Bus Lane mod

[Tennismaster1 1]

Not bad 6underground something like that would be good as well as a complete bus lane. and the road marking sound like a good idea too could you show a picture of what u had in mind.

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

i've been thinking of other ways to make this possible but none seem workable, until now, i just had another idea. if we cannot place lots side-by-side when they are plopped over networks, and we cannot lay a network over lots that are already plopped side-by-side, then how about laying network over network?! surely this must be possible because we can already do this with existing networks; and isn't there a mod which allows EL rail to be placed running along the top of road..? is that infact only a single network, combining road texture and EL structure, and combining road and EL paths? or is it actually two seperate networks running on the same tiles?

my single question i guess would be is it possible to place ANT network tiles side-by-side then run a road-type network over it (or the reverse, place the ANT tiles after the road network)? i apologise for the questions and appreciate anyone's time and advice. i wish i had more knowledge myself so i would need to ask less!

 

here is a quick diagram of what i think may be possible if we can use the ANT network in this way!

http://home.btconnect.com/SMD/simcityfiles/IDEA.JPG align=baseline>

[nooneatall 6]

Well, I don't exactly understand what you are trying to do, but I think in this case, making puzzle pieces would be the easiest solution. The one thing that I don't like about them is the fact that the way they work, they change the colour of the texture, and I haven't figured out myself how to correct them, but I'm sure that smoncrie would know what changes need to be made, as he did them for most of the NAM pieces.
The only other problem with the puzzle pieces is creating the PATHs, I am unsure how to tackle them. But, I'm sure if I do a little bit of reading, I'll eventually learn.

P.S.: I'm willing to help with this project, if you haven't noticed, lol.

-nooneatall

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

i'm so bad at explaining complicated things what i'm trying to say is. we have three BUS LANE menu items which we can use to plop bus-lanes onto road networks:

 

BUS-LANE START PIECE

BUS-LANE PIECE

BUS-LANE PIECE WITH BUS LANE ROAD MARKING PAINTED ON

 

they are like three single 1x1 ANT network pieces - but there are actually dozens of each - and when you plop one of these three pieces you will get different results depending on where you plop them: i.e. it will determine which bus-lane texture & paths IID to use based on the IID of the road network you place it ontop of in that 1x1 city tile........ if it is not a legal place to plop a bus-lane then you will get nothing

 

if the above is possible and they can be placed over road networks then ideally (again, if possible) all of the ANT network pieces will be a simple bus-lane texture on a transparant floor - which will appear over the road's texture

 

then each of the many ANT networks pieces that could appear will have identical paths to the piece they are placed ontop of; but just one lane. plopping them will ALSO need to be able to apply a new path to the road network piece below. i am unsure if the latter part (modifying another network's path) can be done at all?

 

however, if all the above is possible, we will have fully functional bus lane overlays using the ANT, which also apply new paths to the textures below

 

-----

 

if modifying the paths of, or applying new paths to, another network is impossible then ANT puzzle pieces looks like the ONLY option for bus lanes

 

if it is impossible to make the mod tell the game which pieces to use automatically from what road network piece you plop the bus-lane ontop of, then ANT puzzle pieces look like the ONLY option

 

.....for me, this is how things currently stand. but as i say, my knowledge is quite limited to be honest and a lot of things are assumed which is why i need clarification from others

[the7trumpets 10]

Believe it or not, I have considered this very idea in the past. To make a long story short, the transit and especially the automata system are simply not designed for this, so most of my attempts at designing a system like this have ended in headaches

 

First to answer a few questions:

 

1. Are paths defined in the path files by vehicle type? Can we use this to separate the paths of busses from cars?
   
   • Answer:
     Paths are defined by 'transit' type. The valid transit types are (in no apparent order) walk, drive, heavy rail, subway, lightrail, and monorail. Freight train and commuter rail are copied from heavy rail paths. Truck, Bus, and Car paths are copied from drive paths. Therefore there is no way to define one path for busses and anothe for cars.
     
