RHW (RealHighway) - Development and Support

[Geometry123]

So, the NAM 32 RC1 has been release. Now I can finally get my hand on the, potentially presently unstable, Quickchange pieces. [/sarcasm out]

[Wiimeiser]

On that note, does anyone have that u-turn ramp piece shown in the Quickchange video? It seems to be missing from my controller file for some reason...

[Tarkus]

It's not missing from your controller.  The textures/models/exemplars (not part of the controller) were missing.  And in the interim, you can find them here.

-Alex

[Wiimeiser]

Thanks for clearing that up, seems like everything but the controller data was missing.

[Geometry123]

I guess it would be too early to request this, but it would be nice to see an RHW-4 C2 ramp eventually...

[eggman121]

Don't Know where to post this so I think I will post here.

I have recently been adding Stoplights to the FARHW TuLEPs which I think are missing from the NAM32 pr. Maybe someone else has taken upon the task of putting stoplights on these pieces but I thought that I may have a go of doing it myself.

They appear to work 









Now with some vehicles





There are some extras in some of these images. Try to find them 

-eggman121

[jdenm8]

They look great. Traffic Signals was something we just never got around to doing on those intersections.

Could you do some LHD versions as well?

[eggman121]

They look great. Traffic Signals was something we just never got around to doing on those intersections.

Could you do some LHD versions as well?

Thank you jdenm8

Sure. I want to do a LHD version of the traffic lights but the Traffic Light Stalks might be different between the LHD and RHD versions. Maybe if you could post the IIDs of the LHD Traffic Light stalks which would be found in the LHD installation I could make an LHD version.

I may take this opportunity to ask a question since you have an LHD installation.

Do some tiles flip Between LHD and RHD versions of the NAM or SimCity 4 in general, or are other texture packs with the correct textures used? This is the conundrum that is preventing me making an Australian LHD sign mod and other LHD related mods.

Thanks for your time for reading this and I will try my best to make at least the traffic signals LHD.

-eggman121

[jdenm8]

Sure. I want to do a LHD version of the traffic lights but the Traffic Light Stalks might be different between the LHD and RHD versions. Maybe if you could post the IIDs of the LHD Traffic Light stalks which would be found in the LHD installation I could make an LHD version.

I'd forgotten about that, there aren't any in the vanilla game. Someone made some by contorting the Maxis renders, but I can't remember for sure who it was. Maybe Ebina? It was an attachment too, so chances are the file's been lost. I may have a backup of it somewhere, I'll have a look when I get the chance.

Do some tiles flip Between LHD and RHD versions of the NAM or SimCity 4 in general, or are other texture packs with the correct textures used? This is the conundrum that is preventing me making an Australian LHD sign mod and other LHD related mods.

This changes from piece to piece. Some use alternative textures made specifically for LHD (The Volleyball Interchange pieces use this method, as does almost everything involving Chevrons) whereas others horizontally or vertically flip the RHD one on the model (RHW TuLEPs, the SPUI and a few other pieces use this). That's only on the texture level though, T21s use the exact same orientation for both types. The common practice is to invert the anchor coordinate.

[Tarkus]

I'm not sure if we even have LHD stalks in the NAM.  I think there might be one mirrored item (a version of the 2-lighter), but that's about it.

LHD is kind of an odd beast, in the way the game handles it.  The only thing the game does automatically when put into LHD mode is flip the paths on most Road items so they're going the correct direction.  However, for whatever reason, Maxis didn't set up the game to automatically do this with any non-Road items (Railroads, Light Rail, Monorail), and there are certain situations where the auto-flip becomes problematic on Roads--situations involving turning lanes and other asymmetries.  Those have to be manually done, and they require thinking the reverse of backwards (which isn't the same as forward  ) in order to do properly.  It's really a mind warp.  Took me about 3 days to take care of Issue #200, which pertained to the LHD pathing on those FARHW diamond pieces.  (The stop points may still require a little tweaking.)

In order to specify a non-default path setup for LHD mode, there's a section of the Network INI file (which is contained in the NAM Bridge Controller, as that INI also tells the game where to find bridge exemplars, in addition to powerline placement and other odds and ends) which allows us to turn on manual path localization for certain IIDs or ranges of IIDs. 

Textures, models and T21s are not automatically flipped, and in order to fully localize them, it requires making separate LHD versions, which isn't always easy.

I've recently begun thinking it may be high time for a tutorial on LHDification.  It's kind of become a lost art, considering there's a number of people in the transit modding community who have no experience with it, and we've been hurting for awhile in that department.

-Alex

[MandelSoft]

FYI, I've actually signalised this very intersection in the SRM mod. However, this intersection had not been T21d before in the vanilla style, so good work

[jdenm8]

I'm not sure if we even have LHD stalks in the NAM.  I think there might be one mirrored item (a version of the 2-lighter), but that's about it.

I'm sure Ebina did absolutely everything except the Long Arm light. The Mid Arm one was done, the Post-Mount one was done and the Railroad Boomgates and Signal were done too.

[GDO29Anagram]

Something I noticed with the SRM and the little FAD piece was that even with stoplights, the lights didn't properly cycle so they were stuck at green. It may have been because they didn't have stop points, but I can't remember.

While developing the extended family of FADs, I had the intent of making functional stop points (which, in turn, would lead to functional stoplights), so it took a bit of trickery to get them to work; for those wondering behind the scenes, there's actually a Avenue×Road crossing instead of the expected Avenue×Dirtroad crossing. I found that a Avenue×Dirtroad crossing would keep stop points from functioning, so in addition to cutting the pre-existing FAD in half, I rewrote the crossing part. (I also rewrote it such that it didn't have automatic Avenue stubs so that it could be plopped easily on TLA-5's as well, which did require some textural reworking.) Here's a sample of the code; the C tile is the part with the crossing (and stop point).

