Hello my friends and welcome back to the channel! Today it’s time to do a comparison of 5
amazing texture pack mods for Skyrim and see how they differ from each other, in order
to help you find the perfect base textures for your game. I’ll be going over these mods one by one,
and then comparing them to each other, and at the end of the video, I’ll talk more
about textures and what I prefer to use. I’m Bards College Graduate, and without
further ado, let’s check out the first texture pack of the video. Skyland AIO texture pack is perhaps one of
the most esteemed mods to enhance the base textures of Skyrim, for it covers architecture,
landscape, dungeons and much more in a high-quality fashion. The focus of Skyland AIO has been on providing
the most realistic textures, and this is well-achieved as they’re actually created by 3D scanning
real world surfaces. This mod makes the game world appear to have
a higher level of realism, while of course, making Skyrim quite a bit more beautiful. This texture pack is also fantastic as it’s
consistent in every area it touches, holding up to a high visual fidelity. I must highlight these city textures, especially
those of Markarth, as I think they’re just incredible to look at and make the city appear
so much better. In addition to architecture and landscape
textures, Skyland AIO also completely retextures some of the smaller things in the game environment
such as road signs, standing stones and ships. If this is not enough, also check out Skyland
Bits and Bobs, another mod that retextures over a hundred clutter items. Installing Skyland AIO is made convenient,
as there is a FOMOD installer to let you choose precisely which textures you want to add in
your game. The mod’s default texture size is 2k which
is the same resolution as in the vanilla game textures, but there is a 1k version available
for lower-end machines as well. With an additional mod, you can have the 3D
parallax effect on the landscape. To summarize Skyland AIO texture pack, it
offers highly realistic, cohesive, beautiful textures, covering nearly if not every surface
there is including the DLC’s, and suits perfectly for a person who appreciates performance-friendly
visuals in their game with a convenient installation. On the other hand, if you value more hand-painted,
fantasy-style visuals, or want 4k or higher textures, you might want to choose another
one. Skyrim 202X texture pack is perhaps the most
famous among them, as it has been downloaded a whopping 18 million times in total in Nexus. This mod provides high resolution textures
for tons of things in the game, including even retextures for animals, armors, and clutter,
but again, we’re focusing on the landscape and architecture textures today. Skyrim 202X shines with its incredible quality,
sometimes even excessively so, to which I’m not used to, at all. Much like Skyland AIO, this texture pack has
an emphasis on realism, which for example you can see looking here at these delicious
wet mud textures. The textures of Skyrim 202X feature the parallax
effect, that makes some surfaces of ground or walls appear 3D, and that really brings
these environments to life. The default files are in 8k and 4k textures,
and have to be downloaded in three parts. The file sizes are huge, adding up very quickly,
so if you have limited hard drive space then you should reconsider downloading this mod,
or getting the smaller resolution files. I did grab the 4k downscaled textures, but
there are also 2k and even 1k versions for those who need them, which is great. To summarize Skyrim 202X, it’s a huge texture
pack with a lot of realistic quality textures, specifically the ground textures look great,
as well as these forts. The parallax is amazing for those who like
to use it, and you can choose from many options of texture sizes to suit your needs. But on the other hand, I think that the style
of the textures deviates a lot from the original and feel detached sometimes, and it should
be noted that this mod is very VRAM-hungry. Overall, it’s a great pack with a lot of
quality textures and the most modern modded look. Noble Skyrim is probably the oldest texture
pack I’m featuring today, but even though it is indeed old, I think it still holds up
more than well. This texture pack is known for its gritty,
rustic, and sort of medieval style of art direction, which makes Skyrim feel all-around
darker but also cleaner. Noble Skyrim retextures all of the architecture,
but also other things such as the landscape, dungeons, and some clutter too. I’m very biased towards this mod, as I’ve
loved it ever since I stumbled upon it nearly 10 years ago (sheesh, I am getting old). I’ve already described Noble Skyrim as dark
and medieval, but more than that, it shines for its thoughtful and deliberate artistic
direction. This is the texture pack for cohesiveness
- I feel like all the textures, whether we’re in a city or in nature, compliment each other
and have a similar feel. This is very important, at least for myself,
and that is part of the reason why Noble Skyrim is such a good base texture pack. It’s not perfect though, there are some
textures that are not at all to my taste, but that’s fine as that’s what texture
packs are for - to be placed up high in your mod manager, overwritten by other textures. Of course, even if I keep praising it, Noble
