Twinkle, twinkle, little BAT...

[madhatter106 3,931]

emperordaniel - thanks.

Francis90b - thanks; I hadn't designed them for W2W use, but I suppose anyone could tweak them in the lot editor to edge up against each other. I like W2W BATs, but don't see myself designing them; there are so many better BATters out there for that purpose...

Modeled and textured five so far...with the exception of the one on the far right, they need their little details to come alive. Those will be added soon enough...then on to the nightlighting (ugh).

From left to right, the names are...

The Davenport Building

Cook, Crookes & King Ltd.

Fox Financial Partners

Debar & Home, Esq.

Palladino Design

As mentioned before, these are little 1x1's in homage to the selection of similar Maxis CO$$$ buildings - including Paull Inc., the McAdams Building, Vikyar Foods and Farley Audio. The last two were inspired to sit alongside the Brickheaven Office Suite, Ben Tower, and Meehan Marketing.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Wow!!! looks great, you buildings are looking perfect as always. Keep it up.

[shinkansen1 84]

I absolutely love what you have here, especially the Davenport Building. Classic buildings like that always excite me.

[Amthaak 1,501]

Perfect for me!

[Delecto 941]

Ready for uploading!

[gutterclub 2,729]

Debar & Home, Esq is m,y fave, superb work!

[Francis90b 748]

I like W2W BATs, but don't see myself designing them; there are so many better BATters out there for that purpose...

But if people were to build an office palace like the ones you designed there, in such a narrow footprint, they would probably try to use all of the available space, and in most cases they would probably go very close to a W2W configuration.

  Edited January 13, 2012 by Francis90b  

[gutterclub 2,729]

I believe Madhatters niche, and a great one at that..is not for urban realism as such but to offer imo better alternatives to the Maxis buildings that grow like weeds..which weren't wall to wall

[Jasoncw 11,949]

I think that the Maxis buildings weren't w2w is their biggest flaw (otherwise I think the Maxis buildings are all pretty good). w2w is just how buildings of those styles were built, unless they took up an entire block, or if they had an alley running along them. You said you don't see yourself designing w2w buildings, but that's actually what you're doing right now, you're just not making them w2w, lol

Maybe you don't have to model the blind walls, but if you just scaled them to fit the whole width of the lot and used a standard setback, I think it would make them 100 times more useful. Although I think they'd also be great as true w2ws as well.

[Fresh Prince of Wmbg 44]

Hey madhatter, I'm liking Debar & Home, Esq and Palladino Design.

I think they're similar to buildings from the Information-Era Small Cities in Rise of Nations. Here's the example; top picture:

Link: http://ron.heavengames.com/gameinfo/buildings/xbuildingspage.php?action=Turkish&seltype=3&selage=Information

  Edited January 21, 2012 by Fresh Prince of Wmbg  

[madhatter106 3,931]

Aaron Graham, Fresh Prince of Wmg, and Amthaak - thanks!

shinkansen1 - many thanks - indeed, Davenport was one of my favorites to model and texture.

Delecto - not yet ready for uploading - I'm sure they need some additional tweaks and details which I am overlooking. Plus there's the modding and query writing and testing....oh, it will be a while before they see the light of day on the STEX...

gutterclub - Debar & Home is based off a research image I found online ages ago - I would never have come up with something that looks even remotely like that if I hadn't been working from an image for inspiration. I must say it didn't come off too shabby. I dread the nightlighting on it, though!

Francis90b, Jasoncw, and gutterclub - here's the thing for me about wall-to-wall - I'm not interested in them, so I don't make them and I don't download them, partly because of what Jason mentioned (SC4 wasn't designed for it) and partly because I never end up doing a city that uses them. These last few are pretty close to being wall-to-wall anyway, so they are "very close to a W2W configuration" as you have said before. As such, people can use them to sprinkle in between as they see fit, or let them grow "free" like their Maxis equivalents and inspirations. But I don't design them or model them with wall-to-wall in mind, and it's something I probably will never end up doing consciously or actively. They are what they are - I leave W2W to the experts within the teams that match their style; I could never even begin to do them as good as other more qualified BATters, nor mold my style to fit within the community's W2W constraints/requirements. So, sad as it might seem for some people out there, no W2W from me...

Anyhoo....

Here's Davenport with nightlighting...

And here's Cook, Crookes & King with nightlighting...

And Fox Financial with nightlights...

And finally, Palladino with nightlights...