2. Is it possible to use speed=0 settings to limit which vehicles can travel on a particular lane of a particular transit tile?
   

• Answer:
  No and No. Setting transit speed to zero in the tranit exemplar means that vehicle cannot pass through any tile of that network.
  

Can a transit enabled lot have a base or overlay texture base on which network tile it is placed upon?

• Answer:
  Not exactly, I'll elaborate on how transit enabled lots decide where they can be placed: A transit enabled lot can be placed when any network tiles which occupies the land which the lot is being placed on conform to the RUL codes defined in a particular rep of the lotconfig property for that lot. In practice this means it's relatively easy to create a lot that requires a particular situation of network tiles, but it's not possible to create a single lot that will 'conform' to the network tiles underneath it.
  

(Assumed) Transit lots cannot be inline directly next to each other.

• This is actually not entirely true. A few moths ago someone (smoncrie? can't remember now) posted a post in the R&D forum describing how create transit lots which could be plopped end to end. It basically has to do with how you code the RUL code lotconfig lines in the transit lot lot exemplar.

So what does this all mean?

The best idea I could offer is to make transit enabled lots for straight and diagonal versions of each network and code the RUL lines in the lotconfig properties so they can be plopped adjacent to each other. I suppose it would also require a start/end peice for each orthagonal and diagonal network you want. As you can see, the required number of textures/lots quickly baloons, but it seems like it would be feasible to tackle.

Unfortunately I cannot think of a solution to separate bus and car/truck automata. Anything you define in the path file will apply to all three (bus, car, truck). The only thing I can think of is extending the bus lane into a bus stop tile to the side of the network and coding the paths so that only busses can enter and exit that tile. The automata engine will only draw cars/trucks in the right lane if it can continue for the next 3 tiles. Since within three tiles it enters a bus only 'bus stop' tile, car/truck traffic simply won't draw in the right lane, but will in the left. Unfortunately this is a sub-par solution since a bus stop every 150 feet taking up a tile of your city isn't exactly what the doctor ordered, it's just the only solution I can think of at the moment. The 3 tile look-ahead number is configurable, but it has quite a bit of impact on game performance. Once you get above 5, everything crawls even with low or medium automata settings.

Understand that I am almost always a staunch supporter of using transit network solutions rather than transit lot solutions for things like this, I just cannot think of a way to do it without a lot. It is true that you could block non-bus traffic with the ANT, or an ant/road intersection piece, but this would block car and truck traffic through all lanes, not just the bus lane.

 

Feel free to PM me if you have additional questions, I'm just away more than usual with RLS right now. Good luck to you!

 

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

T7T thanks for checking out the thread and posting here i tried to send you a PM but i'm not sure it sent or not, the PM page was acting up a bit just a couple of extra questions were included in the PM

[cjmarshall 0]

Date: 8/17/2005 10:17:59 PM
Author: the7trumpets
...
(Assumed) Transit lots cannot be inline directly next to each other.

• 
  
• This is actually not entirely true. A few moths ago someone (smoncrie? can't remember now) posted a post in the R&D forum describing how create transit lots which could be plopped end to end. It basically has to do with how you code the RUL code lotconfig lines in the transit lot lot exemplar.

So what does this all mean?

The best idea I could offer is to make transit enabled lots for straight and diagonal versions of each network and code the RUL lines in the lotconfig properties so they can be plopped adjacent to each other. I suppose it would also require a start/end peice for each orthagonal and diagonal network you want. As you can see, the required number of textures/lots quickly baloons, but it seems like it would be feasible to tackle.

...

quote>

As far as I understand things there is a problem with this idea. I played with adjacent transit enabled lots last year when I was working on modifying the Marrast underpasses. I was able to set up the rep 15 value so that the lots could be plopped next to each other and by using custom SC4Path files was able to get the automata to pass from one to the other. Unfortunately no matter what I did I couldn't get the pathfinding engine to recognize that there was a valid route between the two lots and so no actual traffic could flow . It is my belief that this limitation of not considering transit routes between two lots is also what causes the problems with residential buildings with transit enabled lots in front of them as well. As I understand it then, a purely lot-based approach to this would have to be eye-candy only.

