CAM 2.0 Restart

[InvisiChem]

Update

Double Industry workforce bug fixed.

Tooling the farming drives a little more. Right now, within a year I have more than 50000 drive for farming. Now, this is awesome, but I consider it too much. Reducing and should be ready for full testing starting tomorrow.

[InvisiChem]

Update,

Beta 2 has been sent for review. I will also continue testing the product on developed and new regions. I have some documentation to write and some readme's.   

I am very impressed with the progress of this project. Even more impressive is the SC4D community, who provided great information that was essential to move this along so quickly.

I know this seems fast to get to this point, but I have actually been working on this for 6 months. Not a small task, but I hope the Simcity community will get to enjoy this and much more in the very near future.

[InvisiChem]

Another update:

Still working on some details. Have some great people trying this out right now. Working out some details to get this ready for full release. Real lives are slowing the progress, to be absolutely expected. I work a full time job and the others have large projects of their own happening along with real life. Getting some really good results. Overall, the package is looking great. The information has been, well informative   

I will say, Hard mode is truly hard this go round. Be prepared to be very strapped for cash in the beginning. Upgrowth is proving to be slow, which it was designed to be in the original CAM 2 beta forums. I did make it a little bit slower though. With that in mind, much more focus will be on regional play and getting those population numbers up.

Workforce total will be increased. The original 40%-60% seemed a little too low. Thank you Vortext for providing a good set of numbers for these. I went a little extreme on the workforce totals.   

Much more to come. Playing with some figures, one other big bug I have found and working on the manual at the same time. Needless to say, taking it to this level is a lot like juggling 

Cheers everyone and keep up the hope. This will come around. I will not give up.

[FrankU]

While some people feared the game was going to die, I was one of them, we now have a very exciting development here. I really would like to have time for a bit more help.
Great progress!

[InvisiChem]

No worries Frank,

I see what you are doing right now. You just put out a couple of new releases. I can't wait to play with them, but I must delay my self gratification for new content   

You actually have helped more than you can imagine. I'll call it group brainstorming. For instance, those heritage lots we were talking about, keep them on stage 6 and 7. Plus, this will be a little teaser for those reading this   

[InvisiChem]

Update:

Having a little problem with the adjustment of the census drives. Although they really need to be modified, if the Total I Census is included in the plugins, it doubles the CRF Report of Regional Industrial Capacity. This is needed to include the IR totals into the Regional Industrial Totals. If it does not have the Sums property, regional industrial is reported as 0.

I have tried creating Dummy variables and summing just that exemplar in the Census Total I exemplar, I tried using the Z fix with contribute and satisfy variables, along with the removal of the sum function at the Total level, tried redirecting the sum to the total Industrial under the General RCI totals and I have explored the use of using an INT 32 overflow error to produce a negative number I could apply to the actual total to get the correct total. No go so far.

Right now, I would have to merge a single file with the Simcity_1.dat to get proper results. Although I was attempting to avoid this, I would like some input on the feasibility of this.

There is a few workarounds that could be interesting. Allow the bug to continue, but double the stage capacities of industrial to compensate. Merge the file, so there is not a doubling issue. Take care of the patch at the install stage, taking out the user problem. Not add the IR totals, waiting for a plugin shifting IR to the medium density zones and acting like ID. This has it's own problems and issues to resolve, but is something I plan to work on diligently once I complete a basic upgrade of the CAM. Another person with more knowledge trying to fix the double capacity within the Census exemplars.

Please comment with your thoughts, experienced users and visitors. Preferably, you are familiar with CAM and understand the issues at hand.

[M4346]

This is great, and much needed. I did a lot of testing for CAM, lotted a few CAMeLots and still use the CAM.

Let me know if I can help in some way, within my limited time Will be keeping an eye on this!

[InvisiChem]

Okay,

I slept on the problem and have had a very interesting thought. The problem comes from the addition of 0x00024101 to the Total I Census exemplar. By merging all the exemplars that total 0x4100 and it's derivatives, two things are going to happen.

First, even without CAM, IR would be totaled in the Regional Industry numbers. Second, Connections would continue to give IR CAP relief. Without CAM, the normal development of a city will still overcome this CAP relief, but at a much slower pace than now.

I see what needs to be merged as a permanent upgrade to the game as a whole, with or without the CAM.  Some cleanup and the next Beta is up for trial. Let the development recommence.

