Earlier this year, Bethesda announced plans to allow mods for Fallout 4 and the upcoming Skyrim remaster on PS4 and Xbox One. It now looks like one of those platforms is ruled out.
In an update on their website today, Bethesda said that Sony won’t allow it:
After months of discussion with Sony, we regret to say that while we have long been ready to offer mod support on PlayStation 4, Sony has informed us they will not approve user mods the way they should work: where users can do anything they want for either Fallout 4 or Skyrim Special Edition.
Like you, we are disappointed by Sony’s decision given the considerable time and effort we have put into this project, and the amount of time our fans have waited for mod support to arrive. We consider this an important initiative and we hope to find other ways user mods can be available for our PlayStation audience. However, until Sony will allow us to offer proper mod support for PS4, that content for Fallout 4 and Skyrim on PlayStation 4 will not be available.
We will provide an update if and when this situation changes.
Comments
45 responses to “Bethesda Says Sony Won’t Allow Skyrim Or Fallout 4 Mods On PS4”
Pretty lame Sony……
Yeah poor form Sony, poor form. Another reason to get an Xbone besides having a 4k blu ray player, mod support in (some) games.
I can’t make myself buy a One S. I was tempted but dropping down in processing power seems to be the wrong way to go. I think I’ll wait on a Scorpio before rethinking it. I’m disappointed that there will be no mods though. I was going to buy a Pro for Skyrim to squeeze out the extra juice.
Cool, so now there’s 2 reasons.
MS allows mods now? :O
If it’s true, then cool, it’s about time! 🙂
I remember devs couldn’t release free content updates for their games on 360 because of MS imposed restrictions.
Yeah mods are on Fallout 4 for Xbone and is likely they will be on Skyrim as well. Dont own a Xbone but am getting more and more tempted.
Good to hear they are opening up a little.
Last gen I was a 360 fanboi. I enjoyed PS3 too though, it’s just that I thought the 360 was better in many ways. This generation thought, I’ve had zero interest in xbone and liked the PS4 much more.
Sadly I don’t like either company at the moment; Sony are kind of heartless these days, and MS just seem lost with an idiot at the helm.
I’ve been the opposite. I was a ps1,2,3 fan boy.
This gen neither had me sold but due to friends having xbones I got one and have not regretted it at all.
Good to hear. 🙂
I had both last gen, and enjoyed games on both systems despite my preference. 🙂
Honestly, I’d own both this gen too if I could, but I’m broke as shit and can’t afford either lol. 🙁
Wtf is goin on over at Sony…
Smart branding? The last thing they want on their closed system is un-checked amateurism breaking their games. Yes, yes, there are well made mods out there, but they make a small percentage of the total available, they also can’t be expected to play nice with any other mods you might have installed and running. Where does the buck stop? The smart consumer would say “at the mod creator”, but the average user would blame Sony when their game stops working or does something stupid or exposes a child to something untoward.
Console is not PC. That’s its strength. Bringing mods to it goes completely against the spirit of the platform and why users like me choose it in the first place; simplicity and consistency.
The modding process so far on Bethesda’s system has worked pretty well in my experience. Nexus is full of half arsed, shoddy ones sure, but Bethesda has curated them fairly well. There’s already the warning up when you log into the service that mods will potentially destablise your game, so people are warned thoroughly and if they do try to blame Sony, the fact of the matter is they can’t say they weren’t warned (they’ll try, but copious, copious warnings *are* there). Sony simply should not have allowed such an announcement in the first place regarding FO4 on their system nor should have Bethesda announced it, so I don’t believe either side should be let off the hook here.
I think at the end of the day the consumer has options and that’s the key thing to keep in mind. If you want mods on your games, PC is the ideal choice, with Xbox One being an option now too. I personally have no interest in it so it doesn’t bother me in the slightest.
I actually like that Xbox One is going in that direction and Playstation is not though, we need more points of difference between the consoles, not less. But yeah it’s completely understandable why Playstation wouldn’t want to put their faith in someone else to manage the way their games work on their platform, it’s just too much a headache, even when everyone is being hyper vigilant.
All fair points, just silly when people are rushing to do announcements of who is getting what, who is allowing what, without checking who is actually ok with what etc, causes massive headaches for the consumer in the end. I’ve got a few mates who are annoyed now due to not getting ps4 mods, ah well, I’ve got my pc mods, I’m ok with that.
