Realistic Lighting

As I've said many times in this blog, I have very few complaints with the original version Skyrim. I think Bethesda finally got the majority of the visual aspects of the game right the first time around, which is great for a lot of different reasons, the main one being that the majority of mods that people want to make after the release of the Creation Kit focus more on adding new or different content than replacing it. Because of this change from how things were in the modding community in Oblivion, it's better to call the majority of replacement mods as "enhancements" rather than "fixes". However, there is one thing that Bethesda really should have put in the original game.

Why does everything have to be so bright? The original nights and dungeons are so light that the various fires and lamps that have been scattered around feel more like overkill than actually useful or necessary. The first thing I noticed with my first play-through was how I never even considered picking up a torch. What's the point if the whole country is already bright as day? It kills immersion in a lot of different ways, so a mod to correct this misjudgment was very high on my list.

The best and most customizable mod I've seen published to-date that deals with this problem has to be Plutoman's Realistic Lighting. The nights are darker, the changes in weather types seem more dynamic, and the dungeons are at least twice as terrifying. Non-dungeon interiors are now much dimmer to match the light sources inside of them, and exterior daylight is now less tinted and unnatural. To get an idea of what the change feels like, see it for yourself in my video.

Another great thing about this mod is that its effects are added to the game without any kind of post-processing, meaning that there should be little to no decrease in performance. The Steam version of the mod is incredibly easy to install, and the customizable version is very simple to edit once you understand the various sections of the configuration file. Clearly the best way to see the difference this mod makes is to try it out yourself, so if you like what I had to say or want to know more, you can download Realistic Lighting here from Steam Workshop or here from Skyrim Nexus.

That's all for now. I still would love to hear any recommendations or suggestions you have for me about the mods I discuss or the design of the blog, so please don't hesitate to contact me in any way. From here I'll probably continue with a couple more environment mods, then hopefully move on to more exciting topics like creatures or combat. Until next time.