Fallout 4 already lets you play in first-person, but if you want an even more immersive experience, there’s a separate VR version of the game you can buy on PC. What’s more, it has its own modding community who have made their own optional improvements.
If you own a VR headset, like the Valve Index or HTC Vive, and you’ve been hankering to get into the Fallout series after watching the excellent TV show, or are simply looking for a new way to play Fallout 4, Fallout 4 VR should be right up your alley. Before you start, though, be sure to go through our list of some of the best Fallout 4 VR mods available that should make for a more optimal experience.
Fallout 4 Script Extender
Let’s get the most boring one out of the way. The Fallout 4 Script Extender is practically mandatory, since it ensures any other mods you download work properly. Some won’t work at all without it. So before you do anything else, make sure this is installed.
Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch
Another necessary mod is the Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch. To be blunt, Fallout 4 was kind of a buggy mess when it launched in 2015. While that’s to be expected from Bethesda games, it was nonetheless frustrating, and dedicated fans took it upon themselves to fix all the issues Bethesda itself never got round to. This mod removes hundreds of bugs related to quests, NPCs, items, and the like, although it does mess with a couple of aspects of the VR version. To resolve those, get the Unofficial Fallout 4 VR Fix as well.
Idle Hands
In the world of Fallout 4 VR, your player character is apparently a telepathic wanderer without arms, since all your tools and weapons just float in the air when you use them. This makes the whole experience far less immersive, so if that sort of thing bothers you, download the Idle Hands mod. It grants you visible hands, which you can customize with different styles and skin tones, as well as an arm to attach your Pip-Boy too. It also pairs nicely with the Kabuto VR mod, which gives Power Helmets their own HUD to make it really feel more like you’re wearing one.
Start Me Up Redux
In Fallout 4, your player character wakes from cryogenic sleep in a Vault 200 years after the bombs dropped, only for a pair of strangers to murder your spouse and kidnap your baby son, setting you on a mission of vengeance. Not everyone wants to roleplay as this character, though, or at least they don’t want to sit through that lengthy opening section every time they start a new playthrough. The Start Me Up Redux mod not only lets you skip the opening so you can get right to the game, but it also gives you the option to play as a different Vault dweller or a Wastelander. As such, it features entirely new dialogue and is described as a “whole-game story overhaul.”
Virtual Holsters/Virtual Chems
These two mods have very similar functions so we’re combining them into one section. Normally, you need to equip weapons and use Chems via the Pip-Boy menu, which isn’t bad by any means. However, with the Virtual Holsters mod and the Virtual Chems mod, you can equip weapons and Chems to your person. So, if you’ve got a pistol strapped your hip, you can whip it out with one fluid motion without the need to open the menu. Aside from adding another level of immersion, it’s just really cool to do and can make you feel like a badass.
Sim Settlements
In Fallout 4, you can build and manage various settlements, which can be populated with NPCs and can help you gain important resources like food, scrap for crafting, and just general experience. Not everyone enjoys how much micromanaging it requires, though, which is where the Sim Settlements mod comes in. It’s practically a complete overhaul of how settlements work, making it closer to something like Sim City where you can place down zones for your settlers to make buildings for you. It also gives the settlers more varied backgrounds and adds a level of randomness to keep things a bit more challenging and engaging.
Be Seated Fallout 4 VR Edition
This is another mod for those who want as an immersive experience as possible. Since you’re probably going to be standing up while playing Fallout 4 VR, it can be a bit distracting whenever your character takes a seat yet their height doesn’t change, making it seem as if they’re standing on the chair. The Be Seated mod fixes that, and you can then sit down in your own chair to match your character.
Fog Remover—Performance Enhancer
Fallout 4‘s performance isn’t the best, but before you pull a Dragon’s Dogma 2 and go around slaughtering NPCs to improve it, how about you try installing this performance mod instead? The Fog Remover mod, as the name implies, removes any instance of interior fog, steam, dust etc. from the game, allowing the whole thing to run a lot smoother. It doesn’t work on any exterior fog, though, since that’s tied to the weather system.
True Storms—Wasteland Edition
Speaking of the weather, the True Storms mod was originally made for The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, but eventually received a Fallout 4 version that you can use in VR too. Fallout 4 already has a pretty immersive real-time weather system, but this mod adds even more variety, allowing for dust storms, heavier and lighter rain, and even hazardous radiation rain. It also promises new sound effects, textures, and particle effects, and storms can provide a sneak buff for you and any companions you have travelling with you.
FallUI
Fallout 4 VR unfortunately doesn’t have dedicated UIs and instead re-uses the same ones from the original Fallout 4. Since they’re not tailor-made for playing in VR, they can make the experience less pleasant, which is why one person decided to create multiple mods, dubbed the FallUI series, to address the various UIs. This link will take you to one that optimizes the main HUD that you can also configure to your liking, but the same creator has ones for the inventory screen, the map, the workbench, and a few others. So, you’re free to pick and choose which ones you want, or you can install the whole set from the get-go.
