Now Playing: Skyrim (VR)

Skyrim VR is terrible and you shouldn’t buy it. Even if it was given away for free I’d still not recommend it. Skyrim was never designed for VR but that doesn’t excuse this incredibly lazy and poor excuse for a VR port. Practically nothing was done to make Skyrim VR an enjoyable VR experience. I picked up the game in a sale and I refunded it within an hour.

The controls barely functioned. My character height continually reset when loading into new areas. The visuals were a blurry, headache inducing mess. The fact they had the audacity to charge 40 quid for this garbage is practically criminal.

So . . . I bought it again. I just couldn’t help myself. I do like a challenge and what better challenge than using mods to transform Skyrim VR into something actually playable and enjoyable? At the time of this review I have 60 active mods running and I’d say that’s roughly the minimum you need if you want to turn Skyrim VR into something worth playing.

Skyrim VR is only worth playing if A) you’re already a fan of the game and are aware of its many issues, quirks and bugs and B) if you’re willing to spend a good few hours tweaking configuration files and installing and testing a variety of mods. Even then, there are going to be aspects of Skyrim VR that you can’t really ‘fix’ and all the existing Skyrim issues still remain.

Because Skyrim VR is still Skyrim. Get ready for broken quests you need to use the in-game console to work around. A lacklustre plot and disappointing guild missions. Invisible dragon attacks. Terrible NPC AI. Shoddy combat – which is even worse in VR.

But I still love exploring the world, building my character and hoarding a massive pile of gold bars in the basement of my modded home. I sunk 600 hours into (modded) Skyrim despite all its flaws. I don’t see myself putting quite so much time into this VR version, but I’ve already clocked over 50 hours and I expect I’ll hit 100 before I’m done with it.

Seeing all of these locations and characters I’m already so familiar with in VR has been pretty great, I must admit. But that’s only thanks to the mods. Now this review isn’t intended to be a modding guide – there’s plenty of good guides already out there. I’ll just give a general outline of the kind of things you want to do.

To begin, install the game and run it at least once to generate the configuration files you’ll need to start tweaking. Once that’s done, get yourself the Vortex mod manager from Nexus Mods. It seriously makes modding so much easier than in the past. Almost too easy, I’d say – f**king kids these days, don’t know how good they got it.

Configuration edits come next, which you can do manually or use a tool and there’s various guides online as to what kind of values you might want / need to change. Next up is what I’d term ‘utility’ mods – these are mods that provide the framework for other mods to function such as SKSE (VR version) and SKY UI. You’ll also want the Unofficial Skyrim Patch. It doesn’t fix everything, but it fixes a lot.

VR specific mods that are a must would be HIGGS and VRIK – these radically transform how you play and interact with the world in Skyrim VR. When it comes to visual overhauls there’s plenty to pick from but I’d always recommend SMIM to be used in conjunction with whatever you pick – just be sure to check for file conflicts and set the load order accordingly.

In fact, you should always be sure to check mod compatibility / requirements before installing anything. World overhauls, character overhauls and weather improvements will all drag Skyrim VR to a visual level that, whilst not exactly cutting edge, still looks significantly better than the vanilla experience.

Beyond this, it’s really a matter of personal choice and that’s why I’m not going to give Skyrim VR any kind of score. How could I? Once you mod the game to your own preference your experience and enjoyment may vary wildly from mine. I feel like I’ve got Skyrim VR in a pretty good place, but I’m sure I’ll keep experimenting with different mods to see if I can improve things further.

If you already like Skyrim and you’re willing to put in the time and effort to mod this VR version then you’ll likely end up with a game you’ll sink a lot of time into and enjoy quite a bit. But it is still Skyrim – warts and all – and as novel as it is seeing everything again in VR, no amount of mods will change that.