I can’t help but feel though this ‘mid tier’ console cycle coming up is going to be confusing for a whole lot of people though…
No attempt to get a comment from Sony as to why they won’t allow it? A bit of journalism would be nice…
Or why Bethesda would announce mod support without getting approval first. Something smells funny here.
Most likely they’re worried that it will be a provide a way to subvert the trusted computing model on the platform. If there is an appropriate buffer overrun that allows arbitrary code execution in Fallout of Skyrim, imagine being able to download a particular mod and perform some action and suddenly the game disappears, only for another pirated game sitting on a USB hard drive to boot up.
Quite possibly, but if the person writing the article doesn’t bother to even ask the question, how will we ever know?
I agree that it would be a good idea to ask Sony, but I suspect Sony wouldn’t give a straight answer.
A lot of the times Sony’s firmware release notes say “system stability improvements”, that is code for “we’ve mitigated an exploitable hole shown up by a game”.
Jernalism
As a console only gamer that was excited to experience mods this is really disappointing. Sony is stumbling lately. So much for 4theplayers
I actually never fell for that garbage, Sony have only ever been after one thing… for the wallets
pretty content now with Xbox one buying digital games and being able to share them with multiple consoles, makes LAN over Xbox live real easy and cheaper
Return of the arrogant Sony from the late ps2 and early PS3 days? You would think they would have learnt their lesson, it seemed they had with the launch of the ps4, and now they just keep making dick moves… Not impressed
yeah something tells me there is more to the story…
Not defending Sony here, but Bethesda’s statement is spoiling for a fight. Almost antagonistic.
Whereby last year their big game was equally hammered as much as it was praised. For being a Bethesda-ass Bethesda game.
Remind me again why we’re getting Skyrim with a fresh coat of paint. Hint, it’s not because of Xbone owners.
i gotta agree with you here leigh, im incline to believe that bethesda was having trouble getting it work and have then found that something in the OS is stopping it becase it controls security or something else thats important. Beth wants it gone, but Sony says NO so beth turn around and blame Sony for their failing. Also gotta remember that bethesda has always favorited Microsoft over Sony as well
You guys sound like you need education.
Lol are you serious??… that is the silliest thing ive heard in ages. Mid support is already on xbone and pc, so they dont want it on ps4?
That’s some serious tinfoil hat stuff you have going there. There are no security restrictions in the PS4 that would prevent user-generated content (which is technically treated the same as DLC), and even if there were Bethesda wouldn’t be so stupid as to lie about it because it would only take Sony saying ‘we’ll allow it’ for the problem to be right back in Bethesda’s lap, amplified a hundredfold for such a transparent lie.
Occam’s razor applies. The simplest explanation is that Bethesda is frustrated by Sony roadblocking the feature for months and that frustration is reflected in their statement.
User generated content run on the platform…. sounds like an easy pirate too me.
Bethesda’s engine treats user-generated content the same way it treats DLC, it’s just another package loaded at game launch.
but circumventing would be easy then
Circumventing what? Mods can only operate within the scope of their parent game and only with the tools granted by that game. There’s no arbitrary execution going on, and you still need to own the game.
user made mods would circumvent the closed platform that is approved sony programs….
not trying to come back atcha ZJ …. just saying it would open a closed door without huge moderation
That sucks!
Sony BTFO
Everyone knows why Sony didn’t allow mod… it’s because they can’t make money off of it.
Look I think Sony is doing what they’ve always done – running a closed platform – and Bethesda is doing what they’ve always done (demand platform holders play ball to get their games – they’ve never brought a game to a Nintendo console) I think they over promised with mods on PS4 assuming it would work similar to Xbone
Why would they consider porting to Nintendo when Nintendo cannot even run their games?
Bethesda are generally pretty good. Sony on the other hand….
Nintendo can barely run anybody’s games but a lot of companies put the effort in to make them run in the Wii (Activision and LucasArts were two big ones)
Maybe ps4 fallout owners should get some consolation DLC. Nothing big just some workshop items or something to make up for their over-promising of mod support before they had an agreement in place with Sony.
They never did promise it. From the moment it was annoumced they said “PC” and “Xbone” with talks being held with Sony when asked about the PS4. So why should they give you extras because Sony is being a dick?
Surely mods being OK on the PS4 would’ve been discussed at literally the very first meeting with Sony about releasing the game on the platform. Surely they didn’t wait until 6 months later to ask. Surely.
They did. Microsoft allowed them and when asked about Sony they said they were still in talks. That Was months before the game even came out.
“Stop calling me Shirley”…
Wrong I have a PS4 and skyrim remastered and it has mod support