What does work though is placing lots set up like this next to NAM puzzle pieces as the pathfinding engine is capable of finding a route from a lot onto a puzzle piece. This is how many of the GLR stations are set up. A hybrid approach (i.e puzzle pieces for the main bus lane sections and lots for the start/end, bus-stops etc) would therefore be worth considering.

[hammo 2]

I just found a bus stop with bus lane on the STEX.
Maybe you could use this as a base (if you ask the author nicely).

https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=13369

[the7trumpets 10]

First let me reiterate something: The main stumbling block I see in any approach to this is that separating bus from car/truck traffic is nearly impossibe if not impossible.

Date: 8/17/2005 2:33:40 PM
Author: edcase2k4-thugangel1983

if we cannot place lots side-by-side when they are plopped over networks, and we cannot lay a network over lots that are already plopped side-by-side, then how about laying network over network?! surely this must be possible because we can already do this with existing networks; and isn't there a mod which allows EL rail to be placed running along the top of road..? is that infact only a single network, combining road texture and EL structure, and combining road and EL paths? or is it actually two seperate networks running on the same tiles?

my single question i guess would be is it possible to place ANT network tiles side-by-side then run a road-type network over it (or the reverse, place the ANT tiles after the road network)?

quote>

When two networks are drawn intersecting each other, there is a RUL file which tells the game which network tile to use in each situation. It looks at the RUL tile side definitions of the first network and the RUL tile side definitions of the second network, runs through this long text file of 'intersection solutions' and spits out an answer if there is one defined. Otherwise, you see the infamous red line and you are unable to draw the second network.

Once the game determines which tile to use as the intersection it does not combine, change, modify, or have anything to do with the path files from the two individual tiles. The new intersection tile has its very own path file. This design is in fact what caused many of the transit bugs post-rush hour release. Since there are literally thousands of possible intersection tiles, there is one path file for all of those, and it's easy to write a '2' instead of a '1' somewhere creating a bug.

For your application, this means that allowing busses to drive on the ANT but not cars and then defining a right lane only path file for ANT pieces and a left lane only path file for roads won't work when they are placed on top of each other since a new custom path file will be used for that transit tile.

The only feasible way I can see to separate bus and car traffic is to design the system some way so that the bus lane goes through a transit enabled lot tile which the car/truck lane does not. That way you can define that only busses can enter/exit that lane.

The advantage of using lots instead of network tiles is that you can define which vehicle type is allowed to enter/exit each tile side in addition to defining the paths. If you were to try to create a drive through bus station that was a network tile, there would be no way to allow busses through and block cars/trucks. With a lot however, this is possible.

If what cjmarshal said is true, doing that gets a bit more complex. You would have to get really creative and create transit enabled lots which have that strange 'overlay other adjacent tiles with an overlay texture' feature, which may or may not be buggy, I've never tried it, just heard about it. Then you would create transit enabled lots which you place every other tile and draw the network through them.

Visually, a oneway or road would HAVE to be two tiles wide, because you need one tile to allow cars/trucks through and one lane to allow only busses through. The diagonal versions would have to be one more tile wide as well. Likewise, avenues would have to be three tiles wide.


I just hope I have answered more questions than I have caused confusion.

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

'tis a shame because if the game was coded to still use seperate paths when networks cross it would change everything..!

