On Sept. 3, a mod called Starfield Script Extender was published to nexusmods.com—the primary hub for modding any game.
If you’ve downloaded mods before, you likely know exactly what a Script Extender implies. In case you haven’t, it basically means Pandora’s box has been opened—and Starfield mods are going to be capable of changing the entire game very, very soon.
Bethesda games have been the frontier and focus for modders for well over a decade. Skyrim is the most modded game of all time by a massive margin, with over 100,000 mods created and almost five billion mod downloads. Yes, five billion.
Of these 100,000 mods, one mod, Skyrim Script Extender (SKSE), has been downloaded far more than any other mod. Why? Because the Script Extender is the framework for major mods—it is what allows the game to be added to and altered in meaningful ways. Without a Script Extender, mods can tweak the game. With a Script Extender, mods can change the game entirely.
Starfield Script Extender was created by Ian Patterson, the same modder who created the revolutionary Skyrim mod. This new Script Extender is not some cheap knockoff, though. It is the real deal from the godfather of modding himself. This time around, he has made the Script Extender far easier to access as well, meaning new modders won’t even have to leave Nexus Mods to get going.
There are already a handful of mods that have been created with the Starfield Script Extender as a prerequisite, but the surface is just beginning to be scratched. Judging from Skyrim and Fallout (which has its own version of the Script Extender, also created by Patterson), we can expect to see:
- Complete graphics overhauls
- New animations added to the game
- Weapons, spacesuits, NPCs, and enemies added to the game
- Quest expansions
- Alterations to existing NPCs, questlines, and even cities
Truly, nothing is off the table now that Starfield has a Script Extender. The changes listed above will just be the basics that are likely to start popping up this month. A decent rule of thumb for Skyrim is if you can think of it, there is probably a mod for it. It probably won’t take long at all for Starfield to become the same way.
What is very exciting about Starfield modding specifically is the scope of the universe. Many modders, myself included, prefer “lore-friendly” mods. In other words, we don’t want Master Chief from Halo showing up in Skyrim. Given that intergalactic travel has been achieved in the Starfield universe, it will be significantly easier for modders to introduce content that would otherwise be contradictory to lore.
