なんかつらい気持ちになったら、この名前を思い出すわ

English isn't my first language. The words and feelings are entirely mine. AI helped me translate.

Min Hee-jin, NewJeans, and a film called Dead Poets Society

I think most of you have seen the image Min Hee-jin posted last August. I wanted to write about the film in that image, in hopes that more people will get to know it. If this has already been discussed in this subreddit (I searched and couldn't find anything), please let me know and I'll delete this.

Only Min Hee-jin knows her true intention behind that post. But as someone who loves that film, I felt something I wanted to share.

The film is called Dead Poets Society.

Because what that film depicts feels, to me, like the relationship between Min Hee-jin and the five members of NewJeans.

The caption she posted alongside the image was this quote: "Medicine, law, business, engineering — these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love — these are what we stay alive for." These are the words of Mr. Keating, the teacher at the heart of the story.

The film follows Mr. Keating, an unconventional and revolutionary teacher, as he arrives at a strict boarding school and begins to connect with his students. Surrounded by resistance and suppression, the students are at first unsure, but gradually they are inspired and changed by him.

Eventually, the students discover that Keating had once founded a secret society called the Dead Poets Society during his own time at the school — named for their practice of reading only the works of classic poets. The students revive it themselves, sharing ideas, inspiring one another, and growing.

I think you can already see where I'm going with this.

To me, this is the relationship between Min Hee-jin and the five members of NewJeans.

Let me quote Mr. Keating — as he shows the students photographs of graduates from long ago:

"They're not that different from you, are they? Same haircuts. Full of hormones, just like you. Invincible, just like you feel. The world is their oyster. They believed they were destined for great things, just like many of you. Their eyes are full of hope, just like you. Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable? Because you see, gentlemen, these boys are now fertilizing daffodils. But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you. Go on, lean in. Listen, you hear it? Carpe diem. Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary."

And another line I can never forget:

"I stand upon my desk to remind myself that we must constantly look at things in a different way. You see, the world looks very different from up here."

Min Hee-jin and I are the same generation. So I can easily imagine that this film left a mark on her. And I've also thought this:

Maybe she showed this film to the five members of NewJeans.
Whether she did or didn't, I think it's fine either way.
Actually — if they haven't seen it, that might move me even more deeply.

When you reach the end of the film, I think you'll feel many things.
The brilliance of the film itself. And the story of Min Hee-jin and the five members of NewJeans, playing out right now.

It might seem almost too perfect. But life has a way of doing that.
Especially with a group as singular as NewJeans.

I believe the five members of NewJeans chose not to be lemmings. And I think the Bunnies who stand with them — and those of us who aren't Bunnies but love NewJeans from the bottom of our hearts — feel exactly the same way.

I want to end with what I consider the most important line of all.

O Captain! My Captain!

Please, if you haven't seen this film yet, watch it.
I think you'll find something in it — something that matters.

With hope for a bright future for the five members of NewJeans, and for Min Hee-jin.

再掲　

宮脇咲良な。マンガをそこまで読んでた訳ではないけど、なぜか思い出した

若かったら、全力でアタックする

今年引っ越したところが虫が多くて、急遽購入して使ってみたけどすごい効果ある。光に集まる小さな羽虫限定ではあるが。あと耐久性も購入間もないから分からない。たまにバチッって音とともに小さな火花が出る時がある。

ただ、一番は網戸に吹き付ける虫コナーズかも。

Shot after shot — not just in this clip, but across the whole match — and the keeper just kept saving everything. Ended up a goalless draw. And yet, somehow, I had a blast.

I keep rewatching the highlights too. There's something about a great save or a brilliant defensive block from the opposition that actually makes me happy. You thread the perfect pass, get a clean strike off... and then the keeper pulls off something special. And I find myself muttering "fair play, mate" out loud.

I guess it depends on the situation — where you are in the season, what's at stake. But sometimes the game just hits different even when the scoreboard doesn't move.

