Clean Install Advice

[Zurii54]

I recently ran into some problems whilst modding my game, namely CTD incidents that didn't seem to have any consistent cause. Since I'm only ten hours into the game, I decided to just uninstall everything and start again, using the mods that were stable in my game.

 

So, my question: Is uninstalling from steam and deleting any remaining game files enough? As in, will it do the same as using a cleaner on my game files?

[wfandrews]

That depends on what you want to do and what you have done already. Using Steam's "delete local content" does very little to give you a clean game as it does exactly what it says, deletes local content only. It also depends on which game files you are deleting as there will be many files which you are unaware of. If you have enabled Steam Cloud Synchronization, something which I would never do, that adds another level of complexity to creating a clean game.

 

If you want to start with a vanilla game my advice would be to google something like "make Skyrim or SSE vanilla again". There are a number of guides out there that will do that and you can pick the one that you want to use.

 

What you have done already may be perfectly adequate to solve your problem as you have only put ten hours into the game.

 

I am assuming after modding your game you have read up on and used the mod tools which are essential to a stable modded game; by these I mean a mod installer, either NMM or MO2, LOOT, TES5Edit and Wrye Bash. If you have not then making your game vanilla again or just reinstalling it will probably not help you as it quite probably could be a mod conflict that is causing your CTDs and has nothing to do with the SSE itself.

[QuagaarWarrior]

To start fresh with Skyrim do the following:

Find the game in steam and delete local content

Find the game on your hard drive and manually delete the game folder (steamapps/common/skyrim)

Delete the Skyrim folder under My Documents/My games/skyrim

You could then delete your mod manager and any other applications like Loot, wrye bash etc.

Personally I then restart my computer

[Zurii54]

Thank you both for the advice! Cleared out all my files, uninstalled via steam and then ran a basic file cleaner, works like a dream!

[wfandrews]

Glad to hear that, enjoy your game.