I am interested in designing and building more traditional American (early 20th century) cities, however I don't want to do it by plopping because I like the randomization that growing lots can provide. I have more than my fair share of custom content but I also don't want to block Maxis completely.
As I'm sure you are aware the tilesets for Maxis lots currently make this hard to do. Those lots with a huge parking lot out front or a lot of lawn space tend to stick out and some what destroy the "urbanism". What I would ideally like to do (and I know it will take a lot of time) is to go through each Maxis lot (and eventually my custom content) and re-classify it. For instance (not final)...
"Chicago": Suburban lots
"New York": Traditional urban lots
"Houston": Modern architecture lots
Europe: European lots
Is changing values on the Maxis lots a safe thing to do in terms of game stability?
If it is, I've read up and downloaded the necessary tools to do this but I am unsure the proper way of how to do it. I was going to use SC4 Tool with its screenshot feature to go through all the buildings and categorize them into what tilesets I want them in and record it. I was then going to go to the reader and manually do the work. I noticed however in the reader program that the buildings in the .dat are displayed in their technical language and not their language as seen on in game and in SC4 Tool.
How would I go about taking the SC4 Tool building lists and matching them with their reader counterparts?
Once that is accomplished, what are the exact steps of going through and actually changing the tilesets?
If you been patient enough to read all of this, I appreciate it. &apls
like my handy work??? ;D
http://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=23723 (http://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=23723)
Quote from: jigsaw on August 24, 2010, 08:05:43 PM
like my handy work??? ;D
http://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=23723 (http://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=23723)
Yes, that is some nice work and would be a good tileset definition to use since you've already done all the cosmetic work. Could you tell me exactly how you went about modding the Maxis lots? I'm new to the reader and to modding SC4 in general. All I've ever done is create different versions of the Maxis civic lots in the Lot Editor.
i went through the simcity1.dat file and manually changed every single one of them by hand with the sc4tool. then, i edited years and years of downloaded content to fit into these new tilesets. lots of work, and it's a pity that i cannot share it.
I wasn't aware that was something you could do with SC4 Tool. I thought you had to use Reader. I've been able to pull up all the buildings on tool but they appeared to be a reference/read-only kind of display. If it isn't too much trouble or lengthy, could you provide me instructions on how to do it? At your convenience of course.
from what i remember is that they (desc. files) are all in one folder, and the names are CHI_xxx_YYY etc, so i changed all the tilesets around accordingly. i saved the modded file, and i use that one repeatedly. that's all i can remember really, but a heads up that a lot of stuff is multi-tileset. i created a spreadsheet on what is where etc, i recommend you make one so you know you have enough of each to go around.
Okay so I finally figured out how to mod the Maxis lots in Tool. Reading the Tutorial helps :) When you were editing the buildings in tool, how did you know what building you were editing? Did you have to look up what it looked up in the reader and than match it?
Good evening, sorry if you already know this, but I thought I would point it out.
A problem is that changing the Tile Set only effects the Building, and not the Lot.
Buildings often have multiple Lots of different stages. Stages represent density, so a lot of low stage has parking spaces (less dense). You wont be able to have a suburban lot have a different tile set than an urban lot if they share the same building.
I would recommend first that you back up you simcity1.dat before you change it around. I do think a Maxis blocker will help you though. The BSC blocker basically sets the stages of all the lots to 255 (0xFF) so that they will not grow. You can then open Maxis LE and search for individual lots that you want, and set that lot back to its proper stage. Then you would have to find the matching Building Exemplar and set that to the tile set that you want.
Controlling Maxis in this way was the start of all of my modding. I have since decided to block them all because I feel like I can make them myself better. One day I may even delete all of the Building and Lot exemplars for streamline purposes. Just make sure you back it up.
Also, check out PIMX in these forums. This program can do all of the things you are asking about, specifically show you the picture of the building. Changing tile sets is also possible, but I dont think it allows you to change simcity1.dat. It has a built in LE too, and it is stable.