Oh, and the young fullback with serious potential who unleashed that screamer from distance? Quadriceps tear. Out for 3 months. That one stings a little, not gonna lie.

Mods alone are already more than enough to make Career Mode fun.

but after finding this sub and seeing everyone's ideas, I started wondering if I could do something with AI too.

So I tried it. I recorded some highlight footage on PC, edited it in Clipchamp, then added some AI-generated images on top. I'd actually used those images in a previous post, and yeah, they're a little rough around the edges. This was very much a "let's see what happens" kind of experiment. That said, I do think there's something to the idea of giving it that local newspaper feel — it actually works surprisingly well.

Anyway, I'm still deep into my Wakefield AFC save. Billy Sharp has been an absolute nightmare up front. Halfway through the season and the man had a grand total of two goals. Transfer window rolls around and I'm sitting there thinking... what do I do here? On one hand, we're somehow in first place. On the other, I really want to win the title, and this lack of firepower is a genuine problem — we've basically been surviving on defensive solidity. Too many draws. Not exactly a relaxing watch, lol.

Meanwhile Danny Rose has five goals, and I've been starting him more regularly. I'd also been scouting some young strikers, and with a mysterious loan of 5 million euros (from the town? I think?), I actually had options. In the end, I decided to bring in some experienced players to help control games better — Joe Ralls and Stuart Armstrong. It was a tough call, but I don't think it was the wrong one.

Then, right when I was still agonizing over what to do about the striker situation... Billy Sharp steps up and converts a penalty. Then adds a header. Two goals, just like that.

This is why Career Mode is so hard to quit.

So the decision made itself.I'm backing Billy and Rose for the rest of the season. That's the story we're going with.

The bigger takeaway: a bit of AI and some light video editing genuinely makes Career Mode feel more immersive. It takes a little effort, but nothing too crazy. I'm really invested in this save and want to make the most of it.

That said,EA could do some version of this natively, right? Like...

I've been playing Career Mode since FIFA 20, and honestly there are very few days when I don't load it up.

Back in FIFA 21, I decided to buy a mid-range gaming laptop. Not a high-end machine or anything fancy. The reason was simple: I wanted more real faces in the game.

Every title update, I'd hope EA had added more scanned players, and every time I'd end up disappointed. Then one day I came across screenshots on Twitter showing faces I'd never seen before.

That's how I discovered mods.

Since then, I haven't really played the game in its vanilla form. In that sense, maybe I'm not even the right person to talk about the strengths of the base game anymore.

The first thing that got me hooked was face mods.

A lot of the faces EA eventually adds through official updates already exist in the modding community long before that. The main difference is usually whether the player has been properly scanned or not.

One of the biggest changes in FC 26 is how faces work.

In previous games, there was effectively a limit on the number of real faces that could exist. Modders would often have to borrow an existing face slot from another player and replace it with someone more popular.

As someone who likes playing in lower divisions, that could be frustrating. Sometimes a player who originally had a real face would end up becoming generic because their slot had been used for someone else.

Now, at least in theory, FC 26 allows real faces to be assigned to as many players as are included in the database. For someone like me who loves face mods, that's a huge deal.

That said, EA deserves some credit too. Generic faces are much better than they used to be. Youth players still need work though. I remember hearing that appearances would change as players aged, but I honestly don't know what happened to that feature.

The main mod I use is FIFER's Realism Mod.

It includes around 3,000 faces. In leagues like the Premier League, almost everyone has a real face. What I appreciate most is that a lot of high-potential young prospects have real faces as well.

For me, that's already enough to make the mod worthwhile.

FIFER's project is probably the biggest modding project in the FIFA/FC community. If someone asked me where to start, it'd probably be the first thing I'd mention.

After a few years of messing around with mods, I'd roughly put them into a few categories:

• Gameplay mods
• Face mods
• Visual and presentation mods (scoreboards, banners, turf, cameras, and countless other details)
• Career Mode overhauls that change things like transfers, player growth, and progression

There's a mod for almost everything.

