How to Fish Unlock All Skins Guide – Save File Editing

In How to Fish, the thrill isn’t just about catching rare Drip creatures—it’s also about customizing your gear with unique skins that set you apart on the water. While many players spend hours fishing to unlock these adornments through chance, there’s a way to gain immediate access to every weapon and boat skin by directly editing the game’s save file. This approach not only cuts down on grind but also offers a clearer path for players eager to personalize their fishing arsenal right away.

Typically, acquiring skins involves catching rare Drip creatures and trying your luck at the Reel of Fortune machines, which dispense random skins. However, if you prefer a more reliable method, you can manually modify your local.txt save file to unlock all skins, bypassing the grind and randomness entirely.

Before diving into save file edits, make sure you’re running Patch 1.0.10 or later. Always back up your save files to avoid any loss of progress or data corruption.

How to Unlock Weapon Skins?

Important: You must already own or have unlocked the weapon before editing its skins. The game only records weapons in your save file after they’re purchased, unlocked, or equipped at least once.

First, close How to Fish completely. Navigate to your save files located here:

C:\Users\%USERNAME%\AppData\LocalLow\Dazed Games\How to Fish\Saves

Inside this folder, you’ll find two text files: First and Local. Open local.txt with Notepad or any text editor.

Search within the file for the following entry, which houses your weapon skin data:

"UnlockedItemSkins":[]

This bracketed section contains entries with each weapon’s ID and the list of skin numbers unlocked for it. The format looks like this:

{"ID":57,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]}

{"ID":57,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]}

Modifying the numbers inside SkinsUnlocked will control which skins are available in-game for that weapon.

Weapon Skin IDs

Weapon Skin IDs

Here are the maximum skin counts and IDs for each weapon you can unlock:

Weapon	ID	Skin Values
Assault Rifle	54	1–13
Brass Knuckles	57	1–10
Fishing Rod	61	1–13
Knife	63	1–14
Pistol	66	1–13
Shotgun	68	1–12
SMG	69	1–15
Sniper Rifle	70	1–15

These skin numbers represent the alternate appearances beyond the default skin, giving you access to all cosmetic options available for each weapon.

Copy and Paste the Weapon Skin Code

To save time, you can replace the entire UnlockedItemSkins section with the following code snippet, which unlocks all skins for every weapon listed above:

"UnlockedItemSkins":[{"ID":63,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14]},{"ID":57,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]},{"ID":61,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]},{"ID":66,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]},{"ID":68,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12]},{"ID":69,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]},{"ID":70,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]},{"ID":54,"SkinsUnlocked":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]}]

Only replace the section containing UnlockedItemSkins. Avoid deleting or modifying unrelated portions of your save data to prevent any conflicts or corruption.

Pro tip: For achievement hunters, unlocking the Bean achievement requires finishing the game quickly, but that’s a different challenge altogether.

How to Unlock All Boat Skins

Boat skins are managed similarly and are found in the same local.txt file, just after the weapon skins block.

Search for this entry:

"UnlockedBoatSkins":[]

Fill in the brackets with the following values to unlock all boat skins:

"UnlockedBoatSkins":[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]

Make Sure You Own the Item First

Editing skins only works after you own the corresponding weapon, boat, or item in the game. When you first purchase or unlock an item, it gets recorded into your save file. Until then, the skin data for that item won’t exist and can’t be modified.

This means you have to:

1. Unlock or buy the item normally.
2. Equip it at least once for the game to save its data.
3. Close How to Fish.
4. Open local.txt in your saves folder.
5. Locate the item’s ID under UnlockedItemSkins or UnlockedBoatSkins.
6. Add the desired skin numbers to unlock.
7. Save the file and relaunch the game.

For example, if you don’t own the Sniper Rifle yet, don’t open the save file and expect to find:

{"ID":70,"SkinsUnlocked":[]}

If you want to unlock skins for a specific weapon or item:

1. Buy or unlock the weapon/item normally in the game.
2. Equip it at least once so the game saves it to your profile.
3. Close the game.
4. Open local.txt from the save folder.
5. Search for that item’s ID under UnlockedItemSkins.
6. Add the skin numbers you want to unlock.
7. Save the file and launch the game again.

This process applies equally to boats; ownership is required to add skin unlocks safely.

In short: You can’t create skin entries for items you don’t yet have. The game must have registered the item in your profile, then you can customize skin unlocks via your save file.

Important: Don’t Add Extra Skin Numbers

Be cautious not to enter skin values that exceed the maximum allowed numbers. Going beyond these limits risks breaking the skin selection mechanics.

For weapons, this can cause erratic behavior when cycling skins with C and Z. For boats, adding values like 14 or 15 could even crash your game.

Stick strictly to the top ranges listed for each weapon and boat to maintain stability.

With these steps, editing your save file allows immediate access to the full suite of skins in How to Fish, saving you time and ensuring your equipment looks exactly how you want on the water.