The Community Shaders Team has shared a new version of it, Version 1.4. Community Shaders adds a lot of new graphics features to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and it’s a must-have mod for everyone who wants to replay it. So, let’s take a closer look at it.

For those who did not know, Community Shaders is a free, open-source plugin for Skyrim. It lets players add advanced graphics effects made by the community. With it, Skyrim’s graphics can look much better and more advanced.

For example, it makes rendering terrain run much faster. It also fixes problems with normal maps, parallax, and screen-space reflections, which caused glitches and performance issues. Water now looks better with fixed refraction, and reflections are higher quality. On top of that, subsurface scattering, grass, and tree lighting have been improved. It also fixes how character normal maps blend and even unlocks internal HDR rendering.

And that’s not all. The plugin has some additional must-have mods. For instance, there is a mod that adds grass lighting, cloud shadows, and grass collisions. So, players can now interact with the grass while exploring the environments. Another mod adds Screen Space Global Illumination (SSGI). Then we have a mod that adds support for DLSS 4, XeSS, and FSR. For AMD FSR, we also get support for Frame Gen.

Version 1.4 comes with lots of performance and visual upgrades. SSGI now looks better and runs faster, and Hair Specular has been improved. Grass collision works better too, and now ragdolls can collide with grass. This update also fixes character lighting and makes terrain blending smoother. It also improves skylighting and dynamic cubemaps indoors. Finally, it adds Burley SSS for better subsurface scattering.

As I said, this is a must-have mod for all Skyrim fans. So, make sure to download it from this link. At the end of the article, you can also find an older video for it. This video shows off some of its key features. Thus, it can give you an idea of what you can expect from it.

Speaking of Skyrim, here are some big fan expansions for it. The First one is Wyrmstooth. Wyrmstooth will add new quests and dungeons to the game. Then there is this mod that brings elements from The Witcher games into Skyrim. Dragon Hall Tavern is a huge 2GB mod that adds quests, new places, an arena, and more. Then there’s  Land of Vominhem, Apotheosis and Legacy of the Dragonborn. Don’t forget to also check out this Castlevania-inspired mod. Modders have also recreated the classic PSX game, MediEvil in Skyrim. Shumer and the Priest Kings is another DLC fan expansion mod with over 200 locations and 180+ quests. You can also download an amazing Call of Duty Mod for it. Oh, and here is another one that adds the cool Nemesis system from Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor to it. Lastly, we have this mod that adds six new islands to explore.

And that’s not all. Skyrim has other mods that add lots of cool stuff.

For instance, this mod allows you to destroy a lot of objects. You can also download this mod that makes the NPCs smarter. With this mod, NPCs will now have a dynamic AI system, and they’ll seek cover. Let’s also not forget this mod that adds unlimited dynamic light sources. Or how about this one that adds a dynamic sanity system? SkyPal is another must-have mod. This mod brings Skyrim and Pokemon together, allowing you to become a Beastmaster.

Last month, we shared a mod that added support for NVIDIA DLSS 4 with Multi-Frame Gen. Unfortunately, that was a paid mod. Still, as I said, Community Shaders adds support for DLSS 4, XeSS, and FSR. These are free to everyone.

Then we have this mod that adds a real-time dismemberment system. There is also a 112GB Mod that remasters all 32,000 textures to 8K.

Lots of mods for Skyrim, right? And you can find even more. So, be sure to check out our Best Skyrim Mods article.

Enjoy and stay tuned for more!

John Papadopoulos

John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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