I would like to share with you my newgen replacement pack. The pack currently consists of:
175,000 male player pictures across 60 different ethnicity categories
18000 female player pictures - this base pack is still under development, not every nation/ethnicity is covered yet.
18000 staff pictures for both male and female.
You can have a preview of my pictures and (almost all) ethnicity categories here:
MALE PICTURE SHOWCASE
FEMALE PICTURE SHOWCASE
For FM26, you can get the pack in two versions:
a) Single Bundle File (NG_Regens Lite Experience)
This is a single bundle file that you can place in your FM26 folder. It's easy to install and use, but it's significantly limited in what it can do, how many faces it includes, and what methods are used to assign faces to newgens.
b) Full Experience with Custom Software
I recommend the full experience with my custom software. It supports more than 15 times the number of pictures, categories, and assignment methods.
FULL VERSION for Mac and LINUX/SteamDeck(FM26 AND FM24)
I have a completely new version for you that reads information directly from Savefiles and requires no SIP deactivation and no sudo. It is in early testing stage, but I still think it is better for you to go directly that way now as the experience is THAT much better. Another major difference: You do not need to have the game running in the background. You still can, but it is no longer required.
Follow the guide here:
FM26/FM24 MAC/STEAMDECK/LINUX GUIDE
FULL VERSION FOR WINDOWS(FM26 AND FM24)
On Windows at this point in time you actually have a choice between two different versions. The one that reads information directly from a running FM instance and the new one that reads all information from a savefile. As of April I think it safe to switch my recomendation. I now recommend you start with the Savereader method. Only if for some reason it doesnt work for you should fallback to the memory reader.
Try this first: FM26/FM24 WINDOWS SAVEFILE READER METHOD GUIDE
If you have problems, try this instead: FM26/FM24 WINDOWS MEMORY READER METHOD GUIDE
If you can open the page from your phone, but not from your pc, then it is your Windows Antivirus/WebFilter - You can try to whitelist *.ngregens.org somewhere in its settings. As another workaround you can try to set your Windows DNS Settings to use Google DNS 8.8.8.8 or Cloudflare DNS 1.1.1.1. You can find (not mine) guide on how to do that on your Windows machine here
THE BUNDLE REPLACEMENT METHOD:
If you're on Windows, I strongly recommend using the full experience of the pack with my custom software. However, if your platform isn't supported yet or you don't want to deal with the software I've created, I have a bundle file for you to use with the bundle replacement method. Just keep in mind that this bundle represents only about 5-10% of the full experience (it's not me limiting you to force software adoption - this is simply how the bundle method works).
1. Download the updated bundle file from here: https://download.ngregens.org/ui-newgen-portraits_assets_all.bundle
2. Go to your FM26 install directory. By default, it should be \Steam\steamapps\common\Football Manager 26\fm_Data\StreamingAssets\aa\StandaloneWindows64\
3. Make a backup of the ui-newgen-portraits_assets_all.bundle file in case you want to revert to default faces.
4. Copy the file you downloaded in step 1 into the FM26 folder, replacing the original file.
5. Start FM26, go to the Preferences screen, and select "Detailed" in the top menu. Then select "Audio & Visual" in the left menu and check the "Use pre-generated pictures of players (and staff) rather than dynamically-generated images" option (as shown in the screenshot).
6. Restart the game.
To revert (or migrate to my full-featured experience with the custom software), uncheck the "Use pre-generated pictures of players (and staff) rather than dynamically-generated images" option and copy the original bundle (that you backed up in step 3) back into the FM26 directory.
If you are interested in FM24 version with shortlist export method for both Windows and Mac you can still download and use the old 25 version of the software below.
This is project costs me 100-200e monthly to develop and support, so your donations are greatly appreciated!
Stay tuned!
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BELOW IS THE OLD SHORTLIST EXPORT METHOD FOR FM23 AND BELOW FOR ALL PLATFORMS:
Due to how diverse the pack is, I had to create my own expanded folder system to accomodate all 55 categories, so the pack requires a custom NG_Regens Manager 25 software
Installation guide:
1 - Get the main NG_Regens facepack here
2 - Copy the NG_Regens folder into your FM Graphics folder. It would be the same folder where you have put the original newgan facepack or where you put real facepacks. In my case that would be “Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 2024\graphics\faces\”
3. Download the NG_Regens Manager 25: Mac
4. Watch the NG_Regens Manager 25 guide on Youtube
If you need a detailed video guide on shortlist export process you can find it here
Deepdive into new version 1.2 features
I will redo all three current Youtube videos into one, but this is a time consuming process, so bear with me.
F.A.Q.
Q: Why did you create a new folder structure? / How can I unpack your pack into the old NewGAN "Italmed/YugoGreek..." folders?
A:
First off, huge shoutout to the original NewGAN team—they did an amazing job, and their work is still being used by thousands of people today. Even my project builds on the filters and views they created, so big respect to them. Seriously, none of this would be possible without their foundation.
That said, the original NewGAN pack came out about five years ago, and it was built using the tools and structure available at the time. It only has 14 categories for the entire world. A lot of care went into the big football nations, but unfortunately, many other countries kind of got lumped together in ways that don’t really make sense.