[vortext]

I see what needs to be merged as a permanent upgrade to the game as a whole, with or without the CAM. 

That's kinda what I hinted at.  It seems that for some reason IR just wasn't properly implemented to begin with.

[InvisiChem]

  I don't pick up on hints very well. Now that I read that with this, I should have caught that. Sometimes you have to just be blunt and slap me with it.

Anyways, took about a week for me to get the hint  . Next time, perhaps only 3 days to get it.

[InvisiChem]

Beta 3 just sent out. Hoping we don't find as many issues with it this time.

Lots of fixes, including one for those who don't wish to keep the CAM (not likely but it could happen). My extreme thinking has been toned down a bit for realism. Always a plus. I found out the hard way you can't make custom INT32 variables from exemplars. Another limiting plus. 

Manual is about half completed and a readme is in the plans right after. It's a lot of work, but I am feeling satisfied with the results. Having a ton of fun doing it too.

Cheers all

[InvisiChem]

Update time:

Manual basically complete. Will need some editing/proofreading. Low on the priority list. Translation to other languages is beyond my skills, so I will have to rely on the community for that one.

Building the installer scripts right now. Slowed by doing some testing. So far, I like the results. There is two versions of the stage tables. One is for those who either wish to grow faster or use smaller regions. The normal is for large regions and provides a difficulty level that brings some great satisfaction when you see those first skyscrapers. Thank you Vortext for showing me why I needed to provide a different version.

I'm not a master at installer scripts, so a little research is going on at the same time, but not too difficult. Hard part is I'm trying to take a little pressure of the user for install. After I get the Windows version up, I'll work on a mac installer. Shouldn't be too difficult once I install the VM.

Cheers guys, progress is looking great.

[xLogan]

This is exciting! Just joined the forum to stop by and say hello.
Is it worth it to download CAM 1.0 or should i just wait for the second version?
Secondly, I'm a little confused as to where to start with the downloading process anyway... 

[InvisiChem]

No need to wait. There is some little things to get prepared for with the new CAM though. I will make this easy, so your economy will not crash once I release the new one.

First, download CAM 1.0 http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=1009
Install like normal. Do not use any of the pathfinding options. These will be named like promote walking, etc.
Go ahead an install all three of the 5% R$ working in ......      This is going to help balance the Census demands CAM 2 makes massive changes to.

Next, Download Z's fixed file. https://www.dropbox.com/s/t03rzx184m335if/ColossusAddonMod_1.0_Update_by_z.zip?dl=0

This will be in a zip file. To use, place the ColossusAddonMod_1.0.dat in the a_CAM folder in your plugins, replacing the one already there. If you are not sure where your plugins folder is, it is usually /Documents/Simcity 4/Plugins

That is it for the CAM 1.0 install. Be sure to install the Network Addon Mod and get some custom buildings, especially stages 8-15 for Residential and Commercial, stages 4-10 for most industrials and all stages of farms. They are not necessary, but there is a serious lack of buildings from maxis and CAM does not add any new buildings.

If you like big cities, download some schools and hospitals with higher capacites, such as from JBSimio. I personally like stuff from FrankU, SimGoober and CARCH. No need to stick with this style though. That is part of the fun of CAM, browsing the lex power search and finding buildings/lots for you playing style.

Buildings and lots from Simtropolis and other sites are okay, just stay away from the higher stage buildings and cheat buildings.

With these steps, you should have a seamless upgrade to the new CAM


Edit: fixed a link ~Swordmaster

[InvisiChem]

Update:

The installer is now working correctly. It is currently just in English, so if anybody is good at NSIS scripts, I could definitely use the help in making it multilanguage. Currently, trying to do so has corrupted my use of the nsVersion.dll plugin. I'll try some more, but currently I may just put out an English only version.

The mod itself seems to be working great. I have corrected the few issues I that were mentioned through some testing. I will always consider any release a work in progress. There should be some issues that pop up through large scale use I can fix.

For now, bed. Tomorrow, back to the grindstone. Try some work at the installer then pull some weeds.

InvisiChem.

[bombardiere]

Hello

I would like to thank you for your efforts.

I don't use farms that much, but it is good that these are looked into. I am very happy that your are solving double industry workforce, census drive, and census report issues. These are not crucial for the game play, but annoying little bugs.

