diff --git a/common/assets/Cargo.toml b/common/assets/Cargo.toml
index a3e40b43f8..f72aa12cea 100644
--- a/common/assets/Cargo.toml
+++ b/common/assets/Cargo.toml
@@ -6,7 +6,6 @@ description = "Crate for game loading assets for veloren."
 version = "0.9.0"
 
 [dependencies]
-serde = {version = "1.0", features = ["derive"]}
 lazy_static = "1.4.0"
 assets_manager = {version = "0.4.2", features = ["bincode", "ron", "json", "hot-reloading"]}
 ron = { version = "0.6", default-features = false }
@@ -14,7 +13,9 @@ dot_vox = "4.0"
 image = { version = "0.23.12", default-features = false, features = ["png"] }
 tracing = "0.1"
 
+# asset tweak
+serde = {version = "1.0", features = ["derive"], optional = true}
 serial_test = {version = "0.5", optional = true}
 
 [features]
-asset_tweak = ["serial_test"]
+asset_tweak = ["serial_test", "serde"]