Skyrim isn’t fancy at all - no groundbreaking 8k textures, no parallax - just simple vision,
executed effectively. Even the time passing hasn’t rendered this
mod obsolete just yet, as it still holds up very well in my opinion. It’s a great texture pack for performance,
as the textures are in 2k/1k size, and there is also a performance edition available. But if you’re looking for realism, parallax
or super-ultra-rtx-on-2024-graphics, Noble Skyrim might not be the best choice for you. CleverCharff’s AIO is a relatively new texture
replacer, covering if not all of Skyrim’s cities, caves and DLC locations in a colorful
and fantastical fashion. This is the first mod in this guide that completely
disregards environmental textures at the moment, so I’ll be leaving those out from this showcase. CleverChaff’s textures are known for being
vibrant in color and overall quite unique in style, nothing that we’ve really seen
before in Skyrim modding. The most shining features of this mod are
clearly the cities of Skyrim, especially Solitude, which feels more elevated and grand with these
new textures, like it’s been painted with a fresh coat of paint. Any surfaces you lay your eyes on look clean
and polished, but on the flip side, there’s no parallax support for those who like the
effect. CleverCharff’s AIO is a very simple and
easy install with 4K, 2K, and 1K resolution options and a handy FOMOD installer so you
can pick and choose which textures you want to install in your game. To summarize this texture pack, it’s a great
pick if you’re looking for fantasy and saturated colors to elevate your cities and architecture
with. On the other hand, it doesn’t cover nearly
as many textures as the other replacers, so you might need to install another one at the
base and then overwrite it with CleverChaff’s AIO to get everything covered. Skurkbro’s Retexture Project AIO is another
newcomer to the texture overhaul scene, and it’s also the last individual mod we’re
looking at today, although not least. This overhaul states its goal as transforming
Skyrim’s visuals into those of a next-gen game, while staying lore- and performance-friendly. Ambitious, for sure - let’s take a closer
look at this mod. SRP’s style of retextures are highly realistic
- they look like something you’d see in the real world. The colors are quite muted, and it’s more
focused on realism than fantasy. This retexture mod covers the main architecture,
dungeons, and landscape textures, but there is also a file for miscellaneous textures. Parallax is enabled for this mod to bring
out that extra realism on the ground covers and other things, and it looks absolutely
amazing. My favorite parts of these textures are the
nordic ruins and of course the stone ground covers with parallax, they look great. SRP textures are available in 1K, 2K, and
4K resolution size, and the mod is divided in four categories to choose from: architecture,
dungeons, landscape and miscellaneous textures. This replacer is a great pick if you value
realism, muted colors, and overall a high-quality texture pack that makes your Skyrim feel like
a next-gen game. On the other hand, the same as with earlier
more realistic overhauls, it might not be for you if you prefer the hand-painted, fantasy
visuals of Skyrim. Now that we’ve taken a look at all of these
mods individually, it’s time to see how they compare against each other. I’ll stay out of this part for your viewing
pleasure, and meet you in the next section where I’ll talk more about texture mods
and give my own opinion on the perfect texture setup. All right, that’s that for the comparison! I hope it helped you determine which texture
replacer you like the most. As you might already know, even these big
packs of texture mods are very easy to install and use, because even if you accidentally
mess something up, nothing irreversible will happen. Only if you’re exceeding your VRAM limit
you might experience crashes, but that’s pretty much the worst case scenario. By nature, texture packs are compatible with
each other and can be combined - you just have to determine which textures you want
to override with another mod and create a perfect mix and match for your game. My favorite texture pack will forever be Noble
Skyrim, partly surely because I’m just so used to it, but after trying out these different
mods, I must highlight Skyland AIO as it is an impressive and balanced collection of quality
textures, and I could see myself completely migrating over to it. I also loved some of the city retextures by
CleverChaff which will stay in my game for now. There were also beautiful and high-quality
textures I really liked in other texture packs, but in the end, I do prefer my Skyrim to look
consistent and retain that classic Skyrim feel. Let me know in the comments, which texture
packs do you use if any, and what kind of criteria you have for a texture mod. Thank you for watching the video! If you’d like to help me produce the next
video, head on over to patreon.com/bardscollegegraduate for a way to support the channel and gain
access to extra content and a private Discord server. A special shoutout to Aapeli, Kiera, Ryan
Ulrich and The Panicked Monk for going above and beyond at supporting what I do. Take care, and see ya!
