Serious Sam 3: BFE

Serious Sam 3: BFE

Developers
	Croteam
Publishers
	Devolver Digital
Russia	1C-SoftClub
Engines
	Serious Engine 3.5
Release dates
Windows	November 22, 2011
macOS (OS X)	April 23, 2012
Linux	November 9, 2012
Reception
Metacritic	72
IGDB	71
Taxonomy
Monetization	One-time game purchase, DLC
Microtransactions	None
Modes	Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Pacing	Real-time
Perspectives	First-person, Third-person
Controls	Direct control
Genres	Action, FPS, Shooter, TPS
Art styles	Realistic
Themes	Egypt, Sci-fi
Series	Serious Sam

Warnings

The macOS (OS X) version of this game does not work on macOS Catalina (version 10.15) or later due to the removal of support for 32-bit-only apps.

Serious Sam 3: BFE is a singleplayer and multiplayer first-person and third-person action, FPS, shooter and TPS game in the Serious Sam series.

General information

Official wiki

Serious Zone Community Forums

Steam Community Discussions

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		Includes Serious Sam Double D.[citation needed]
Humble Store
Steam		Gold Edition also available. Custom DRM code can sabotage the game by spawning an invincible arachnoid in every level, and uncontrollably spinning the player in Under the Iron Cloud.
Amazon.com (unavailable)
Amazon.co.uk (unavailable)
GamersGate (unavailable)

All versions require Steam DRM.

Monetization

DLC and expansion packs

Name	Notes
DLC_3 Models	Includes one multiplayer model (Brett Sanderson). Included with the Bonus Content DLC.
Sniper Scope for the Devestator	Included with the Bonus Content DLC.
Jewel of the Nile	Additional campaign Part of the Gold Edition.

Essential improvements

Skip intro videos

Console command men_bShowIntroCutscene
Run the game and open the console (~). Enter the command men_bShowIntroCutscene=0.

Mods

To use the installed mods, the moddable version of the game must be launched from the Steam library. While in the moddable version however, achievements and leaderboards are disabled.

Serious Zone hosts a wide variety of mods and maps for Serious Sam 3: BFE, in addition to other games in the series.

No More Hitscan Enemies

• No More Hitscan Arachnoids
• No More Hitscan Cloned Soldiers and Technopolips

Game data

In-game general settings.

In-game advanced settings.

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Steam	<Steam-folder>/userdata/<user-id>/41070/local/SeriousSam3.ini

It's unknown whether this game follows the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux. Please fill in this information.

Save game data location

System	Location
Steam	<Steam-folder>/userdata/<user-id>/41070/

The save games for the moddable version are separate, however they can be moved over as they are compatible with each other.

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
Steam Cloud		Approx. 477 MB available.

Video

In-game general video settings.

Graphics feature	State	WSGF	Notes
Widescreen resolution
Multi-monitor			Use Widescreen Fixer to set HUD width limit.
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD			See 4K Ultra HD.
Field of view (FOV)		Slider, 60-120°.
Windowed
Borderless fullscreen windowed		Working using Borderless Gaming. If forced, main menu will have mouse-hud misalignment. See Software Mouse Cursor
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Anti-aliasing (AA)		MSAA, FXAA, and SSAA.
High-fidelity upscaling		See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
60 FPS and 120+ FPS		By default, the menus are capped to 33 FPS. To uncap it, see Uncap menu FPS. Ingame there is no frame rate or refresh rate cap.
High dynamic range display (HDR)		See the glossary page for potential alternatives.

• 

  In-game advanced video settings for CPU.

• 

  In-game advanced video settings for GPU.

• 

  In-game advanced video settings for VRAM.

Software mouse cursor for better borderless window support

Using borderless gaming will result in HUD misalignment.

Open the console and type prj_bHardwareMouseCusor=0[citation needed]
Notes Additionally the menus are capped at 33 FPS, this makes the cursor very laggy by default, see the next section.

Uncap menu FPS

The game warns that changing this from the default 33 may cause loading issues. Testing shows that on modern machines with a SSD this is not an issue.