With other developments, it looks like this is a good time for SC4 

[InvisiChem]

With other developments, it looks like this is a good time for SC4 

I could not agree more. The original creator will no longer develop any more SimCity games, Maxis failed (IMO) with the 2013, NAM Development is strong, RTMT is going strong and the LEX is still going strong. Content creators are still putting out some beautiful buildings and lots. I think this will only add to the game more, perhaps even spurring a group back to us. 

I don't use farms that much, but it is good that these are looked into. I am very happy that your are solving double industry workforce, census drive, and census report issues. These are not crucial for the game play, but annoying little bugs.

I have read about farm unhappiness since SimCity 4 first came out. Many just stopped using them completely and started with Dirty Industry. I hope to make IR a valuable part of the Industrial sector. I call this freedom of gameplay. The doubled workforce and doubled CI actually caused a lot of people to shy away from CAM. Coupled with the seemingly difficult instructions on how to patch the SimCity_1.dat file, people were quite literally scared of this mod for a while.

That is about to be fixed. First, Z did a great patch to fix these issues. I built upon Z's fix to develop this one. Well, back to work so I can get this thing out.

Cheers man and thank you for your kind words.

[Jimmyson]

I'm really keen to start using CAM for the first time. I had started to download lots and dependencys for CAM 1.0, but with CAM 2 now rolled out, I would like to know what is included in the installer.

I can assume that it bundles the table adjustments, but I can't understand why it's >300MB. And given that its DAT packing, have the CAMeLOT packages been bundled into the installer?

And has CAM 2.0 been tested with the Steam version of SC4? When I tried to install CAM 2.1.0, it deleted "SimCity_1.dat" from the game data. Luckily it was backed up!

[InvisiChem]

Hi Jimmyson, welcome to the world of CAM.

I had started to download lots and dependencys for CAM 1.0, but with CAM 2 now rolled out, I would like to know what is included in the installer

CAM actually has no dependencies at all. Since you stated it had removed the SimCity_1.dat and backed it up, I am going to assume you are using the Windows installer. This should only be about 14MB and is found here on the LEX http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=3335.

This installer includes the Core CAM files - Controller File with Workforce adjustments, Census Job adjustments, Demand Graph, etc. - The PlayStyle file of choice which adjusts all the Stage growth tables and the Startup Screen - Maxis buildings that have been adjusted for CAM 1.0 - Fixed versions of the Nuclear Power Plant, Solar Power Plant and Medical Clinic - BSC Cleanitol with a specific CAM Cleanitol file (will be deleted after install) - Wouangaine's SC4 Dat Packer with 3 Visual C++ dll files (Will be deleted after install).

Having a 300MB File size tells me the file you are investigating is the NAM + CAM bundle. Please be advised this is for the Macintosh system. The file sizes are large because it is having to use a wineskin wrapper to run windows executables in a macintosh environment.

I use the Steam version of SC4. I have tested this with Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and currently Windows 10. CAM was finished using Windows 10, Steam SC4.

I would love to include CAMeLots into the package, but at this juncture this is not possible. The permissions needed have not yet been solicited or granted to do so. Perhaps in the future I can get some available to increase the amount of base game content. For now, only Maxis buildings modified to the CAM values are included in the CAM install. This is why CAM has no dependencies and will work perfectly without any other downloads, just stages 10-15 will not be represented until you download some CAMeLots.

The included Dat Packer has some very specific instructions in the installer. Please follow them specifically. CAM 2 does need to patch the SimCity_1.dat file. This is a permanent fix for SimCity 4. This patch is modifying the industrial files to include IR into the industrial totals and to provide IR CAP Relief for industrial connections. This is the only part that is being patched, but has to be patched or you will have doubled industry numbers.

If you have any more questions, feel free to post them here, the CAM 2.1.0 uploaded and ready thread or PM me directly.

Cheers and welcome to CAM,
InvisiChem.

[b22rian]

Hi there InvisiChem

I have pretty much read through all the CAM 2.0 threads now
This fantastic what you have going on here and what you have accomplished to this point , is hard to believe 

I am a part of the RTMT (which is still active and trying to get the long awaited 4.0 build ready for upload and release to the community..)

I want you to know you have inspired myself and the rest of the RTMT team to carry on and I wanted to thank you personally for motivating me and the team 

Thanks so much , Brian