Realistic Primitive Horse Breeds is a model and texture replacer for Skyrim's horses by KrittaKitty. The new textures and meshes keep Skyrim's pony-like look for the horses, while being far more high quality. The version tested is 1.1, though a version 2.0 has been released after a slight mix-up with the folder structure caused invisible horses. This has been fixed. The mod is incompatible with any other mods that alter the horse textures or meshes. |
Note: Whenever I call them ponies, I don't mean this, I mean this.
Realistic Primitive Horse Breeds, which we'll call RPHB from now on, is a mesh and texture overhaul for the horses of Skyrim. It stays true to the pony-like vanilla look of Skyrim's horses, even enhancing it, while also giving all the ponies of Skyrim high quality textures so they can feel good about the way they look. Seriously though - the textures are 2k textures, which is about 4x the default texture quality of Skyrim, depending on the texture.
Realistic Primitive Horse Breeds, which we'll call RPHB from now on, is a mesh and texture overhaul for the horses of Skyrim. It stays true to the pony-like vanilla look of Skyrim's horses, even enhancing it, while also giving all the ponies of Skyrim high quality textures so they can feel good about the way they look. Seriously though - the textures are 2k textures, which is about 4x the default texture quality of Skyrim, depending on the texture.
Pros:
RPHB is a really great horse retexture mod. A lot of the retextures and mesh changers for horses on the Nexus stray from the default look of Skyrim's horses. There are also many conversations about how Skyrim's horses look "fat, floppy, and round". But there's a real reason for that - ponies like the Clydesdale are workhorses, strong and stout. They may not be as fast as say, an Arabian racehorse, but they can survive and tolerate cold climates far better. Bethesda made Skyrim's horses the way they are for a reason. But, the textures for the horses remain somewhat lacking. RPHB fixes that with new, far superior textures for the horses and some mesh changes that, while small, enhance the appearance of Skyrim's horses. They look great, and all the animations and horse-related actions look perfectly normal. RPHB also uses individual meshes for each horse breed, which allows for each horse to look different from each other.
Cons:
When the mod was first released there were one or two issues with the packaging of the files, but those are all fixed now. RPHB does use an .esp, and it is required unless you're okay with losing the unique texture for Frost and having only two manes/tails and one eye color between all 7 horse types. However, if you want you can always merge the .esp using Wrye Bash. The author has tried to minimize the amount of texture seams, but apparently there are still one or two. I didn't notice them at all, and, quoted from the mod page:
I tried to get rid of as many seams as possible just using photo-shop, so there are still a few but they are in out of the way places, such as the inner back legs where you'd never look unless you're a bit kinky for horses...
So unless you're a bit kinky for horses, you should be fine. The manes are cool looking because of the different colors, but you can sometimes see underneath the manes. It doesn't bother me much, and it might not be fixable, but it would be great if it were.
Conclusion:
I found RPHB right when I was looking for a new horse retexture mod for my playthrough. I'd been looking at HALE and Enhanced Horse Skins, but RPHB looks far better to me, since it stays closer to the vanilla look. Since it uses different meshes for each breed, it also allows for far more customization - each breed looks very distinct and different. I highly recommend you take a look at RPHB, and remember to endorse.
Update: The author is also very responsive to user requests. I found the black pony's eyes to be a little too red, and asked about changing it. KrittaKitty uploaded an optional file very quickly. Kudos to KrittaKitty for that.
Update: The author is also very responsive to user requests. I found the black pony's eyes to be a little too red, and asked about changing it. KrittaKitty uploaded an optional file very quickly. Kudos to KrittaKitty for that.