🔧 How to Fish Mods & Modding Guide
No Steam Workshop, but a healthy modding scene: where the mods live (Thunderstore, NexusMods), how to install them with BepInEx or r2modman, and how to keep your saves safe while doing it.
Published September 2, 2026 · Last updated September 2, 2026
Quick Answer: Does How to Fish Have Mods?
There is no Steam Workshop support, but a real modding scene exists: Thunderstore hosts a How to Fish section (over 120 packages as of early September 2026, led by the official BepInEx pack) and NexusMods has a growing howtofish category. Mods load through BepInEx, installable manually or with the r2modman / Thunderstore Mod Manager one-click flow. Back up your saves before installing anything.
💡 Save files live in %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\Dazed Games\How to Fish\Saves — copy that folder before your first mod, and again before every game update.
The Modding Landscape
All of this is community-driven — Dazed Games has not shipped official mod support, so everything on this page describes third-party tooling that works today.
| Source | What is there | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Steam Workshop | Not available | No Workshop integration — modding is entirely third-party |
| Thunderstore | How to Fish section, 120+ packages | BepInExPack pinned as the official loader entry |
| NexusMods | howtofish category, 100+ files | Manual install, standard Nexus layout |
| Modding Discord | Community hub | Unofficial; where new mods and BepInEx builds get announced first |
Installing Mods with BepInEx, Step by Step
- Steam → right-click How to Fish → Manage → Browse local files — this opens the game folder.
- Download BepInEx from the Thunderstore How to Fish section (the pinned BepInExPack) and extract it into the game folder so that plugins/ and doorstop files sit next to HowToFish.exe.
- Drop each mod's .dll (or its whole folder) into BepInEx/plugins/.
- Launch the game once — BepInEx generates its config files, then restart to apply settings.
- Easier route: install r2modman (Thunderstore Mod Manager), pick How to Fish as the profile game, and click Install on each mod — it handles the folder layout for you.
💡 If a modded game suddenly fails to launch after a patch, delete the BepInEx folder and re-extract a fresh loader — game updates break old loaders regularly.
Back Up Your Saves First
Saves are plain .txt files (single-line JSON) under %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\Dazed Games\How to Fish\Saves. Copy the whole folder somewhere safe before modding, and again before verifying game files — the full save-editing walkthrough, including restoring a backup, is on the save troubleshooting page.
- Steam's "Verify integrity of game files" will strip modified game files including BepInEx — re-install the loader afterwards, your saves survive.
- For inventory-level tinkering without mods at all, see the item IDs page — editing the save file directly needs no loader.
Popular Mods to Know
What the community is actually downloading, by category — names and availability change weekly, so treat this as a starting map rather than a catalog:
- Training / cheat menus: in-game debug-style menus (e.g. the BoomThisHowToFish trainer) for spawning items and testing.
- Lobby-size unlockers: raise co-op beyond the official 8-player cap — use at your own risk, and only with players running the same mod.
- Quality-of-life tweaks: weather and day-night control, blood-color and visual changes.
- Frameworks: NPC and scripting frameworks that bigger mods build on.
💡 In multiplayer, every player needs the same mod set — one modded client desyncs the lobby.