank you for all of that info, im getting into it now :smile:

Edited December 24, 2017 by cwarren165

[dubiousintent]

One of the peculiarities of the game Pipboy screens people get used to and then tend to forget to mention is that only some areas of the screen respond to mouse clicks. Going by the placement of the cursor in your screenshot, you seem to be expecting any part of a line can be selected. Not so.

 

When selecting from lists of items, you have to point just to the left of the item, in that row precisely. Sometimes you have to click on the item name first (so it knows you want that part of the screen) and then to the left of the item to choose it.

 

This is especially true when switching between trade items to "sell" and to "buy". The "Player inventory" part of the screen has to be selected before you can choose an item to "trade/sell". Then the "Merchant inventory" part of the screen has to be selected before you can choose items to "buy". Once you have registered which part of the screen you have currently "selected", you can choose multiple items from that inventory, but you have to re-register you are on which part of the screen whenever you switch lists.

 

FYI: Images and attachments like ZIP files can't generally be posted directly to the forums. You would have to put them on another site and use the "URL Link" icon on the "Reply to this topic" page menu bar to point to it. (Images are terrible for providing the "load order" (LO) anyway, because they usually can't show everything in one image and it's hard to track/scroll across multiple images.)

-Dubious-

[madmongo]

I personally have never experienced this bug, but I have heard about it.

 

If you can navigate around with the arrow keys, sometimes switching to a different display (stats, items, data) can get you out of it.

 

Another thing to try is open up the debug console (press the ~ key) and type "EnablePlayerControls" (without the quotes) and see if that helps.

 

This can sometimes be caused by game controllers. Make sure that you do not have gamepad controller activated in the game settings.

 

Some drivers in Windows 10 can cause this issue as well. I'm very fuzzy on details and I don't know if there is any fix for it if this is the case. According to google, if you have a logitech mouse and have this issue, download logitech's setpoint software and play with the game settings in it. Alternately, deleting the logitech driver and letting Windows install a microsoft driver in its place might help as well.

 

Different mice and trackballs may have similar fixes available, or a driver update might help you (then again, might not).

[munnibhai]

@ Munnibhai, Nothing is disabled, it simply wont let me click anything. I can still navigate among the three buttons on bottom of the PipBoy, but within those menus I cannot click a thing- I can mouse over them but it just won't register any mouse clicks. Same thing when I hit escape; I can mouse over the options, for example to save or quit the game-- but I cannot click anything I have to ctrl-alt-del to stop the program. I know my mouse is fine, but the stupid UI just stops working for some reason.

 

I took a screenshot in game but when I attempt to attach it as a file to this post it says it is too big... so I'm linking a GYAZO snapshot of it. In that snapshot you see, I am unable to click anything whatsoever on the pipboy screen.

 

:smile:

 

From the shot, everything seems to be in place. One thing you should check, if game freezes and crashes to desktop is the resolution and screen refresh rate you are using may not be compatible with game. And due to this very reason, the clickable links may be off location. Happened to me in come games.

 

These are the settings I am using.

 

[cwarren165]

What I have not done: Move Steam from the original default location in program files, to where it ought to be. I know this needs to be done, but I'm lazy and I kept telling myself, "If my Skyrim runs basically flawlessly with 250 mods, surely New Vegas can work in this locale also." Mostly I'm lazy! Also I'm very noobish when it comes to all these things, and I get very frsutrated working on it all. Sure I know how to download and use mods- but I have no idea how they're actually working, what the various file types mean, etc etc etc. I simply follow instructions to use them.

 

What I have done: Manually installed the script extender and the 4gb patcher directly to the game. Then, instaled ModOrganizer and used it to install UIO and Yugichigai's Unnoficial Patches, and enabled player controls via the in game menu.

 

Cons: After installing even only these couple mods, I began to notice certain bugs that I think are associated to modding, such as items floating in the air when they shouldbe lying on the ground, and radscorpions being stuck halfway int he dirt and glitching out instead of behaving normally. I didn't notice any of that before.

 

Pros (important part!!!): Since installing these mods, I have played one session of 4-4.5 hours, and I noticed none of the problems with the UI that I had been having; so it seems to have worked for now, we shall see!!!

 

Thank you all for the advices and pointing me in the right direction. Its been well over a year since I used any mods and without the suggestions and resources listed above I woulda missed a lot. Theres still much in dubiousintent's suggestions that I need to learn more thoroughly. Hopefully the game will keep working for now though, I basically just want at least one vanilla playthrough before I go crazy on it like I did on skyrim a few years back :smile:

Edited December 27, 2017 by cwarren165

[dubiousintent]

Just some FYI to clarify.

 

Comparing "Skyrim" with "FNV is like comparing "apples" with "oranges". They use different game engines (Creation vs Gamebryo), and hence have different limitations.

 

The mods you listed (NVSE, 4GB Patcher, UIO, YUP) will have no effect on mesh and texture issues such as "floating items" (usually trees and rocks) and stuck creatures. They are definitely vanilla game bugs that people have tried to create mods to fix (but some still persist. They are inherent in the placement into the game world).

 

Understand the reluctance to move the game out of the default location. Just remember that decision when things go wrongly. That particular advice goes all the way back to Windows Vista.

 

-Dubious-

[cwarren165]

Well, despite playing that one night for 4.5 hours with no problems, the mods I downloaded didn't fix my issue at all. I started to play today for the first time since then, and within moments I was having the exact same issues with my UI; unable to click or do anything after opening the PipBoy. So I will have to definitely reread everything you gave me more closely and begin fixing it for real :/

 

Do you think there could be something about in-game location causing that UI problem? I ask this because, the further north I go, the less it seems to happen. The farther south I am, the more of a problem it is.