Spintires

My journey into modding

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As hard as it may be to fathom, before I began working for Nexus Mods, I had never really tried to "mod" anything. I mean, the only form of "modding" I had ever done in my life was add a spoiler to my first car back in 1996; put a window into the side of my first, self-built computer; and maybe change a console game with one of the cheat cartridges that were available at the time. Modding just seemed irrelevant to me, like an unnecessary hassle; I already liked the game so why on earth would I go tinkering with it? I mean, I’d probably make it unstable, or surely it would BSOD, right? It was the equivalent to me of taking a Ferrari and sticking a massive turbocharger inside it: it may be fun, but was it needed? No, of course not. I was also worried: Was I going to be VAC banned for changing textures? Would people think I am cheating if I added a mod to allow me to carry more in my inventory? Would it detract from the game if I added a map with all the roads? The list of concerns I had seemed endless.

So what has changed?



To put it simply, I tried it...  Robin told me to take a week or so to have a play around and see what happens. So I started with Skyrim, the most popular game on the Nexus Mods website with over 1 billion downloads and counting. It seemed like a relatively good place to start; mods were readily available and highly tested by our community, so I loaded it up. I played the vanilla game for some hours, taking in the standard game vistas, the armours, weapons, NPCs, weather, and the like. Skyrim is an incredible game, one you can get lost in as the hours pass by like they're minutes. One moment it's 5 p.m.; the next thing you realise, you've hit 1 in the morning! Your character has many active quests, each like an episode of 'The Walking Dead', and you just need to see it through to the end before you can tear yourself away.

I was enjoying the game...  That's a given! However, I had to take the plunge; my job was now on a modding website, the biggest on the internet no less, so the pressure was mounting.

To begin with, I went through the list of mods, which is a daunting task in itself as we're currently closing fast on 50,000 mod files. I explored the list of most downloaded mods and had a look to find those that were immediately going to give me something different, something I would notice, and something I would like.



In fact, the first mod that I ever downloaded was SkyUI, which is by far the most popular mod file we have on Nexus Mods. This mod has been downloaded over 13 million times, that’s more than the entire population of Greece! That is a crazy figure that indicates how good the mod truly is. SkyUI is designed to change the UI (User Interface) of Skyrim in a huge way; it replaces every menu within the game with a far more productive and informative version. Need to know how much damage your mace swings for? Just open the menu. It brings in so many useful tweaks; it makes you wonder why the developers did not create it this way in the first place.

Now, here is where I had my first RTFM (Read The Fucking Manual) moment! I installed SkyUI using Nexus Mod Manager (NMM). It seemed easy enough; you just click 'Download (NMM),' and the next moment, NMM opens, and the mod file is automatically added to your list of available mods. Then, you activate it directly from within the application. Easy!

(That is of course until Skyrim Special Edition gets released and we get a huge influx of people, so we have to turn off NMM so the sites don’t go down ;))



After activating the mod, I opened Skyrim and went about my merry way; but where was this amazing new UI that I was expecting? Everything still looked identical! I opened up a browser and navigated rather solemnly to the mod page and read through the description. It seems I had missed one ever so minor part that was necessary to get SkyUI working correctly: I had not installed SKSE (Skyrim Script Extender). SKSE is a mod that isn't available directly on Nexus Mods, so I had to download it manually from their website. To put it shortly, SKSE does exactly what it says on the tin, it expands the scripting language for Skyrim to allow for bigger and more robust mods. The memory allocation patch that it includes also allows you to add more mods to the game without it crashing to desktop, I however, just wanted to use SkyUI.

This time, I ran the game and pressed Tab – you could say that I was pleased when I was immediately presented with the updated menu system that I had been expecting the first time. I continued my game for another hour or two before stopping to think about what had just happened. Now I don't know about you, but have you ever thought about how much time that singular mod has saved you while you have played the game? Before, I would have to open up my inventory and then click to select Armour, Magic, Books, etc., and then run my cursor down the list to find their information.  Now, all I had to do was open the menu, look straight at a table of items, and all the stats were immediately available. I could even sort by any of their values if I wanted. It was just a pleasure to use.



