FrankU's Lottery - Space Center update

[FrankU]

Hi Matthijs,
Or something like Low-ar-wide.... Nobody knows...
And yes, some have street lights. The horse pen is used by night time now and then and for that purpose I put some cheap street lights around them. When you take a look at real life horse pens you'll see them also.

Hi Jack_wilds,
Thanks for the comment. Additional remarks are always welcome. Also later. Even when the lots are released.... I can make a second version.

And at Lowkee,
They are growables already. I even have the ambition to give them their own growable fields, but I am not sure how long that all is going to take.
For the show I just plopped them with the extra cheats.dll

The cows... I hoped they would not cross the street, but they do. So I guess I will delete the cow effect.

Wesseling Weide 1. Yes, you are right.
Indeed the tree seems to grow up/on/in the crate.


But when I rotate the lot:


You see? It does not now.
It is probably a similar effect as with the mill and the barn. I think I am just going to accept the fact that sometimes things will grow through each other. Do you disagree and is this a "feature" that has to be removed?

Started to work on stage 2 lots.

[cogeo]

This is definitely caused by the shape of the LODshell (the trunk is projected on the front face of the LOD). Try moving the box a little, so that it doesn't overlap with the trunk. You may even have problems with the trunk and the fence (check the back side of the lot too).

[Andreas]

Yeah, that's a common issue with most tree props. Usually, it's enough to move stuff around just a little, and then rotate to check all four sides if they still overlap.

[FrankU]

I guessed something like that. But sometimes I want stuff to appear under the tree and then this effect is not always avoidable.
Do you consider this a reason to disqualify the lots, or is it acceptable if rarely present?

[Lowkee33]

Disqualify?  Would you really want to release something that has a tree growing out of the top of a box?

Try raising the box slightly, this may work.

Some things, like the garbage, would make sense having a tree on top of them.  You might change to a chain link fence, and then a tree growing through it would make sense (Picture).

As Andreas said, any time you add a prop it is best to check all of the angles to make sure it fits.

[Lowkee33]

Just had an idea:  Your mill could be a seaport.  It would provide jobs, but the main thing is that it would be a place where industry (farms) would export to.  It doesn't have to be on the water either.

Checkout BSC Functional Seaports.  Along with providing a host of upgradable seaports it will also provide you with empty lots to work with.  (and you don't need any dependencies if you are just going to lot)

[FrankU]

Hmmmm, nice idea...
But I fear I am not going to do this. I fear for CTS's and the like...
Besides that I am a great fan of Pegasus's seaports and for reasons I really do not understand the BSC and Peg don't go along. So there will never be a seaportcontroller for both types of ports.

[FrankU]

Finally I finished lotting my Stage 1 and Stage 2 set of growable farms.
I edited some of the lots I showed here before.

As I told: I use my self made prop families extensively, so it is maybe hard to see how the lots look like when they grow. There will be a surprise regularly, although I hope there will be no more trees growing through crates or trucks.

Here we go!

Stage 1 lots
Image 01


Image 02


Image 03


Image 04


Image 05


Image 06


Image 07


Image 08


Image 09


Image 10


Image 11


Image 12


Stage 2 lots

Image 13


Image 14


Image 15


Image 16


Image 17


Image 18


Image 19


Image 20


Image 21


Image 22


Image 23


Image 24


Image 25


Image 26


Image 27


Image 28


Image 29


Phew! That was quite some work.
Some of these farms grow flowers. For these I have made flower farm fields. You can't see them now, because for these images the farms are plopped, but they will grow in game.
For some other farms I consider making some new fields too, but I am not sure I will do that.
I hope you like them.

Now for stage 3, 4 and 5!
Please comment!

[mave94]

Looks very good, Frank! good job. Good that you're working with prop families for varietion.
One suggestion: could you make a set of the green-houses, something like in the Westland. Those huge green-houses?
Keep it up, good luck

-Matthijs

[Simcitler]

Great work, can´t wait for them. Alltough i can see cows on the street. 
Also the Prop family's look really great, so many variations. 