Let’s do a little experiment: I could show you a few images from my pack, each from a different category. In the old NewGAN setup, all of those would’ve ended up in the same group—meaning a player from one of those countries could randomly get any of those faces.
Notice the difference? That’s why it’s just not possible to repackage my set back into the old structure without losing all the nuance (or simply creating a mess).
Discussion: NG_Regens Newgen Megapack with Women's Football Pack 2 - FM26, FM24 and below
389 comments have been posted so far.
I definately will work on that, but I want to do things properly, so it will take some time unfortunately.
The whole process of collecting training data, training models, the generation itself and picture post-processing after that takes hell lot of time.And that needs to be redone for every ethnicity/nationality category.
Tldr: Yes, but gradually and over time.
So when I want to add the config to my profile in the tool what exactly am I supposed to add there? Im used to working with the original NewGan tool, but obviously the new game and your tool are different.
edit: Nevermind, I just saw the beta instructions on ngregens.org. Absolute legend. I’ll be buying you a coffee and paying for electricity really soon. Killer stuff.
If you are on windows you can use the pack right now with the provided software. It will assign faces to male players, and both male and female staff (no female players pack yet).
The male player pack is fully functional with my custom assignment logic that people have used in FM24.
The staff pack is pretty basic (for my standards) and I still work on better assignment logic, but better then plastic heads
Im not 100% sure what the SI hotfix does, but it didnt seem to affect my assignment method in any way. I tried it after the patch and it is still the same (the config.xml not able to read subfoders was still not fixed, but I understand SI has other priorities now and thats fair).
I've yet to use your pack, but it sounds like we can use it for FM26 right now, but more enhancement and potential mapping is still being worked on?
Just curious if SI's update for today's patch changes anything, positively or negatively, in regards to your work on the update for FM26?
"A smaller update is now live on Steam and Epic.
A key element is the use of pre-generated player and staff images. Due to an in-game toggle not functioning as intended in previous builds, we've revised our approach as detailed in the changelist below. These changes give you greater control over how these images are displayed in FM26, especially important on lower-end devices which was the intention.
We understand though that this lead to confusion, with some believing that all Newgen faces in the game are pre-determined. We want to emphasize that this is not the case – but through our adjustments you now have the ability to choose between pre-generated and dynamically generated player and staff images, granting you full control over these settings."
If you want to assign a specific face to a specific player you can also do that via manual assignment mode (2nd option in the wizard). Just dont forget that FM26 bug workaround with Clean up/Activate. If SI confirms this is not a bug or wont fix this with the official release, then I will probably consider that a feature and make it run automatically
I'm in the process of creating guides for everything similar to the beta guide you probably have followed on ngregens.org, but it takes time. Between model trainings, picture generations, software development, working and parenting things go slow sometimes
Nevertheless, I installed it with protontricks inside the steam proton FM26 prefix and it loaded the save game. As its a brand new save, I dont have newgens. Will try again later into the game.
Mac and Linux are on my radar to make work, it is doable, I can build nativelly for mac and linux, I just need SI to stop pushing updates too often (as every update makes me look for new patterns to make it work again, kind of like FMRTE).
Now, it installed fine on linux so now I am going to try installing inside steam FM26 prefix.
Do you have your FM26 savegame loaded? What platform are you, Steam, Epic or something else?
It says: Unable to read FM26. FM24 not found.
But FM26 is open and my savegame is loaded.
So basically that would mean:
All central/east asia - KZ, Mongola, China, Korea, Japan would be the same face
The whole Northern-Central Europe from Island to Hungary, from Paris to Vladivostok, Australia, NZ, USA, Canada would be the same face.
Almost every black player would be the same face.
For now it seems even more basic that the original NewGAN. OG NewGAN had 14 categories. FM.Z tool had Ethnicity Code + Nation code pairings.
Lets see if someone finds a way to manupilate it more. I will monitor how things develop, for now I will stick with my own tool. For FM24 there are still no other alternatives possible and FM26 re-uses 90% of the code, so Im not stressed about that.
The BassyBoy method currently only replaces (I presume) pre-generated SI faces with og Newgan. But it doesnt change the core SI logic that tells which newgen gets what face.
Even when I reduced my demands to "I want to see a white face on a white person, a black face on a black person and an asian face on an asian person" it still took me 2 minutes to find even that simple rule broken multiple times.
This is not BassyBoy's fault, he is real gigachad, but we need more control to make this pack work with that method.
Have you noticed that views and filters are nowhere to be found? I have been trying to use the tool to assign the facepack to all regens, using the unemployed manager, but as unemployed there isn't even the possibility to the players list.
The real best-of-both-worlds solution would be to read the information from save files. Those of you who remember CM01/02 days might remember an Options menu with a Save Compression on/off toggle. When turning it off, tools like CM Genie Scout (or something similar) were able to read info from there and find you those sweet Tsygalkos.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to turn off encryption now, probably because SI wants to monetize the Live Editor... not sure if Unity changes anything on that front.
Cheers!
But after it will be released, yes Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 26\graphics\pictures\player is the correct place. You just unpack NG_Regens folder there, so you would have, for example, Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 26\graphics\faces\NG_Regens\Afroamerican\ etc
My path is the following:
Documents\Sports Interactive\Football Manager 26\graphics\pictures\player
So, all my faces are inside the folder player. Where should I place your folder? Inside pictures? or inside player?