SkyUI single-handedly changed my view of modding. Now, that may come across as a bold statement, but I'm pretty sure that most of the people who have read this far, and have Skyrim themselves (the original, not the Special Edition), will have SkyUI installed.

Now, I digress, but the impact of the mod was made clear to me the other day when the Skyrim Special Edition was launched. I was looking forward to checking out the new visuals and improvements that Bethesda had made to the already excellent game. After pre-loading and waiting for the game to unlock, I sat looking at the screen wondering what mods I was going to install first. Working for the site, I knew that the interest was high, and we would soon get an influx of mods that I could choose from.  Then it opened, and I quickly began the game and sat through that same cart journey toward Helgen, after which I had to configure my character (something I take my time over) and go into the actual gameplay. The dragon descended and away I went. I decided to follow Ralof and made my way through Helgen, collecting junk, choosing the sword over magic and following the path, only to emerge on the other side a little bit sad. Yes, the game was still fun; yes, it still drew me in, but the standard UI on the menu system was just terrible, and I was already missing the look and feel of SkyUI.

So if this was just one mod, what could I do if I began to find ones that were going to prove helpful and stack them together?

I must have spent a good few hours looking through the mods for Skyrim on Nexus Mods; I admit that I did it the 'easy' way and sorted through a list of 'Most downloaded' before going through each one to discover what it was offering. I believe that in the first few days of modding, I had downloaded, installed and activated around 50 mods. It was exhilarating to add new features to the game, jump into my character, and see what new items, tasks, quests, abodes and spells were available to me. The mini-games that I found tedious and (in my eyes) took away from the main game I no longer had to worry about. Lockpicking no longer deducted from my gaming experience as I installed 'KenMOD - Lockpick Pro - Cheat'. Concentrating on the quests now became the priority and it became clear that these mods had enhanced the game considerably based on my own personal tastes.



With a choice of 50,000 files on Nexus Mods for Skyrim alone, I needed to think about how I wanted my game to 'feel', so I began plotting. I wanted to find mods that were going to enhance the sound and the visuals. I wanted a few more abodes in which my character could relax. Also, as the standard map in the game is 'adequate' but not great, I thought that maybe I should go for a different map.

The list began to grow, and so did my frustration with the website. Nexus Mods is a vast repository; it hosts over 400,000 mod files and even more image files, but can you find anything on it? Yes, but barely. The search was only just functional and didn't allow many filters or arguments at all. Something was definitely going to have to be done to rectify that in the redesign!

Over the period of around a week, I must have installed around 75 mods into Skyrim. It most certainly wasn't smooth sailing, I had numerous crashes to desktop, problems getting mods installed, trouble removing ones I no longer wanted and much, much more. But through tools such as LOOT (Load Order Optimisation Tool), sites such as http://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/wiki/beginners_guide and the Nexus Mods Wiki, combined with lots of perseverance, I have now ended up with a build that suits me down to the ground. Now, following the release of Skyrim Special Edition I have to go through the entire process again. But you know what? That's part of the fun!

I've based this article on Skyrim; it was the logical stepping-in point for me due to it being the most prolific game on Nexus Mods. But since then, I have had the enjoyment of creating a new experience within Fallout 4 ('Lowered Weapons' and 'Full dialogue interface' are two mods I now can't live without), adding different vault suits, changing the UI and allowing someone else to accompany Dogmeat and me on our travels.

I've tweaked some of our lesser known and used games such as Dying Light, Starbound, Wolfenstein and Dark Souls to name but a few. 

Each little tweak here and there adds to the experience, allowing new possibilities and fixing some of the bugs that remain in games. The hardest part, for me, has been knowing when to stop and play the game. I get engrossed in the build. It becomes like a powerful drug and I find myself saying "just one more mod, then you can give it a play-through". 