 

i guess there's two ways to do it with lots:

 

- two-tiles-wide using one tile of road, one tile of bus lane lot.. or three lanes wide using two tile for the avenue and one tile for the bus lane lot

 

or

 

- IF we can place lots side-by-side on top of a network, we could always create a new ANT network road and avenue but only had paths for one lane (made for all other road traffic - bus speed turned to 0), then IF we can create paths for the lot plopped on top (?) then that can have the paths for the other lane (with all road traffic speeds turned to 0 except bus)

 

the second way would mean we don't have to have an extra tile alongside the roads but it would be a lot more work (if its even possible?) as new puzzle-piece road networks would need to be created too!!! -- but i guess that would actually be no more work than creating a bus-only puzzle-piece network

 

what would be best (if the second solution is a possibility) is to copy RULes and paths and textures exactly, where possible, from the original road network pieces. although we could edit some to make less puzzle pieces -- as some maxis textures are very similar and if changed a little bit we could narrow it down to just made of basic straights, 45degree curves, 90 degree curves, and all the t-intersections and crossroads... then we would have to edit original paths to remove one lane. and alter RULes as necessary, while also ensuring it is possible to connect this up to existing networks

 

then once this bus-lane-ready road network has been layed we could plop puzzle-piece lots of the bus-lanes over them.... if the pieces don't match you will just get the red invalidity square until you TAB through to the correct piece

 

all of this may be impossible though.. i don't know if the Lot plopped on top can have its own set of paths in the first place...? OR would the exact same problem still be apparant: that when a lot is placed over the network - a new unique path must be created for that to work and it STILL cannot use two entirely different paths on the same tile?

 

=======

 

out of personal interest and i suppose unrelated to this project: i would like to know how the NAM actually works regarding a particular situation -- in the case of road-type networks that cross over eachother; how are the paths kept seperate where they cross, if they have to be together in one path file?

[smoncrie 43]

Like the7trumpets and cjmarshall I can see no way to do the bus lanes unless the bus lane goes through a lot on a separate tile.  This is because only lots can treat buses differently from cars and trucks.

A lot can only specify if buses can pass through the entire lot in a given direction (e.g. north-south, east-west).  If more precision is needed (e.g. different lanes) the lot can use a path file, (A different path file can be used for each tile in the lot.)  Unfortunately, paths treat buses cars and trucks as if they were all the same.

An additional restriction is that traffic can not go directly from one lot to another.  My own tests verify this.  You can do it so that automata will pass between adjacent lots (for a short time) and UDI will pass between adjacent lots, but the traffic simulator will still not recognize it.  (As a side note, custom paths and rep 15 are not needed, all that is needed is the correct RUL value in rep 13 for the transit enabled lot edge tiles.)

 

Edit: Plopping anything on a network tile completly replaces it, including it's paths.

Perhaps a short description of path files would also help clarify things.

A path consists of several parameters and a list of 3d coordinates.  One of the parameters specifies the type of vehicle that can use the path.  For this parameter a value of 1 means car, truck and bus, 2 means Sims, 3 means passenger and freight trains, etc.   Note that means that if a bus can use a given path, so can cars and trucks.  Vehicles following the path travel successively through each of the 3d coordinate points listed.

A path file contains 1 or more paths.  For example the path file for a straight road network tile would contain four paths: one for each lane and one for each sidewalk (for Sims). An intersection has many more paths; one for each possible route through the intersection.  If two different transit types are intersecting, the path file contains paths for both transit types. Each network tile uses one and only one path file.

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

thanks for clarifying all of the smoncrie

it is pretty obvious i have been desperately determined to find a way to make the bus lanes without losing the tiles running alongside the network. unfortunately every concept that i have managed to come up with has not been possible. if i had the knowledge at the time i would have known right away that they are no-go ideas and would not have pursued them

 

i myself am completely stumped at how to get around the problem with the traffic simulator not recognizing an on-going path through Lots.. actually, as usual, an idea has sparked into my head..

 

---------

 

could the solution be:

 

- to create an ANT network consisting of road puzzle pieces with paths: made of straights, bends, intersections, etc. as outlined in my last post..

 

- but these roads come in two varieties.. (in the case of a straight piece) one is a single lane running against the left-edge of a tile, the other is two lanes running in opposite directions with a divider between, and the lanes running against the left-edge and right-edge of a tile.. this becomes the new road network

 

- we also create a single Bus-Lane start-piece Lot which has a bus-lane running against the right-edge of a tile -- and will allow traffic through but all speeds are also turned to 0 except for buses - just like the HOV only Lot. we then place this Bus-Lane start piece wherever we desire, alongside one of the new road networks ideally

 

- we also must create identical puzzle-pieces as the road network with their own similar paths, allowing all vehicles, no speeds changed, but THESE road puzzle-pieces are textured with the Bus Lane... and run along the right-side of the tile!...

