When misrule takes its place at the eight corners of the… god, Barry, put some clothes on. Ahem. When the Brass Tower walks and Time… just stop that. We’ll go questing in a minute. Where was I? When the thrice-blessed fail and… Josh, don’t spawn enemies. I’m trying to intone.
Yes, we’ve been playing the Skyrim Online mod for Skyrim. No, it’s not ready for you to play yet – it’s only just Alpha. I’ve just watched a chain of naked AIs bump into each other in a swollen pack outside Whiterun Stables for about ten minutes, while human players bumbled around trying to find their friends. I tried to play with Craig, but I was invisible to him, while he was naked to me. I know which of us was more embarrassed.
If you’re a keen modder or even a beginner, you might be interested in our100 best Skyrim mods.
The premise is simple – this turns Skyrim into something akin to an MMO. First, you need to visit http://skyrim-online.com and download the client. You also need to create an account on the Skyrim online forum. Next time you load the game, Skyrim Online should be one of your Skyrim mods and will auto update – if it doesn’t, then grab the mod from the Steam Workshop. You’re best off launching the game through the client directly – it seems to handle a lot of the extra functions.
Once you’re in-game, you’ll see a new flashy intro screen and then you can load your game. We recommend a save where you’re out in the open. Also a save that you don’t mind losing… then, in-game, hit F3. This will allow you to log in one of the two servers using your forum log-in. Once you do, the timezone will sync with the server and you’ll see a chat window with other players.
Then it’s just a matter of finding someone to hang around with and have adventures – other players will appear as naked prisoners. NPCs seems hugely confused to see you, so we’re not clear how well any quests are going to work. If you hit Numpad 8, waves of confused AI enemies will start spawning – press 9 to stop them. At the moment, apart from that, it’s a glorified chatroom, but the team are working on implementing other features soon.