Code Select Expand

[HighwayIntersectionInfo_0x00005F03]; Fractional-Angle Diamond FARHW-4/Avenue Type 201-220 FULL (ROTATE FOR OTHER HALF)
;Added by Ganaram Inukshuk 7/8/2013
;rhw_special_fad_44b_full_out
Piece = -32, 0.0, 0, 0, 0x5e100325
PreviewEffect = preview_rhw_special_fad_44b_full_out

CellLayout =.....
CellLayout =.....
CellLayout =.abc<
CellLayout =.abc.
CellLayout =.....
CellLayout =...^.

CheckType = a - dirtroad:0x00020000
CheckType = b - dirtroad:0x00020002
CheckType = c - avenue:0x02040200 road:0x02000200

ConsLayout =......
ConsLayout =......
ConsLayout =.--+.<
ConsLayout =.--+..
ConsLayout =......
ConsLayout =...^..

I did have an attempt at affixing T21s upon one of those FAD pieces but that attempt didn't go so great; never did have the prop show up but I did find that cars were stopping and going properly despite it.

[jdenm8]

there's actually a Avenue×Road crossing instead of the expected Avenue×Dirtroad crossing.

Same deal goes for the Volleyball Interchange pieces, there's a Road X Road intersection in the centre of them to make the stop points work.

[eggman121]

Something I noticed with the SRM and the little FAD piece was that even with stoplights, the lights didn't properly cycle so they were stuck at green. It may have been because they didn't have stop points, but I can't remember.

While developing the extended family of FADs, I had the intent of making functional stop points (which, in turn, would lead to functional stoplights), so it took a bit of trickery to get them to work; for those wondering behind the scenes, there's actually a Avenue×Road crossing instead of the expected Avenue×Dirtroad crossing. I found that a Avenue×Dirtroad crossing would keep stop points from functioning, so in addition to cutting the pre-existing FAD in half, I rewrote the crossing part. (I also rewrote it such that it didn't have automatic Avenue stubs so that it could be plopped easily on TLA-5's as well, which did require some textural reworking.) Here's a sample of the code; the C tile is the part with the crossing (and stop point).

I did have an attempt at affixing T21s upon one of those FAD pieces but that attempt didn't go so great; never did have the prop show up but I did find that cars were stopping and going properly despite it.

I noticed that. I checked that there where stop paths before attempting to place traffic signals on the FAD pieces so that they would function so nice work. It is always good to know the inner workings of the NAM. As for the T21 exemplar file I could make it available since it is using props from the NAM and a vanilla SimCity 4 Deluxe version of the game. Would this interest any of the NAM team?

As for LHD props, could the RHD versions be found and mirrored with Cogeo's model tweaker?  Just an idea if Ebina's props can't be found.

Same deal goes for the Volleyball Interchange pieces, there's a Road X Road intersection in the centre of them to make the stop points work.

That is the next piece to get traffic signals. Probably do it tomorrow. Good to know that it can get done without checking with the drawpaths cheat. 

-eggman121

[jdenm8]

As for LHD props, could the RHD versions be found and mirrored with Cogeo's model tweaker?  Just an idea if Ebina's props can't be found.

Not with Model Tweaker that I'm aware of. It has to be done manually in Reader, so it would take a lot of effort.

Same deal goes for the Volleyball Interchange pieces, there's a Road X Road intersection in the centre of them to make the stop points work.

That is the next piece to get traffic signals. Probably do it tomorrow. Good to know that it can get done without checking with the drawpaths cheat. 

I'd double-check the one with MIS through the centre, I don't remember seeing the stop points actually work. I know for a fact the one with RHW-4 in the centre does work properly.

[Opkl]

@ eggman121... Nice job on the FA ramp intersection TuLEPS! I like the traffic signals. However, is it possible to have the traffic signals on the the opposite sides of the intersection like on the regular TuLEP intersection pieces?

[Tarkus]

@ eggman121... Nice job on the FA ramp intersection TuLEPS! I like the traffic signals. However, is it possible to have the traffic signals on the the opposite sides of the intersection like on the regular TuLEP intersection pieces?

As jondor and I discovered some time ago, it is possible, but it's not particularly feasible with the standard Maxis fixtures.  I kind of was able to fudge that with some of the TuLEP intersections, but that was a special case, and it required doing some screwy things with the stop points.  The standard US setup will have to be done outside the NAM as a third-party cosmetic addon, using custom offset mast arm and signal props.

-Alex

[eggman121]

@ eggman121... Nice job on the FA ramp intersection TuLEPS! I like the traffic signals. However, is it possible to have the traffic signals on the the opposite sides of the intersection like on the regular TuLEP intersection pieces?

I could try to BAT my own offset Traffic signals since you need the signals to align with the stop points as far as I'm aware. Someone please correct me if I am wrong. I may also need a tutorial to make animated props since that is not my area of expertise. What you see in those images is the generic Maxis props which I just copied over from the TuLEP pieces. It was a case of copy and paste.

I know metarvo made some good props for signals in the sign mod that he is working on and I may BAT something similar.

Tarkus is right. Any props offset from the intersection will be in the third party arena.

I will look into it when I get a chance.

-eggman121

[Tarkus]

Somewhere, I actually have animated S3Ds and some mast arms Ryan B. made, which have been modified for such purposes.  I'll have to see if I can locate them.  It's a project I've kind of wanted to undertake for awhile now.

-Alex