Hey everyone!

Not been an update in nearly a month. I've been really busy trying to get things sorted out for everyone. And I've not sat still. This changelog will be really long, but I promise it is worth your time. Now, I want to state right away that this will not be a "magic fix for all my issues and problems" and you COULD/WILL face lighting issues in all the stadiums not mentioned below. As such, this is an optional update, but one that will lay the groundwork for the 3.0.

So what actually changed? I think the list of things that did not change is shorter, but let's go.

STABILITY

FM 26.2 / 26.3 Compatibility:

Full compatibility with the latest FM updates. The game switched to Unity 6.3 under the hood which broke a handful of things, all sorted now. Ball injection, stadium loading, and crowd rendering all verified working on the new version.

Keep in mind the test pool was small, if you have issues, then please report them either in the Discord or in the group chat!

Bug Fixes:

Fixed newgen screens going black. Custom lighting was nuking the ambient light in the newgen preview UI, now properly restores when you enter and leave the screen.

Fixed balls appearing completely black in non-custom stadiums. Our custom ball materials were using a shader that doesn't work with FM's lighting setup. This version should be better on that front.

Fixed a memory leak in ball injection where cached textures weren't being cleared between competitions. Long sessions across multiple comps would eat more and more memory - sorted now. Leads to better performance.

Fixed crowd objects not being properly cleaned up between matches. They were stacking up invisibly, wasting resources every time you played another game.

Fixed 6 silent failures in stadium injection that were swallowing errors without logging anything. If your stadium wasn't loading and the log was empty - this is why. Errors are now properly reported.

Fixed weather particles (rain/snow) randomly stopping mid-match. The stadium's internal weather system was accidentally killing our custom weather effects. They now stay in their own lanes.

NOTE! Remove your config file for this!

Fixed per-light lens flares on floodlights disappearing. Our custom lighting volume was conflicting with the per-light flare system - two completely different systems stepping on each other.

Performance:

Lighting toggle got a performance pass. Was making 28+ expensive object searches per call - now uses a caching system. Dynamic lighting updates only fire when something actually changes. Noticeably smoother.

Stadium injection now logs bundle load times so we can track which stadiums are slow and why.

NEW PLUGINS:

CameraInject:

I got the ability to place custom cameras inside the stadium bundle and they'll override FM's match cameras. Two modes:

Ball tracking - your camera position, FM handles following the ball

Static - full control, position and rotation locked

Automatically detects when FM flips the viewing side for UEFA competitions and adjusts accordingly.

Bloom Tweaker:

In-game bloom adjustment panel. Hit Numpad 1 during a match to open it. Adjust intensity, threshold, scatter, iterations and player brightness clamp in real-time with arrow keys. Changes save automatically.

REWORKED STADIUMS:

ENGLAND:

Birmingham City

Blackburn Rovers

Brentford (Gtech Community Stadium)

Bournemouth (Vitality Stadium)

Brighton (AMEX Stadium)

Burnley (Turf Moor)

Crystal Palace (Selhurst Park)

Everton (Goodison Park)

Everton (The People's Club Stadium / Hill Dickinson)

Fulham (Craven Cottage)

Arsenal (Emirates Stadium)

Leeds United (Elland Road)

Liverpool (Anfield)

Manchester City (Etihad Stadium)

Manchester United (Old Trafford)

Newcastle United (St James' Park)

Nottingham Forest (City Ground)

Sunderland (Stadium of Light)

Tottenham Hotspur (Tottenham Hotspur Stadium)

West Ham United (London Stadium)

Wolverhampton (Molineux)

Aston Villa (Villa Park)

WALES:

Wrexham (STok Cae Ras)

SCOTLAND:

Rangers (Ibrox Stadium)

GERMANY:

Augsburg (WWK Arena)

Bayern Munich (Allianz Arena)

Bayer Leverkusen (BayArena)

Borussia Dortmund (Signal Iduna Park)

Borussia Monchengladbach (Borussia-Park)

Eintracht Frankfurt (Deutsche Bank Park)

FC Heidenheim (Voith-Arena)

FC Koln (RheinEnergieStadion)

SC Freiburg (Europa-Park Stadion)

Hamburger SV (Volksparkstadion)

Hertha BSC (Olympiastadion)

Mainz 05 (MEWA Arena)

RB Leipzig (Red Bull Arena)

SC Paderborn (Benteler-Arena)

Fortuna Dusseldorf (Merkur Spiel-Arena)

FC St. Pauli (Millerntor-Stadion)

Schalke 04 (Veltins-Arena)

VfB Stuttgart (MHPArena)

Union Berlin (Stadion An der Alten Forsterei)

VfL Wolfsburg (Volkswagen Arena)

Werder Bremen (Weserstadion)

ITALY:

AC Milan (San Siro)

AS Roma (Stadio Olimpico)

Atalanta (Gewiss Stadium)

Bologna (Stadio Renato Dall'Ara)

Cagliari (Unipol Domus)

Como (Stadio Giuseppe Sinigaglia)

Cremonese (Stadio Giovanni Zini)

Fiorentina (Stadio Artemio Franchi)

