The Heartland - Random Images

[kwakelaar]

The sunken highway is a fantastic looking picture, and futher nice looking images from Cedarville.

[nova vesfalo]

really nice, as kwakelaar I like the sunken highway , and Cedarville looks nice (love your previous update too, may I ask the name of your favourite industrial building, even if it's a rewarrd ?)

[Pat]

Meinhosen wow that update is just awsome... What about the Jarheads LoL my dad was at Camp Pendleton... Well i hope you are safe during this summer and take care my friend and be safe with the kiddies LoL....

[Livin in Sim]

Hi, meinhosen,

Cedarville and Grantville are looking quite credible.  This diary always was a nice mix of town and country.  The inner city park was a nice lunch hour getaway.  I'm an ol' farm fence-r from way back--time consuming (however not as time consuming as the days I spent helping my dad fix real fence), but what farm doesn't have them?  Do you get the brewery as a reward when you grow enough hops?

I always wanted to try those highway wall, and I have that Simgoober station but haven't used it yet.  Does the clock really keep game time?

Thanks for sharing, and bye for now

--Liv

[meinhosen]

Well friends, this will probably be my last post until August.  Before I say "Adieu" to you all for the summer, I'll leave you with a few classic screenshots, and the rarest of the rare- my cities during their planning and building stages.  But first, thanks to whom thanks belongs: 

thundercrack - Thank you for the kind compliment and the wishes.

threestooges - Ah, let me clarify a bit: I'll be teaching college students how to be Soldiers.  Nothing too rustic... the Army never does rustic     As for the dump: I agree about the symmetry of the trash.  The lot(s) in question are actually a very nice set done by North Country Dude and modeled on a vehicle dump.  They can be found here.

emilin - Thanks!  I honestly didn't see it was sloped... but it makes for a nice touch now that you mention it.

bat - Thank you!

Yoder - I'm not going to make any promises on uploads/updates until I can actually make one.  On the bright side, when I came back from Iraq I had two brand new regions... so two months away might bring a lot of fun new stuff.

rooker - Thanks!  I've seen those rural walls used a lot recently in urban settings and liked the look (thanks to Marcszar for the inspiration).  I think it turned out well.  There's also been a rash of nice, old urban American structures hitting the STEX recently... which inspired me to start redoing my urban areas.

kwakelaar - Thank you!

novo vesfalo - Ah yes, that building is SimGoober's Yuengling Brewery.  Make sure you read the readme (learn from my mistake ) and pick up the regional tracking mod... else you'll never get offered the reward.

pat - LOL!  I have nothing against blockheads, erm Jarheads.

Livin in Sim - The brewery has two different requirements: Mayor Rating over 85 -or- 50 Hop Farm Fields in Region OR 8 Pubs in the city. I think that small city actually met both requirements.  And yes, that clock does indeed keep game time.  It's a cool set of props that SG put together, and makes for a nice effect on the building.



Before I share, let me say this: I do my building and eye-candy on a budget... i.e. everything runs within the city's budget (SC4 farm towns make fantastic cash... it's true)  The town itself isn't quite ready for it's eye-candy coating yet, but the already-developed farms and landscape was...



What you see is this: farmfields awaiting the inevitable sprawl of suburbia (the yet-to-be-built empty quarter in the upper left).  The RR tracks and dark trees are placeholders for a series of streams I've not yet plopped at the time of the screenshot.



Here you see the early of developing a crossing for my stream(s).  This was mainly my chance to see if the combination of the trees, stream, bridge, and farms would work well together.



Laying roads and putting down zones.  The beauty of suburban neighborhoods is that you can use your imagination with the streets and still make it look realistic 



Prior to sprawl, every small town starts out with a small, gridded area.  Brockton, being no different, has a small residential grid that is surrounded by farms and soon-to-be upscale housing.



Here's where we leave the concept pics and move into the finished product (excuse the gridlines).  Actually, I got so engrossed in building the city I forgot to continue to take screenshots until this pic and the two that follow.





