The Skyrim modding scene has helped keep the game’s community alive for almost a full decade after The Elder Scrolls 5‘s original release. The huge array of available mods range from survival systems like Frostfall to graphical upgrades, AI improvements, combat tweaks, and even brand new areas to explore across the continent of Tamriel.
For a long time only PC players were able to mod Bethesda games. When it became apparent that mods were partly behind Skyrim‘s longevity, however, more consoles began to give players access to mods. Nonetheless, players with the Xbox Game Pass version of Skyrim still have access to far fewer mods than their PC counterparts. Even with the FPS upgrade available to players with an Xbox Series X/S there are some fundamental limitations to modding on the console, and there’s one key reason why.
Recent Xbox versions of Skyrim have allowed for some modding. The process for downloading mods on the Xbox Game Pass version of Skyrim is slightly different to the process for modding on PC, however. Not only that, but the available collection of mods is also far more limited. For PC players who want to start modding, they need to download a mod manager like Vortex, follow a tutorial on getting started, and begin making changes to their version of the game.
Skyrim on the Xbox Game Pass can be modded by hitting “enable mods” on the Game Pass app, which gives the player access to the Skyrim Special Edition folder and the game’s executable. In theory, this should allow players to mod Skyrim just as much as as PC players. There’s one big limitation to modding the Xbox version of Skyrim, however. Many mods on the PC rely on another mod called SKSE – the Skyrim Script Extender. This mod hugely expands the capabilities of Skyrim by extending its scripting capacity, and without it many of the Skyrim mods made over the last decade simply will not work. For PC modders, it is often considered an absolute essential.
Many Bethesda games require script extenders for a lot of their mods to work. There are also other similar kinds of mods designed primarily to allow other mods to work. Many mods for Fallout: New Vegas, for example, require a patch which allows the game to access 4GB of memory instead of its default 2GB. Mods like these often help extend the lifespan of Bethesda’s open-world games significantly, expanding the capabilities of the games to allow for more extensive and demanding modding down the line.
Xbox players can’t download a version of the Skyrim Script Extender for their version of the game. For now, there isn’t a patch for the Skyrim Script Extender which works with the executable that Xbox Game Pass players will find in the game’s folder after enabling mods on their console.
Not all hope is lost for Xbox fans who want to mod Skyrim, however. In theory, the Skyrim Script Extender could be patched to allow it to extend the scripting capabilities of the Xbox Game Pass’ executable at some point in the future. There are also a lot of classic mods which will still work on the Xbox Game Pass version and which do not require the Skyrim Script Extender. Some popular mods like Live Another Life – which allows players to skip the game’s Helgen intro and choose from a variety of origins across Skyrim and its DLC areas – do still work. Nonetheless, for fans who want access to all Skyrim‘s modding community has to offer, the PC version of the game remains the way to go.
Skyrim is available to play now on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch.
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