I'm particularly proud of the last - big walls of glass are tricky to do nightlights with in gmax, as you don't have as many great tricks to play with as you do with 3dsMax, it seems. But I like the end result - this building was based on some strange little narrow building I found somewhere online while doing an image search ages ago.

I haven't had the stomach to do the nightlights for Debar & Home - so much to do with that one. Ugh, I can't even think of it right now....

[Sgt Pepper 864]

It's MOAR!

Glad to see some of these again. Really like them.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

I'm glad your back at working, I wonder how long will you be back at this. I love the little building you know I will download these once I see them in the STEX. I only think is are there going to be a little roof junk in the tops of the building with the flat roof?

[zahrul3 472]

They're impressive really, its quite rare to see gMax buildings being released as most people have moved to 3DSMAX, and make it look like it was made in 3ds.

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Wow! I think Davenport and Palladino are my favourites. Especially Palladino has so much detail to look at... CC&K and FF could really use a tiny bit more detail - maybe some modest roof junk or an occasional retrofitted A/C unit or something to give them that detailed and "lived in" vibe that most of your BATs convey in such a convincing manner.

Either way, it's always good to see updates from you!

[Ion_Cannon 677]

Nice nightlights, but I must echo what T Wrecks suggested. The modelling for all of the buildings is fantastic, but FF and CC&K look a little bare without roof junk. Good to see you around though

[Sgt Pepper 864]

They're impressive really, its quite rare to see gMax buildings being released as most people have moved to 3DSMAX, and make it look like it was made in 3ds.

Me and Madhatter will nevar makez teh switch to da 3ds. Mawx

[Gn_leugim 858]

They're impressive really, its quite rare to see gMax buildings being released as most people have moved to 3DSMAX, and make it look like it was made in 3ds.

Me and Madhatter will nevar makez teh switch to da 3ds. Mawx

I think you forgot someone XD

Anyway, very nice buildings

[Jack_wilds 550]

I like the Davenport Bldg best...

[madhatter106 3,931]

On ‎4‎/‎10‎/‎2012 at 4:26 PM, Sgt Pepper said:

On ‎4‎/‎10‎/‎2012 at 1:28 AM, zahrul3 said:

They're impressive really, its quite rare to see gMax buildings being released as most people have moved to 3DSMAX, and make it look like it was made in 3ds.

Me and Madhatter will nevar makez teh switch to da 3ds. Mawx

Dats rite. 3dzBwahahahamax is 4 teh modellin haxxors, gmax is teh way 4 us 1337 modelurz who likes da challenge, amirite? 10100011101101!1010!10101111!

Yeah, I know that CC&K and FF need some extra "oomph" - they need roof access hatches and whatnot, plus an extra detail here and there to make them sparkle. Such revisions will be forthcoming...

Here's another from this series that I found on my laptop - I think my original idea was to do three "old school" buildings (FF, Davenport, and CC&K) and three more modern-looking buildings (Debar, Palladino, and this one).

I think I'm calling this one Slade Global Corp...

[shinkansen1 84]

Definitely fond of the generic office look of this little building!

[Sgt Pepper 864]

Aren't we clever?

Diggin' the shape of this one. Simplistic yet artistic.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Lovely little building, I love the balcony on this one.

[BIWDC 2,296]

Those are some Nice Buildings

[Gn_leugim 858]

simple, with style and nice. forgot the tow other adjectives to be 5*, bat it is anyway a 5* so far .p

[madhatter106 3,931]

Thanks everyone. Here's a first crack at lighting Debar & Home...not too awful for gmax.

I haven't even gotten around to texturing the last one yet. In good time...

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Keep it up, you know when it's a great batter because all you can say on there render is damn that look so darn good, I can not find any errors, unless my eye sight is bad.

[zahrul3 472]

There's one thing i like about your BATs;

- They don't stand out

- No dependencies

- Come in packs

- Are varied

- Looks like they were rendered in 3dsMAX, actually they're in gMax

- Does not grow like weeds, nor does it replace Maxis buildings(it fits well actually)

[T Wrecks 10,210]

"not too awful for gmax"? Well, yes, I guess they might do if we don't have a choice.

[madhatter106 3,931]

Thanks, all - it might be just little old gmax, but it gets the job done. Here's some texturing on Slade - I think I need to play around with hue, saturation, and contrast on it...not quite happy using the recycled textures from older BATs of mine.

I also chopped off an entire floor out of it - it was looking too tall and narrow in comparison to the others of its ilk...