Greets
Simcitler

[FrankU]

Yes, there are cows on the streets, cows in the ponds, cows in the haystacks. Maxis cows are not fearful!
Indeed it bothers me too, but what can I do? I want cows on my meadows! Surely I could plop JES cows, like I do a bit in the farms on images 18, 19, 22 and 23. But that would mean that all my meadow lots have the same cows on exactly the same spots.... it would be very  .

And Matthijs: these farms are stage 1 and 2, so these are small agricultural enterprises. The larger highly developed agricultural industry will show up in stages 4 and 5. So there will be glasshouses like in the Westland.

By the way: one of my wishes (for CAM 2.0?) would be that the higher stage farms would be useful for higher educated sims, so that they still will show up when the sims get education.
I don't know if someone of you knows how high the education of contemporary farmers is...? It is much more than the 40 points of Simcity, that I can assure you. It is almost high-tech!

[jmyers2043]

Hello FrankU

My favorite is image 14.

Stage 1 and 2 you say?  1 - 15 jobs =  Stage 1 and 16 - 31 farm jobs = Stage 2

Good Luck. 


- Jim

[noahclem]

Your farms look great!    It's nice you made so much use of prop families for variety.

[Kergelen]

Looks very nice!
I like the variety and specially like farms 17,24,25,27 and 29.

Great work 

[FrankU]

Thanks for the comments and appreciation.

At the moment I am working on some matching farm fields. They are not very special, but I want to have a collection that is found in The Netherlands in real life. So no tomatoes, because we grow them in glass houses, no agave (what is that?), bananas or ananas, but potatoes, corn, wheat, asparagus, blackberries, apples and rhubarb.
For these I use mostly Simgoober's revised farm fields, but I edit them. The way they are seasonal is not my cup of tea. So I have to make new exemplars, find out (optionally) how to make them seasonal the way I want and put them together in farm lots. Somehow this is much more work than I thought and because my time for SC is very limited this job is taking alrready more than two weeks and I am in no way finished yet.

I found something funny: when making a farm field lot in Pim-X I get the option of lot size. Did anyone ever experiment with farm field lots larger than 1x1? I did. I just made a farm field 4x1 and put Tag_One's glass houses on it. The fields grow, but will overlap each other and the surrounding streets and lots. It does not work. Or does anyone know a way to make this actualaly work? It would be nice to have growing glass houses with my farms!

After the farm fields I will commence with stage 3 lots.

[Jack_wilds]

Hello FrankU,

Today's lesson is:

Agave is a succulent monocarp 'desert' type plant of over 122 varieties, closely related to aloe... used for edible flowers, lotions, fibers for fabrics...

Like the farm lots over all, nothing to really pick on... its all good  several pics are favorites...

Jack

[FrankU]

There is one issue I'd like to discuss.

My meadows.

I use the Meadowshire terrain mod, because I like it. It gives me nice lush meadows. For the lots I use CP_MegaTextures_vol1 (what as the exact mane again?) with also nice lush meadows.
But of course they are not alike.
What I want to do is, after the meadow lots have grown, to extend the meadows around the lot. I want to add fences and/or hedges to make smaller fields, put some cows in them etc. The result should be lots of meadows which are divided by ditches, fences and hedges and on some locations a farm lot.

Now there are four ways to go:
1. Just leave the lot as is and delete the farm fields that have grown with it. And accept the difference in base texture.
Advantage: easy.
Disadvantage: ugly.

2. Delete the farm fields and make use of ploppable flora (ChrisAdams and PEG) to make the meadows more matching (like Battlecat dioes in his MD).
Advantage: quite easy, versatile. God looking.
Disadvantage: not perfect, lot of work.

