Starfield has a fairly in-depth character creation process that lets you pick your character's background and the traits they come with. The game also features hundreds of weapons to facilitate your favorite builds. However, something lacking was the ability to customize your weapons and add your own custom weapon skins in Starfield.
Modding might sound like a technical term, but don't let this scare you away from getting your hands on your custom textures, skins and weapons. This guide will give you a basic step-by-step guide on how to mod your own custom weapon skins into Starfield.
Software Required
Here's a list of the software you need and how it will be used.
BAE
Get the Bethesda Archive Extractor from Nexus Mods. This software allows you to extract and place various textures and meshes into Starfield. Be sure to follow the instructions provided and save the textures in the Documents folder.
GIMP
While you can use any image editing software of your choice, we suggest GIMP because it is free and lightweight. It's also easy to navigate and work with if this is your first time messing around with textures and their formatting.
Those are the two tools you'll need. Now that you have them, let's begin with a step-by-step guide on how to start modding weapons.
How to Make a Custom Weapon Skin Mod in Starfield
Launch BAE and make sure you've followed the setup instructions to have it prepared and ready to go for basic modding.
In BAE, click on the open files button on the top left and then select the Starfield Textures BA2 files from 1 to 11.
Type in the name of the weapon you're looking for and navigate to its directory. Make sure to "Select None".
Select your weapon of choice, select Extract at the bottom of the BAE window and save it.
You're going to see a bunch of .dds files in the extracted folder. Open the texture asset that you want to change using GIMP.
Make your desired changes in GIMP, click on the File button on the top left and select Export As. Make sure to export to a new directory rather than overwriting the original and to turn on the "Generate Minmaps" check.
Just make sure your exported directory has the same file names as the original directory where the weapon textures were placed.
And that's it. You've successfully created your first Starfield weapon skin mod. Now, put your creativity to the test and try your hand at making unique new textures to customize your arsenal.
A big shout out to Reddit user Carpeggio for his guidance and impressive Constellation-themed weapon, as well as a video guide to explain the process of weapon skin modding.
Be sure to check in with our Mods hub for all the best and latest Starfield mods. Also, check our list of the most anticipated mods for Starfield.
As usual, stick with us at the Starfield Portal for more Starfield.