 

can anyone who understand all that see where this is leading?

 

the two new ANT networks now operate independantly on two seperate tiles side by side.. but they appear together like one network split directly across the middle of two tiles!! and they function with seperate paths! and the single bus-only lot and the start of bus-lanes should prevent any other vehicles entering the new ANT road network which is textured as the bus lane

 

we then just add some ped walkways and such to the sides of the single-lane bus-lane ANT network and single-lane road ANT network where there is wasted space. each side of the roads would have an even width sidewalk

 

and it would have to functionally and visually connect to existing networks

 

please tell me this will work ? i can't see what problems there could be.. but it will be quite a lot of work (i think) and i know absolutely nothing about CREATING paths and RULes so a lot of help will be needed from others regarding this project

 

texturing is not a problem as

- myself

- 6underground

- dexter

- nooneatall

are all willing to help with this if necessary. its the other parts of the mod that we would need other people willing to help work on this in order to make this mod a reality

[the7trumpets 10]

Date: 8/18/2005 1:01:17 PM Author: edcase2k4-thugangel1983

out of personal interest and i suppose unrelated to this project: i would like to know how the NAM actually works regarding a particular situation -- in the case of road-type networks that cross over eachother; how are the paths kept seperate where they cross, if they have to be together in one path file?

quote>

Well, about 80% of the time there is no problem because the tile entrance sides are different for the two paths. For instance, when all the road paths underneath a highway enter on side 1, and all the highway paths enter on side 2 or side 0, there is no possibility of cars 'jumping' from a road to a higher level.

 

Every once in a while though, there is a problem when two paths which exit different tile sides enter on the same tile side. Maxis' solution has been to code custom exception rules into the exe, so we have no way of solving such errors in custom created content if they exist, or fixing existing bugs (almost all of which were fixed in rush hour update 1).

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

that sounds encouraging T7T with regards to my last post's concept.. after posting i thought about how traffic entering a road with a bus lane (where traffic has to actually cross over a bus lane) would be prevented from allow traffic to jump from one path to the other one. hopefully that shouldn't be too much of a problem - although with my latest brainwave, i don't think it is relevant any more:

this also makes me realise one other potential problem (not an obstructional problem, though) and that is when we have a T-junction where a road ends at a T-junction on a road with bus lane, any bus traffic emerging from this T-junction would not be able to enter the bus lane - unless the path was connected to the bus lane too; but this would mean any traffic could enter the bus lane including cars and freight. so either way its not a perfect result. the only REAL solution would be to make the paths allow any traffic to enter the bus-lane when emerging from the T-junction, but you would have to place another bus-only lot somewhere after the junction so it acts as a block to other traffic and they will therefore use the other lane in the other tile... maybe the solution is to make the BUS LANE road marking into the bus-only lot - so as long as you place one of these after intersections in the bus-lane side of the two tile wide network it should prevent other traffic using the bus lane (or at least make them change lane soon after entering the bus-lane)

i hope i'm on to something with this technique of creating new two seperate ANT networks which run respectively along the left-side of one tile, and the right-side of one tile... and using a bus-only lot on one tile, at least once, between intersections instead of the bus-lane ANT network puzzle piece - to prevent other traffic using that lane

-----

here is an image showing some example ANT puzzle pieces and one example Lot - that i hope makes it clearer: on how i now think we can create this mod using ANT network puzzle pieces (as they allow the traffic simulator to recoqnise the paths and their on-going routes) and in addition having a BUS-ONLY lot which is used at the start and between intersections to block other traffic using the bus lane....forcing the traffic simulator / automata and pathfinding to use the other lane for cars

http://home.btconnect.com/SMD/simcityfiles/EXAMPLE.bmp align=baseline>

[6underground 11]

I like this idea, it sounds very promising!