The great thing I have found with modding is that it is all down to personal preference; there is no wrong or right way to mod your game. I mean, you can have your files in the incorrect load order or can put two incompatible mods together, which would need to be rectified before your game will work, but what you want to install is entirely up to you and your overall aim.

The community that we have here at Nexus Mods (I know, I drum on about it a lot) truly is an excellent source of knowledge, one which I relied on a lot when I was first trying to get things working. I often found myself scouring the forums, trying to find a solution to some problem I had come up against, and more often than not, I would find the solution. I’ve found everyone I have spoken too to be exceptionally receptive, assisting me in all manner of queries and never begrudging my seemingly benign questions. Our community is a resource, one that each of us can tap into no matter how far along the modding journey we are. 

Over the coming months, Dave (SirSalami) and I will be presenting an 'Introduction to Modding' series that will concentrate on a particular game and show how we have modified it to meet our needs.

We'll most likely start with vanilla Skyrim (Standard Edition) and begin adding mods to it. As the weeks progress, we'll show you how we use tools to get everything working, how they make it easier for you to organise mods, and much more. We do hope you stick around and join us.

If you would like to submit an article to us here at Nexus Mods, please feel free to get in touch with Paul (BlindJudge) at [email protected].

42 comments

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  1. SydneyB
    SydneyB
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    Wellcome to the wonderful world of mods, Paul!
    1. TheTokenGeek
      TheTokenGeek
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      Ha ha ha, cheers SydneyB
  2. WesternFish
    WesternFish
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    I thought this article was going to be about how to actually create mods for the game...oh well.
    1. TheTokenGeek
      TheTokenGeek
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      This will be happening! I'm trying to learn basic modding at the moment and am documenting as I go along (mistakes and all!)
  3. freedom190
    freedom190
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    The Skyrim SE release has been funny. I've gotten maybe twenty quests in on ten new characters because mods keep getting released that change my entire narrative/role-play. Like, Rendspire just got released, and you're telling me I can start the game as pretty much the richest person in Skyrim, with the most insane castle you can possibly think of? Or, Alternate start just released and I can stall the main storyline while I set up my player's backstory the way I want it? Or Adventurer's Basement means I didn't have to go out and individually load out my twenty houses with ingots and food because there is now an insanely awesome auto-storage/display space that can connect to my other houses?!?

    I was an XBOX-ONLY player a week ago. The more I heard, can't do this, can't do that, I got tired of being on the outside, so I got the PC version, then fired up Creation Kit and started playing. The absolute coolest gaming experience I have ever had was downloading Alternate Start, firing up Skyrim SE, choosing the left for dead option, vision clears, hit tilde, type COC 0tgscrafterssecret, hit enter, and teleport inside my custom mod player home 3 seconds into the game. Fricken awesome!!!

    So yeah, a big thanks to the modders and Bethesda for opening up a limitless new world. My imagination has somewhere to play again. The tutorials and overall support makes it possible for absolute newbies like me to go from FOTB to adding a space I would actually call home to my game within a couple of days. I can't wait to keep exploring.