Two pics of the finished rural side of town.  I'm fairly certain that once I return you'll see the completed town of Brockton, Nebraska.

If I don't get a chance to visit during June or July, I'll definitely be seeing you in August! 

EDIT

David/Dedgren - Please, please, please, please, please, please, please (have I made my point  ) don't move this to the "Completed MD" Section.  I know I'll most likely not get a chance to update within the next 60 days... but some time around August 15 I'll be back and ready to update this MD again.

[glepet]

Nice update. I like to see how others plan their regions. Have a good summer and looking forward to August.

[bat]

Wonderful update, meinhosen!
Like the "river" and especially the 5^th picture!

[kwakelaar]

The fth picture will be a sure winner. I would like to know how you did that.

[Snaper]

Wonderful

I love your fields 

[Giligone]

More great work. Have a great summer!

[Nardo69]

Interesting - not so much different from me ... 

Just one thing: Which Street Side mod du you use? I ask because you have the PEG dirt shoulders only on the empty areas and next to farms - just as I want but didn't get by now ...

Take care and make Backups!

Bernhard 

[kimcar]

    Like the others i  really enjoy the fifth picture. Really well done.

[Pat]

LoL Meinhosen Blockheads hmmmm what would i say here to that about the army hmmm?
But anyways im a greeeeeeeeeat guy LoL and we are friends so anyways i hope you are having
a blast with the kiddies LoL and cant wait to see the next update in August - pat

[thundercrack83]

Your farms are tremendous. I'll be counting the days until August 15...59 more to go!

[meinhosen]

Consider this space reserved for an update sometime soon. 

And yes, I'm alive, well, and I have internet access for an extended weekend. 

[Pat]

 
Woohooo Meinhosen great to see you got some ferlow cant wait to see your update
space reserved for final comment LoL

[flame1396]

Pic 5 is very appealing!

LOL! Almsot wrote "apalling"

[meinhosen]

Wow... I go away for two and a half months and look what happens to SC4... the CAM, a mess of new plugins, and me with a lot of fun new stuff to sort through.

Turns out that West Point was a busy time for me.  I had little time to play, and it looks like that trend will be continuing until November when I head back to Iraq.  As far as a commitment to a MD goes, I'm unsure of my ability to adequately update it to satisfy both myself and my readers.

I want to extend a special thanks to all of you who have read and replied over this busy summer.  Here's something to look forward to... assuming I ever get to finish it.

EDIT
Cheers to my not reading the replies close enough.  Here are a few answers:
kwakelaar- I used buddybud's rural highway walls and the NAM to bridge that PEG canal.
Nardo- Swamper has a "suburban addition" to the dirt-shoulder's mod on PEG's website that addresses some of the issues that plague the original mod.  It works pretty well for mixed areas (as seen in the previous update).

[threestooges]

You're back! Good to hear the West Point went well. Don't worry about trying to crank out updates, a pic here and there is just as good. Especially so when they are like the one you've just shown (you should enter that in the photo competition... it should go pretty far if not all the way). The train rolling through downtown just looks so real (perhaps because I saw somthing similar today in a slightly less dense area of Los Angeles). If I may ask, what are the buildings on the lower left side of the pic? At any rate, please continue to showcase your work. Something is better than nothing. Pics like your last one, and the 5th of the previous really add insight to what the game can do and (at least for me) provide good sources of inspiration (theft) for things to do in the game. Good to know you are well. Take it easy.

[Pat]

Meinhosen welcome back from West Point.... I do belive this update was a real master peice and awsome....    Im soo happy to see you back and yes alot has changed since you left us for the summer alot of good changes at that too.... CAM is a very good asset to the game its anther stepup from Deluxe edition.... I see you are heading out to Iraq... I see you are due for deployment in November man that bites the biiiiig one...  I hope you are gonna be able to play some, in between dodging bullets and mortar shells...