Guide on installing Skins / Graphics

I have been looking through the graphics forum and have noticed a lot of people asking the same questions over and over again.

I have decided to make a post which covers all the basics regarding graphics and other add-ons...

Firstly please take a look at the website below; there is a list of websites where people will find various graphics, skins and other materials for Football Manager 07/ 08.

Football Manager resource site..
/footballmanagerportal.co.uk
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SKINS

Firstly lets get to work on creating the right folders in the right places..

For installing Skins people need to create a skins folder in:

C:/Documents and Settings/your folder/Sports Interactive/ Football Manager 2008/ (Here you create your Skins Folder)

You will find loads of different skins around the web and the resource site I have provided covers most of them.

Once you download a skin which you like the look of you will need to download it and save it on your computer. (I save all mines on my desktop before moving them to the right place.)

(Tip: download skins which are working correctly and have good feedback, as some skins do not work correctly or have errors)

If you don’t have Winrar then you will need to download this on order to extract the contents you have downloaded..

Look here: http://www.rarlab.com/download.htm

1) Click on the file that you have downloaded and extract the contents onto the desktop..
2) Open the folder that has just been extracted and check the contents..

For example: BBCSkin downloaded

Extract the contents and open folder, inside you might find few other folder such as BBCSkin Right and BBCSkin Left depending on which one you want copy the folder to C:/Documents and Settings/your folder/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 2008 /Skins

Now your Skin is ready to be installed onto your game…

Start Football Manager 2008 and go to preferences and go to Display and Sound

1) You will see a drop down options for skin, click on that and select the skin you want.
2) On the right hand side Uncheck use skin cache
3) Check always reload skin on confirm
4) Check show backgrounds
5) Press confirm and your new skin will get loaded…

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GRAPHICS


Firstly lets get to work on creating the right folders in the right places..

For installing graphics people need to create the right folders in:

C:/Documents and Settings/your folder/Sports Interactive/Football Manager 2008 (Here you need to create your graphics Folder)

Inside the graphics folder create a Pictures Folder and inside that create the following folders..

Facepack
Stadium
Clubs
Competitions
Logos
Kits
Backgrounds

You will find loads of different graphics around the web and the resource site I have provided covers most of them.

Once you find the graphics you want, extract them as you did with skins and put them into the right folders. Most graphics comes with readme so I suggest you read that if you have any problems or post in this thread.

Also make sure all graphics have config files will them, this is very important, without the config your graphics will not show.

Once you have done all the necessary steps start the game or if game is running go into preferences (as long as you have followed the steps on installing skins) just press confirm and your graphics will load up.

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CONFIG FILES

Config files should look like the following:









































Ill go through one of the examples:

If you want the man utd stadium background you will need to find the correct unique id for the team which can be found in the editor / using FMM / or in preferences screen checking show unique id.

Once you find the unique id then you need to write the correct path in the config file as the example shown above.

To show club pictures you will need to change the path from stadium to club

E.G:
from:
to:

For competition pictures like champions league background you will need to change the path from stadium to comp

e.g:
From:
To:

If it’s done correctly then in game all graphics will be shown.

If you have made your own backgrounds then it don’t matter what you call your files as long as the correct unique id is being used..

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People who want to create their own kits and logos, www.sortitoutsi.net has some good templates people can use..

and this maybe some question

question : i have just download all the premiership and good young players facepack hav followed ur instructions and put them in a graphics folder under face packs. but i cannot see the faces on the game ?

Answer : is this because there are in indivdual folders? i.e FM2008/graphics/facepacks/ man u

question : when i add mines it just said adding skin forever ?

Answers : Before changing to a new skin, it is always best to go back to the default FM08 skin. After that you can remove the skin you don't want and replace it with the new skin you do wish to use.

If you are actually using a skin, and remove it from the skins folder, then the game might "hang" when you try and load another.

This could be the reason.

Download This and watch if you still have problem with my explaination. This will show you how to install a skin.

Hope this Helps