Open the console and type men_iMaxFPSInMenus=60, or replace 60 with whatever value desired (ideally match it with the current refresh rate)[citation needed]

4K Ultra HD

Custom resolution[citation needed]

Open <path-to-game>/Content/SeriousSam3/Config/SeriousSam3.ini using a text editor. Find the lines gfx_pixResWidth, gfx_pixResHeight, gfx_pixLastGoodResWidth and gfx_pixLastGoodResHeight. Now type the desired resolution, for example: gfx_pixLastGoodResHeight = 2160; gfx_pixLastGoodResWidth = 3840; gfx_pixLastGoodWinHeight = 2160; gfx_pixLastGoodWinWidth = 3840; gfx_pixResHeight = 2160; gfx_pixResWidth = 3840; gfx_pixWinHeight = 2160; Now save and set SeriousSam3.ini to Read Only in properties. Notes As of the latest patch the game natively supports 4k. This is still useful if wishing to use custom resolutions.

Input

In-game general keyboard/mouse settings.

In-game key map settings.

In-game general gamepad settings.

In-game gamepad layout settings.

In-game gamepad button map settings.

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping		Some actions like Quick Save or Quick Load can not be remapped.
Mouse acceleration		Off by default in latest version. On in launch version, see Mouse Acceleration for details on how to toggle.
Mouse sensitivity		See also Use lower mouse sensitivity.
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support
Full controller support		Also includes full built-in Steam Controller functionality.
Controller remapping
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers
Xbox button prompts
Impulse Trigger vibration

Tracked motion controllers
Button/gesture prompts

Generic/other controllers
Button prompts

Additional information
Button prompts		Works with hotplug and updates live when switching from keyboard and controller.
Controller hotplugging		Does not work in Split-screen. Switching to a different controller from the first can stop the menu from working.
Haptic feedback		Also allows changing the vibration strength.
Digital movement supported
Simultaneous controller+KB/M

Steam Input
Steam Input API support		SCAPI actions are missing the crouch button. It needs to be bound using a legacy method to a keyboard key.
Official controller preset(s)
Steam Controller button prompts

Audio

In-game audio settings.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound		Auto configures up to 7.1 output
Subtitles
Closed captions		Includes inaudible speech, such as screaming and growling. Enabled with the subtitles option set to On, not auto.
Mute on focus lost
EAX support		Use OpenAL Soft for binaural HRTF mixing.
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Bulgarian
Simplified Chinese
Croatian				Fan translation, download.
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Polish				Fan made joke dub, download.
Brazilian Portuguese				Fan translation, download.
Russian
Spanish				Fan dub, download.

Network

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Players	Notes
Local play		4	Co-op, Versus Split-screen. Supports multiple keyboard and mice.
LAN play		16	Co-op, Versus
Online play		16	Co-op, Versus

Connection types

Type	Native	Notes
Matchmaking
Peer-to-peer
Dedicated		Dedicated Server software is available under Tools in the Steam client.
Self-hosting
Direct IP		The the console type gam_strConnecToIP="x.x.x.x" replace the x's with the ip.

Ports

Protocol	Port(s) and/or port range(s)
TCP	27015
UDP	27015

Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) support status is unknown.

VR support

3D modes	State	Notes
vorpX		G3D Officially supported game, see official vorpx game list.

Devices
Tobii Eye Tracking		Supports: Aim at Gaze, Clean UI, Dynamic Light, Extended View - Eye & Head Tracking, Flashlight Control, Interaction at Gaze. For Eye tracking features to work, use the Serious Sam Fusion 2017 version of this game.
Novint Falcon

Issues fixed

Mouse acceleration

• Latest version: (version 3.0.3 / 261096 as of 2022) The game defaults to raw input, which does not support mouse acceleration. So even though the option remains on by default, it has no effect. In game this is shown in the mouse options by having the Mouse Acceleration option greyed out. Raw input cane be turned off, or make sure it's on by editing SeriousSam3.ini.
  • Change this line to toggle raw input (Change to 0 to disable): inp_bRawInput = 1; _(version="2")
  • With Raw input off, mouse acceleration will be enabled by default. Use this console command entry to disable: prj_bMouseAcceleration=0
    • Note: The game does save most console commands to the .ini, but not this one. It also seems to ignore it in startup scripts, so there is no way to save this functionality, the command has to be run again after every startup. Better to just keep on raw input if wanting to have mouse acceleration disabled.
    • Also Note: The game is still a bit unstable on modern machines, if it crashes, it tends to revert SeriousSam3.ini to "safe" settings, which includes reverting any changes like these. So to make them permanent, set SeriousSam3.ini to read only so the game can't do this.
• Launch version: No Raw input and Mouse acceleration is on by default in the launch version with the default mouse mode. It can be toggled off in the menu but the option is not remembered.