Genoa (Stadio Luigi Ferraris)

Hellas Verona (Stadio Marcantonio Bentegodi)

Inter Milan (Giuseppe Meazza)

Juventus (Allianz Stadium)

Lazio (Stadio Olimpico)

Lecce (Stadio Via del Mare)

Napoli (Stadio Diego Armando Maradona)

Parma (Stadio Ennio Tardini)

Pisa (Arena Garibaldi)

Sassuolo (Mapei Stadium)

Torino (Stadio Olimpico Grande Torino)

Udinese (Bluenergy Stadium)

SPAIN:

Athletic Bilbao (San Mames)

Atletico Madrid (Civitas Metropolitano)

Barcelona (Spotify Camp Nou)

Barcelona (Old Camp Nou variant)

Celta Vigo (Abanca-Balaidos)

Deportivo Alaves (Mendizorrotza)

Deportivo La Coruna (Estadio de Riazor)

Elche (Estadio Manuel Martinez Valero)

Espanyol (RCDE Stadium)

Getafe (Coliseum)

Girona (Estadi Montilivi)

Las Palmas (Estadio de Gran Canaria)

Levante (Ciutat de Valencia)

Mallorca (Estadi de Son Moix)

Osasuna (El Sadar)

Real Oviedo (Carlos Tartiere)

Rayo Vallecano (Estadio de Vallecas)

Real Madrid (Santiago Bernabeu)

Real Sociedad (Reale Arena)

Sevilla FC (Ramon Sanchez-Pizjuan)

Sevilla (Estadio de La Cartuja / Copa del Rey)

Valencia (Mestalla)

Villarreal (Estadio de la Ceramica)

FRANCE:

Angers (Stade Raymond Kopa)

AS Monaco (Stade Louis II)

AS Saint-Etienne (Stade Geoffroy-Guichard)

AJ Auxerre (Stade de l'Abbe-Deschamps)

Le Havre (Stade Oceane)

FC Lorient (Stade du Moustoir)

RC Lens (Stade Bollaert-Delelis)

LOSC Lille (Stade Pierre-Mauroy)

FC Metz (Stade Saint-Symphorien)

Montpellier (Stade de la Mosson)

FC Nantes (Stade de la Beaujoire)

OGC Nice (Allianz Riviera)

Olympique Lyonnais (Groupama Stadium)

Olympique de Marseille (Stade Velodrome)

Paris FC (Stade Charlety)

Paris Saint-Germain (Parc des Princes)

Stade de France

Stade Rennais (Roazhon Park)

Rodez AF (Stade Paul Lignon)

RC Strasbourg (Stade de la Meinau)

PORTUGAL:

SL Benfica (Estadio da Luz)

FC Porto (Estadio do Dragao)

Sporting CP (Estadio Jose Alvalade)

SC Braga (Estadio Municipal de Braga)

GREECE:

AEK Athens (OPAP Arena)

ANDORRA:

Andorra (Estadi Nacional)

Okay there we go. That was a non exhaustive list eh? In the meantime, I will be bashing onto the stadiums still remaining. It will take time. Again, for this one I recommend a full REINSTALL! But save your crowd kits ;)

Installation:

The link below is where you can download the files. The password is that which you received earlier in your mailbox if you have lost the passkey, shoot me a DM and I'll send it your way!

BACK UP YOUR CUSTOM KITS IF YOU HAVE THEM!

DOWNLOAD LINK

HOTFIX LINK!

This is a FULL VERSION. So you need to remove the files below, with the exception of the crowd kits as stated above. Then reinstall this version. That way you have a really small chance of issues or residual plugin effects.

The hotfix fixes the pitch lines, and includes the reworks to both La Bombonera and Mas Monumental! You install this one after the main file and simply drag the BepInEx folder to the FM26 folder and overwrite the files it asks to overwrite.

You can then add in the new files!

Installation path for Steam is:

Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Football Manager 26

Installation path for Xbox Game Pass is:

XboxGames\Football Manager 26\Content

Installation path for Epic Games is:

Program Files (x86)\Epic Games\FootballManager26

Steam Deck (Desktop Mode):

Download the Linux version of BepInEx

Download r2modman and extract it

In that folder you go to r2modman app image

Follow the path -> home-deck-config-r2modmanplus-local-fm26-profiles-default-

Add my files to that path.

You can make a shortcut on your homescreen of the r2modman app image and click execute

Search game: -fm26 and then select profile

Showing on this screen is bepinexpack-footballmanager26 click on it and install

In the top left click on start modded, not vanilla.

Game will load

Again huge thanks to Luke for the find.

Furthermore, when you install the files, make sure you place all subfolders into those directories above. That is two folders and 4 loose files. If you do not do that it will not load.

If you are having extraction issues, try using winrar or winzip to extract the files.

The first boot after an update to FM or running for the first time will take a long time.

IT HAS NOT FROZEN, IT IS LOADING. DO NOT INTERRUPT IT!

Should you get an anti tamper message do this:

Remove the files from the directory when FM is closed.

Boot the game, play a match, close FM.

Reinstall the files whilst FM is closed.

Then you will be able to play.