I've even seen mods that do nothing but replace the splash screen.

These days though, the biggest reason I mod the game isn't faces anymore.

It's gameplay.

At the end of the day, that's what we spend most of our time with.

Right now I'm running FIFER's Realism Mod together with KIARIKA's Career Mod.

I'm also using Career Craft's Create-a-Club Mod, which gives you much more freedom when creating club badges and kits. It's a really unique project.

Then there are a few standalone face mods for lesser-known players. Sorry to those players, but I mostly use those faces for youth academy prospects.

For gameplay, I use Anth James' EAFC Gameplay Overhaul.

I've jokingly started calling him the Bielsa of the modding scene.

The amount of attention he puts into details is ridiculous.

In addition to the standalone version that serves as the foundation, I use options that make goalkeepers stronger, tighten up midfield play, increase defensive blocking, and make injuries more realistic.

I've been using Anth's gameplay mods for a while now, and they're probably the biggest reason I still enjoy playing match after match.

It's difficult to explain in words.

For me, matches simply feel more dynamic and believable.

I've heard that vanilla FC has improved a lot with the right slider settings, and I believe that. But if I had to point to one thing that completely changes the experience, it'd be gameplay mods.

People upload comparison videos all the time, but honestly those never really convinced me.

I think gameplay mods are something you have to experience yourself before you understand why so many people swear by them.

There's still a lot more I could talk about, but I'll stop here for now.

I just hope this gives some Career Mode players an idea of why I've stuck with modding for so long.

If you're curious about what's out there, these are the sites I'd recommend looking at first:

• FIFA Infinity — probably the biggest FIFA/FC modding site. Most of the major projects can be found there.
• Nexus Mods — covers PC gaming as a whole. I've found plenty of smaller and more unique mods there.

Those two sites are probably the easiest place to start.

I'd also recommend EVO-WEB.

It's mainly known as a PES community, and honestly it's where I learned both the frustrations and the rewards of modding through PES 2021. The amount of content there is incredible. It's a community with a strong DIY spirit, and there are active FIFA and FC discussions as well.

For me, modding has changed these games so much that it's hard to imagine going back.

If you enjoy Career Mode, I think it's worth considering at least once.

One thing I would recommend, though, is starting with free mods.

Unfortunately, the FIFA/FC modding scene also has a paywall side to it.

Both FIFER and Anth, whose mods I currently use, offer paid early-access versions. I wouldn't recommend jumping straight into that.

To be fair, FIFER eventually releases complete versions publicly, and Anth always provides a free Lite version.

More importantly, there are already countless free mods available.

Before spending any money, I'd suggest simply browsing the sites above and seeing what catches your interest.

And if people find this useful, maybe I'll write another post about the trial-and-error side of modding. Honestly, that's where most of the real stories are.

English isn't my first language. I originally wrote this in Japanese and used AI to help translate and polish it.

Found a mod that fills a gap I didn't know I needed. It adds emblems specifically for created clubs, ranging from real-looking ones to fictional designs. There's a decent variety and some are even tailored to different countries. You can also pick from sponsored kits that are more varied than anything in the base game.

For my current save I went with an emblem that says Wakefield. Looked it up and it turns out there's never been a football club there historically, though apparently something did form in 2019. I went with a different emblem but decided to start as Wakefield AFC.

The inspiration actually came from a comment in the "What's your 'I sign him every save' player?" post here. Saw Billy Sharp mentioned and something clicked. Built the squad around him, added David McGoldrick alongside him, and made those two the heart of the team.

Barrow fans, I apologize, but they were bottom of the league so I took their spot, kept the loan players out, and brought in my own. Manager is Ted Lasso. Rivals are Leeds.

Haven't felt this excited about a save in a while. This is exactly why mods are worth it.