3. Make the lots wothout base texture, so that they show the same base as the deleted farmfields. It could be, though, that the yellow assingment (farms) will show through. Althought I think it does not show under the farm lots, but it definitely does under the farm fields.
Advantage: beautiful match.
Disadavantage: maybe the yellow colour, definitely the underwater texture bug, because of all the overlays I use.

4. Leave the lots as they are on the above images, but design a farm field with the same textures. The textures will match now.
Advantage: I don't have to delete any farm fields, the jobs provided will be there, the textures do match.
Disadvantage: I cannot divide the fields into smaller fields, because some of them will loose contact with roads and the zots will show. Besides that I need to remake all fence lots by Chrisadams. And probably the textures will repeat in an ugly way.

What do you think and what could be the best option?

There is a fifth way, though.
Delete the base texture on the lot. Do not use any overlay textures, but use the Mayor mode ploppabe stuff by Chrisadams and Peg to spice up the lots and the fields.
It is even very simple to convert this stuff into props that can be used in LotEditor and Pim-X.
Disadvantage: for a uniform look I should redo all my above lots, not only the three meadow lots! And I will have even more dependecies! And the list is already very long.

[Lowkee33]

Hi Frank,

I strongly suggest to leave the base textures on any growable lot.  Without them you will get a) the water bug, b)construction textures or c) seemingly immortal lots.  You can make invisible base textures (by importing only an alpha map), but I think the water bug remains (although b or c are not a problem).

What is image 5?  Does it have texture issues?

To be honest, I think that the transition from lot to terrain in all of your pictures is fine.  It will never be perfect (unless we made terrain textures the size of a tile, and I don't think anyone wants that.  Although, sometimes I wonder about putting the textures from CIV 1 as terrain...).  I think it is up to the end user to make lots that tie the lot to the terrain, but perhaps that can be a next project for you.  Basically, terrain textures spread out in different zooms, and can also be blended with each other.

Don't delete what you have.   Perhaps you could make some plop lots that are just overlays that have dirt on one side and blend into nothing on the other.   

Chris Adam's flora comes as props in that pack as well.  You may be able to make a flora/prop field like BattleCat does grow with the farm.  Try the property "Prop Random Chance" out. 

[jmyers2043]

I use the Meadowshire terrain mod, because I like it. It gives me nice lush meadows. For the lots I use CP_MegaTextures_vol1 (what as the exact mane again?) with also nice lush meadows.
But of course they are not alike.

They could be - if you wanted - on your computer.

The textures of the Meadowshire Terrain mod have ID numbers as do textures of CP vol 01b mega pack. You can change one/or many textures of the terrain mod on the fly with textures of your choice.

The consideration is whether this is for your computer and MD or for uploading? If for your use then do as you wish.


For me? I personally use the Missouri Breaks terrain mod because the terrain textures are very close to the Maxis pasture field. Not perfect but close enough for me.

- Jim

[FrankU]

What is image 5?  Does it have texture issues?

No, this lot does not have a base texture. It is mainly meant for use as an entrance lot to a meadow. It is in fact an experiment for method 3. And it gives me the underwater bug. The lots are not immortal and I don't know what you mean by construction textures. I must admit that I have found out that the yellow assignmentcolour does not stay under the lots when they grow. But I don't know what their behaviour is exactly. I have not been testing it very closely, so maybe something might pop up in future.

Civ 1 textures.... Oh, that would be nostalgic fun. Did you actually play the game? I did extensively and even made a Dutch translation of it. It must still be on some backupdisc.

Chris Adam's flora comes as props in that pack as well.  You may be able to make a flora/prop field like BattleCat does grow with the farm.  Try the property "Prop Random Chance" out. 

Does it? I have just been making props out of these models. Just a small job with Pim-X. It is really a fantastic utility. And I will do some research on the "Prop random chance" property.
I have been following Battlecat's MD from some distance. Did he indeed make growable farm fields with Chirsadams' flora? I have also been thinking about that possiblity.
I also considered a farm looking like a car dealership and a farm field like a carpark tile with random maxis-cars on it. Wouldn't that be fun?