Keyboard/mouse not working

Some background programs like antivirus (specifically ZoneAlarm and F-Secure) are known to cause this.

Use the console[citation needed]
Open the console with F1. Type inp_bRawInput=0.

Use lower mouse sensitivity

Use the console[citation needed]

Open the console with F1. Type prj_fMouseSensitivity. This will show the current value that the mouse sensitivity is set to. It should be set to 1 by default, or 0.5 if the slider bar is all the way to the left in the options menu. Enter prj_fMouseSensitivity=0.2. This should lower the sensitivity even further. Play around with the numbers to get something that's comfortable. Numbers like 0.25 or 0.05 can be used.

Chat message crash

Use the console[citation needed]
Open the console with F1. Type in ccn_iMaxChatConsoleMessages=50 (default value). Notes Due to a bug in the engine, the game may crash if ccn_iMaxChatConsoleMessages is set to 0.

Dynamic shadows flickering

Turn off Parallax Mapping
Open the console with F1. Type sha_iParallaxMappingMethod=0 and then shaReloadShaders().

Alternative solution
Navigate the configuration file and open it with a text editor. Add shb_bVisibilityMesh = 0; at the end of it. Save the file. Right-lick on the file, click Properties, then mark it as Read Only.

Other information

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D	9.0c, 11	Direct3D 9 is the default and most complete renderer on Windows. Direct3D 11 is buggy. Direct3D 12 (beta) is only in the Serious Sam Fusion 2017 version. Direct3D 11 can be forced in this version through the gfx_strAPI="Direct3D11" console command. This will be saved in the .ini for later launches.
OpenGL	2.0	Default on OS X, Linux. Can be forced on Windows via the gfx_strAPI="OpenGL" console command.
Vulkan	1.1	Only in the Serious Sam Fusion 2017 version.
Shader Model support	3

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows
macOS (OS X)			This 32-bit-only macOS game does not work on macOS Catalina (10.15) or later.
Linux

Middleware

	Middleware	Notes
Audio	XAudio2, DirectSound, OpenAL
Multiplayer	Steamworks

System requirements

Windows

macOS (OS X)

Linux

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	XP SP2	7 64-bit
Processor (CPU)	Intel Dual Core 2.0 GHz AMD Dual Core 2.0 GHz	Intel Quad Core 3.0 GHz (i5, i7) AMD Phenom II 3.0 GHz
System memory (RAM)	1 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce 7800/7900/8600 series ATI/AMD Radeon HD2600/3600 or 1800/X1900 series DirectX 9.0c compatible	Nvidia GeForce GTX 480/580 ATI/AMD Radeon HD 5870/6970
Sound (audio device)	DirectX 9.0c Compatible Sound Card

Due to future updates planning to remove DX9 support, Windows XP support will be likely lost with these updates.

macOS (OS X)
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	10.5.8, 10.6.3
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz	Intel Quad Core 2.7 GHz (i3, i5)
System memory (RAM)	2 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	6 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GT 120/9600M/320M ATI Radeon HD 4670	Nvidia GeForce 8800/9800/260 ATI Radeon HD 4870

Linux
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	Ubuntu 12.04
Processor (CPU)	Intel Dual Core 2.8 GHz AMD Dual Core 2.8 GHz	Intel Quad Core i5 3.0 GHz AMD Phenom II 3.0 GHz
System memory (RAM)	2 GB	4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	4 GB
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce 8600/9600 GT ATI/AMD Radeon HD 2600/3600 OpenGL 2.1 compatible	Nvidia GeForce GTX 280/460 ATI/AMD Radeon HD 4870/5770
Other	(Graphic drivers: Nvidia 310, AMD 12.11)