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

what i really need at the moment is someone to help me extract necessary files from the DATs and convert FSHs to a bitmap for the texture and a bitmap for the alpha channel (two seperate files for each FSH) --- this would help for both this mod and the UK road textures mod!

 

to begin with it would really help me if this was done for the one-way road textures:

they are all in SimCity_3.dat

 

in total there are 424 textures i need (848 files because of two seperate bitmaps)

 

to find out the instanceIDs of the ones with no wealth, open the Reader goto Tools > Texture Viewer and expand the Street/Road/Rail/Highway option and expand the Zoom 5 option.. click on One-Way Road and the textures will appear on the right. all of those textures will need turning into two BMPs each - but in addition, so will all those with an indentical InstanceID except for the second last digit. this digit determines the wealth. 0=no wealth, 1=low wealth, 2=medium wealth, 3=high wealth...

 

so for example, one texture which appears in the reader's Texture Viewer is 0x09005704. in addition to this texture, 0x09005714, 0x09005724, 0x09005734 will also be required!!

 

any help with this would be great, i am converting files slowly but while working on textures and other things. i don't need them in any particular order (but they will ALL be needed for the UK road mod if not all for the bus lane mod) and either be uploaded so i can download them. or sent to me. any small amount of help is appreciated because if a lot of people want to help it will all add up

 

as i said - this mass conversion will not just be strictly for helping with the bus-lane mod.. but also for the uk road mod

[nooneatall 6]

I'm presuming that you would preffer the .BMPs, as opposed to .FSH files?

As well, wouldn't you only require the no wealth texture, the only difference in between would be the sidewalk texture/ grass if it applies. In this case, it could be quicker to do the textures, get all wealths done with one texture, and if we absolutely require different wealths, simply change the texture (sidewalk and/or grass) on the no wealth texture, then change its instance? Does this make sense?

A bit off-topic, but I can also help make the textures themselves if you wish, for the UK Roads MOD, which might make for a faster progress if more people were working on textures.

[Dexter 40]

As I said, I can help, but I also need help to be sent files. I can't use the reader because it crashes my PC, and I wouldn't know where to start anyway. My email is here.

simtropolisdexter@hotmail.com

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

nooneatall: you are right that INITALLY all is needed is the no wealth texutres; but you are also right that we would need to create the other wealths too by changing the sidewalks (and sometimes the alpha maps too) - and to do this it is easiest to use existing textures but placing the road part of the no wealth texture over them. so ideally, no wealth is what i need in BMP first but all the other textures will be needed in BMP format too later anyway... so its people's own decision if they want to start saving the other wealths as BMPs too (for later use) - howver that would be more helpful with the UK road mod, less important regarding the Bus Lane mod

helping with the textures would be great once i enlist what puzzle pieces are required for this - but i need a little bit of time to work that out..

 

i seem to be having trouble with saving one-way textures from SimCity_3.DAT. none of the zoom 5's have alpha maps anyone else noticed this????

 

i guess it would be a good idea to just to help get all the no wealth one-way road texture pieces saved as a BMP and each one's alpha map saved as a BMP too. if anyone can send me those 200 or so converted files; i'll be able to prepare the ones which are required for this mod - so that they are ready to be modified with the bus-lane, new sidewalks, etc. you will all be able to help then with creating the new textures as i will post here the pre-transformation puzzle pieces, if that makes sense  and the rest of the converted one-way-road texture pieces would go towards helping make the UK road mod...

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

just to avoid confusion:

 

only the no-wealth pieces converted into BMPs is needed initally to make the bus lane mod. we can add custom sidewalks for the other wealths later

 

all wealths pieces converted into BMPs is needed for the UK road mod only

[Tennismaster1 1]

hello everyone any updates?

[SHADD0W09 2]

Hi hope this will be compatable with nam love the idea

[baabaaloo 0]

couldnt this just be done like the no trucks?