  4. Karl775
    Karl775
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    Hi Guys
    Sorry to say I have never used any mods for Skyrim EVER. So with the release of the Xbox One version where you can use mods sounded awesome, WRONG.....I wanted to play my brand new Xbox One Skyrim Special Edition with mods and enjoy getting the achievements as well. You can have one or the other, but not both. I now understand why, so I scrapped that idea and moved over to my pc ( don't know why I never did this year's ago) I bought Skyrim Legendary Edition, where I can mod. To be truthful I think I was scared of killing my game of worse my pc. So I watched loads of YouTube videos and I read this post and I was blown away. To think of what I've missed, well not anymore. Tomorrow I'm going in with both guns blazing. I've already earmarked the mods I want to try. So basically I wanted to say thank you to all the modders out there and a massive thank you to nexusmods for making it so damn easy for me to use.
    Thanks for reading
    Karl775
  5. BigEffinZed
    BigEffinZed
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    do you know what's it like for someone to play skyrim for the first time five years after it release? and with 50,000 something mods at your disposal? it's so distracting! Lol. I'm addicted to making my skyrim game "better". I spent more time on looking for mods than playing the actual game. I don't think I'll ever complete the main quest.
  6. LudwigvanB
    LudwigvanB
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    For me, the mods go further than making vanilla Skyrim better. They cure it. Vanilla Skyrim was a console port created by Vaermina and Sheogorath collaborating on a bad day. I wouldn't have lasted a week playing it without SKSE, SkyUI and others. The people who make the mods get my heartfelt gratitude and they ought to get Bethesda's, too.
  7. Homercide
    Homercide
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    "Skyrim is an incredible game, one you can get lost in as the hours pass by like they're minutes. One moment it's 5 p.m.; the next thing you realise, you've hit 1 in the morning!"

    There's a mod that will help you with that...
  8. TheGhostface1973
    TheGhostface1973
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    @Kalell
    "Btw, there is a version of SkyUI that works with SSE. There's no MCM and there's an error message in the corner of the inventory, but I've been using it for a while now and it works fine."

    Here you can read how to get rid of the error warning of SkyUI 2.2.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/5awtkm/guide_quick_and_dirty_way_to_remove_skse_warning/

    Works perfectly.
    1. Kalell
      Kalell
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      Very cool, thank you!
    2. TheGhostface1973
      TheGhostface1973
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      No problem. Hope it helps you.
    3. WyoMike48
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      You say there is a version that works, is it the latest version posted in the Skyrim Nexus site or a special download? I miss it a lot, but don't want to go back to Skyrim and not play SSE.
    4. WyoMike48
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      I checked out your link above and see the version I need to download. Thanks, and sorry for being a "pest" ...
    5. MrKit
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      THANKS!!!! SkyUI was one of the main things I was missing in the Special edition, but things weere so nice in the SE I didn't want to go back.
    6. JoruneSkyman
      JoruneSkyman
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      SkyUI, even (temp, hopefully) without MCM - thanks, man.
      [NB - Everyone seems to be talking about SkyUI v2.2, even though the latest is v5.1, so take a note when looking at Nexus 3863 (SkyUI)].
  9. FathomsDeep
    FathomsDeep
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    *slaps her arm and twitches at the familiar phrase, "just one more!"*
    I started my gaming life back in Neverwinter Nights, which thrived on a robust modding community, and NOT being able to mod most games is what kept me from playing other things. So glad that modding has become the norm, and grateful to Nexus for making it so!
  10. TheMagician16
    TheMagician16
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    This was a great read. Thanks for sharing. If you ever find yourself modding Skyrim or Skyrim Special Edition again,I recommend giving "The Forgotten City" a go. http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/1179/?
    Recently I gave it a shot and was amazed. Definitely one of those mods that makes you appreciate the community and the modding scene so much more.
    1. MrKit
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      The best quest mods are ones that are done so well you foget you added them yourself. So, I have all these things, like Forgotten City, that I run across in Skyrim Special Edition, that I don't remember from original Skyrim, but what does that mean? The guide is 1119 pages! So, even after thousands of game hours, there's a LOT of Skyrim I haven't experienced. I look for quests especially that fit in so well you're just not sure. Did Bethesda make this or was it a home gamer? Modding just gets better and better with more realistic locations, sounds, characters and all that. Often the most realistic stuff is what came from the Nexus. Not only have I just finished the main quest barely twice, I have great quest mods that I have never finished. They have been on my computer for years. I have visited them and I will complete them to be sure. Skyrim is such a rich, deep, varied experience as individual to the player. Adding mods to that only makes it even more unique. I mean no two gamers would have the same exact mod collection unless they collaborated and chose to. So, my Skyrim gameplay will always be totally different from everyone else's. I love that.