The cross-platform Nexus Mods app v0.21.1 makes mod collection installation smoother

The Nexus Mods app team have rolled out another early release for their in-progress successor to Vortex, with v0.21.1 bringing more improvements. It's free, open source and most importantly - has a Native Linux version available.

With this release they said the focus has been on "making mod collection installation smoother, improving Health Checks and logs, and squashing several key bugs for a more reliable experience". While in the background work continues on technical features needed to support Bethesda games like Skyrim and Fallout 4.

From the changelog:

Features:

• Collection Conflict Rules: Mod collection conflict resolution rules (which files win when multiple mods include the same file) are now correctly applied the very first time you install a collection. This ensures your collection starts up correctly from the beginning.
• Better File Checks: The "Missing Game Files" Health Check now includes a list of the actual affected files. This makes it much easier to pinpoint exactly which files need attention.

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Bug Fixes and Stability:

• Fixed Collection Installation: Fixed a bug that occurred when installing collections that use Fomod installers with predefined choices.
• Resolved 'File In Use' Error: Fixed a "File in use" exception that could appear when unmanaging a game and then trying to delete the associated mods.
• Improved Logging: Added more debug information to the logs, specifically for cases where backup limit exceptions are triggered. This will help our team diagnose and fix these issues.

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Behind-the-Scenes Improvements:

• Refactoring and Optimizations: we did some general refactoring and optimization related to project structure, hashing and GameIds.
• UI State System: Implemented a system to save and restore user interface (UI) state. While not actively used yet, this sets the stage for features where views can remember your preferred layouts and configurations.

See more on the GitHub and website.

Considering we're about to see more hardware arriving with SteamOS Linux like the new Steam Machine and Steam Frame, getting a properly good cross-platform mod manager like this is going to be essential. So it's pleasing to watch it continue to mature towards being the go-to.