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

that's the idea but we can only apply it to one entire tile, not just one lane of a tile! so the only solution is to seperate the lanes onto two seperate tile

 

as for updates: i still need all no-wealth one-way textures converted into BMP format before i can sort out what pieces we need to create. and i think i need to reinstall simcity4 to get the original textures back in the DATs as my one-way roads on the closest zoom seem to have no alpha maps

[Swamper77 90]

Date: 8/21/2005 12:00:00 PM Author: edcase2k4-thugangel1983

as for updates: i still need all no-wealth one-way textures converted into BMP format before i can sort out what pieces we need to create. and i think i need to reinstall simcity4 to get the original textures back in the DATs as my one-way roads on the closest zoom seem to have no alpha maps

quote>

Ed,

That's how they appear on my end as well. Somehow the game allows the sidewalks to show through, but I have no idea how it does it.

-Swamper77

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

o, that's odd! thanks swamper that's good to know, for me anyway -- i don't have to go reinstalling now.. because that means the default Simcity_3.dat file must have no alpha maps for zoom 5 of one-way roads. the alpha map is what determines the level of transparency of each pixel in the FSH texture - and as the alpha maps on zoom 5 are blank - the sidewalks show through

strange though because the alpha maps are there on zooms 1-4; and thus unlike zoom 5 the sidewalks do not show through.. o well  i guess i'll have to create my own alpha maps for those particular textures

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

okay, here's an update for texturers: (all images of textures posted here from this point will be in BMP format already (non-jpeg) so details are preserved)

for the first intersection to be made, i have it broken into puzzle pieces..i will post what puzzle pieces are required here and what we need changed.

 

here is a standard left-hand lane. save it to your computer as a BMP; then what we need is:

- this texture changed into a simple red tarmac bus lane - no text required, though

- a white/greyish solid line will be needed along the right-hand side where the partial broken line is viewable. this solid line should only be about 2 pixels wide (with one pixel on the left-side of the line faded)

- on the left border of the red tarmac (border of the road and sidewalk) there should be a double-yellow line each of about 2-3 pixels wide within the red tarmac. (no-parking lines)

- lastly, a custom sidewalk will need to be designed for the three different wealths. it is best if these custom sidewalks are also kept in their own files aswell, so that they can be replicated on other textures

sorry for all the specifics, but those same rules can then be applied to the creation of other pieces

 

 

in addition we will also need some to create pathfinding for each piece. the paths required for this piece are as below:

it may look a bit odd, but it serves a purpose of allowing this piece to be used for straights, as well as for all vareities of T-junctions/intersections it also allows buses to change lane into the car lane (if necessary, e.g. appraoaching a junction where the bus is turning right)

 

i hope all is understood..

 

as for street props - i'm not sure how these work, but i'm thinking it may be best if intersections are ploppable complete structures - rather than build from puzzle-pieces. like the overpasses in the NAM which are made from several pieces. i don't know if members would prefer to have ploppable complete intersections, or just build them manually from puzzle-pieces? if they are ploppable complete structures, does anyone know if we can choose which props appear depending on what type of intersection? or are the props fixed for each puzzle piece?? i know nothing about props.. if it turns out that the set of props are determined by each puzzlepiece itself - and you cannot create props that are part of a larger structure made of puzzlepieces? then the above pathfinding MAY also change (for other reasons) so any potential creators of the pathfinding may wish to hold back before attempting to work on anything

 

what i kinda need to know: is if we can use puzzle-pieces as parts of (more than one type of) larger structure; but with different props used with different types of complete structures??? if this is not the case then we would need to create several copies of the same puzzlepiece textures - with only different props. but we would definitely have the make intersections ploppable as 2x1 and 2x2 pieces...

[edcase2k4-thugangel1983 1]

in the mean-time i will be making the other two required textures for the first intersection to be made. and i will post what paths are required later

[6underground 11]

Something i just cooked up.... Comments as always...

[Tennismaster1 1]

good comeing along nicely!