Update: 2/12/14 - Added new version of Climates of Tamriel stars replacer with greater star density, but no larger stars added. Doubles the density of the small stars, but doesn't add any additional large stars. For CoT users who want to eliminate the dark spot issue, without changing the appearance much from the original.
Update: 2/10/14 - Added new stars replacer texture for Climates of Tamriel users. This will change the CoT starfield to match the appearance of the Ethereal Cosmos stars, and also eliminate the dark spots that were sometimes visible during aurora events, or on bright galaxy replacers, like my nebula belt. *ONLY DOWNLOAD this file is you are using Climates of Tamriel. It won't be visible otherwise.
Update: 11/25/13 - Added a subdued twinkle version, with a less saturated nebula belt, dimmer constellations, and a sparser twinkle star field.
Update: 11/20/13 - Added a "twinkle" star version, since so many people have been asking about it. Only the tiny stars have the twinkle effect, so the larger ones will be static. The constellations were dimmed in this version to blend better with the little twinkle stars. The nebula belt is the vivid version.
The twinkling effect is controlled by the timescale, so at the default setting of 20, the twinkling will be fairly rapid. If you play a more realistic timescale (lower setting), then the twinkling will be slower and more subtle.
Ethereal Cosmos is my attempt to bring more beauty and grandeur to the Skyrim night sky without breaking the lore-friendly feeling. Of course, we're talking about a world with two moons, as well as talking cat and lizard people. What is considered "realistic" is a matter of interpretation. I wanted to bring some of the flavor of my original The Cosmos mod, but make the effect more subtle, so it would appeal to more people. Skyrim is a fantasy world, but it is rooted in a certain earthy realism. I hope my night sky overhaul achieves that balance.
You get new textures for the Skyrim galaxy, stars, and constellations that were designed to blend well together. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, in other words. If there is interest, I may offer the files individually for those people who love their current galaxy, stars, or constellation textures.
Anyway, I hope people enjoy these new textures..... I hope it gives some added beauty to their gameplay.
OK. I am really thrilled with this mod. I use a mod that gives me darker nights, and I mean pretty dark. With the vanilla sky, even on clear nights you can't see much. But now on clear nights the landscape is realistically bright in reaction to the new night sky. On rainy or cloudy nights it's appropriately dark. If I hadn't already endorsed this mod I would do so again.
Anyone who is reading the comments and thinking about trying Ethereal Cosmos, do it. You won't be sorry.
All these night sky mods miss the biggest things realism demands. They don't reduce the amount of stars! There are no actual constellations. There is just a blanket smattering of dead, lifeless stars. I've seen games from the 90s have much more realitistic night skies than Skyrim has. Nighttime is a realism killer.
Wonderful to look up at the sky with this mod, it's the best. Twinkle subdued with your cloud replacer is breathtaking. Thank you for sharing your hard work!
Hi Gamwich! I'm sorry for bothering you, but I have an issue that confuses me: as a CoT-User I've downloaded your gorgeous stars replacer. However, the "new" stars don't appear nor did NMM ask me to overwrite the default CoT stars (actually, I expected that). Could my ENB (Vividian) caused that issue? Best wishes - Lucy
176 comments
Update: 2/10/14 - Added new stars replacer texture for Climates of Tamriel users. This will change the CoT starfield to match the appearance of the Ethereal Cosmos stars, and also eliminate the dark spots that were sometimes visible during aurora events, or on bright galaxy replacers, like my nebula belt. *ONLY DOWNLOAD this file is you are using Climates of Tamriel. It won't be visible otherwise.
Update: 11/25/13 - Added a subdued twinkle version, with a less saturated nebula belt, dimmer constellations, and a sparser twinkle star field.
Update: 11/20/13 - Added a "twinkle" star version, since so many people have been asking about it. Only the tiny stars have the twinkle effect, so the larger ones will be static. The constellations were dimmed in this version to blend better with the little twinkle stars. The nebula belt is the vivid version.
The twinkling effect is controlled by the timescale, so at the default setting of 20, the twinkling will be fairly rapid. If you play a more realistic timescale (lower setting), then the twinkling will be slower and more subtle.
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Ethereal Cosmos is my attempt to bring more beauty and grandeur to the Skyrim night sky without breaking the lore-friendly feeling. Of course, we're talking about a world with two moons, as well as talking cat and lizard people. What is considered "realistic" is a matter of interpretation. I wanted to bring some of the flavor of my original The Cosmos mod, but make the effect more subtle, so it would appeal to more people. Skyrim is a fantasy world, but it is rooted in a certain earthy realism. I hope my night sky overhaul achieves that balance.
You get new textures for the Skyrim galaxy, stars, and constellations that were designed to blend well together. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts, in other words. If there is interest, I may offer the files individually for those people who love their current galaxy, stars, or constellation textures.
Anyway, I hope people enjoy these new textures..... I hope it gives some added beauty to their gameplay.
Enjoy,
Gamwich
Anyone who is reading the comments and thinking about trying Ethereal Cosmos, do it. You won't be sorry.
When I next went outside at night and could see the sky, I was staggered. Deleted previous set-up. No need for it ever again.
Great mod, and under-endorsed. No picture does it justice.
1. Take skystars.dds from STARS v2 1024x
2. Add skyrimconstellations01.dds and skyrimconstellations02.dds from Ethereal Cosmos (Twinkle Subdued option).
3. ...
4. PROFIT!
No need to thank me, people, no need to thank me.
Best wishes - Lucy