Where mods live

Everything is in the player's own folders, never in the launcher's (which is read-only when installed: an AppImage, the macOS app, the Windows installer's folder). The launcher keeps its games in an install folder, shown in its Settings; by default:

(If that folder cannot be made, the launcher's own data folder: ~/.local/share/dev.openrac.launcher, ~/Library/Application Support/dev.openrac.launcher, %LOCALAPPDATA%\dev.openrac.launcher.)

Inside plugins/#

plugins/
├── plugins.json     the mods' order, which are on, their settings (the launcher writes it)
├── status.json      what the game did with each mod at its last start (the game writes it)
├── sources.json     where mods installed from a link came from, for updates
└── <id>/            one mod, as installed: openrac-mod.json, scripts or lib/<platform>/...

plugins.json:

{
  "format": 1,
  "mods": [
    { "id": "lock-strafe", "enabled": true, "settings": { "mode": "lock" } },
    { "id": "button-swap", "enabled": false, "settings": {} }
  ]
}

The order of mods is the load order (hooks). A folder that is not listed shows in the launcher, off.

How the game finds them#

The launcher starts the game with --data <the game's data folder> and --plugins <data>/plugins/plugins.json, or --no-mods in purist mode. Neither side guesses a path. Run by hand without --plugins, the game reads <data>/plugins/plugins.json.

Without the launcher#

Copy your mod's folder to plugins/<id>/ and add it to plugins.json. This is also the quickest way to try a change: edit the files in place and restart the game.

Android#

The game runs inside the app there, and Android does not let an app load code it wrote itself, so native mods are not loaded on Android. Script mods are.

A mod's own files#

A native mod keeps its own files (a seed, a list of games played) in the folder data_dir gives it (interface 1.11): mod-data/<id>/ in OpenRAC's data folder, beside the memory cards (~/.local/share/openrac, ~/Library/Application Support/OpenRAC, %LOCALAPPDATA%\openrac). The game makes it on the first ask and never removes it; updating or removing the mod leaves it in place.