A low-density street sidewalks style mod?

[Magneto 316]

HEllo everyone,

What I'd like is to have street sidewalks to be always the same regardless of density zoned but with the low density appearance. It is somewhat the opposite (of DarthSith's *SEE EDIT instead of replacing grass with plain concrete I want it to stay, just as shown below:

So I glanced at his mod (the one for streets) but all I could find were FSHs files, nothing else.

My question, is it possible to do such a mod with some simple "scripting" orthe only way is to have a million of FSH files with the correct IID to override appearance?

Since density is tied to a single digit in the ID, I guess it is possible but I could be very wrong here...

Any suggestions how to do this are highly welcomed, thanks!

*Edit: wrong mod, I was referring to

  Edited August 26, 2012 by Magneto  

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

Sidewalks are dictated by one single texture per wealth level and they apply to every non-rail transit tile; They're completely separate from the wealthification grass. In fact, if you look at the textures for for, say, Streets, you'll see blank areas where the sidewalks go, but nothing on the sidewalks themselves. This is also why RHW networks have wealthification: To cover up the sidewalks that would pop up otherwise. Ever seen the RHW-6C diagonals? That's what RHW would look like if it didn't have wealthification grass. Not really pretty.

Something along the line of should make the sidewalks (but not the grass) uniform; No more dingy sidewalks and no more pink sidewalks. It copies and assigns the medium-wealth texture to both the low and high wealth texture.

If you're referring to keeping the wealth grass identical across each wealth level, open up the spoiler.

Wealth grass, on the other hand, are dictated by the transit textures themselves. Excluding mipmaps (zoom levels 0-3), there are usually four main textures (wealth levels 0-3) that control wealth grass (which I usually call wealthification).

The last four digits of a network tile instance ID is somewhere along this format: PPWZ, with PP being the piece ID, W being the wealth level, and Z being the zoom level.

If you open up Simcity_3.DAT, and find the 0x05###### IID range, you'll find the textures for the Street network. Its IID range is from 0x0500#### to 0x0501####.

Since there isn't any sort of INRUL editing done to the Street Network from the NAM (except for Roundabouts and Diagonal Streets), all of the textures that apply to SC4 unmodded will apply to SC4 with the NAM.

To make two (or all) wealth levels identical, you simply need to copy all the textures whose seventh digit is, for example, 2, paste it into a new blank DAT (File --> New), change the seventh digit to 1 (Tools --> TGI Editor, and in the window that comes up, under instance, replace the seventh digit with 1, select the textures you wish to change below, and click Apply), and repeat the process for wealth digit 3.

This is assuming you don't have the PNGs for each texture or don't have a custom PNG (See below.)

Since the game can't handle Diagonal Streets without having to resort to INRUL modification, you'll then need to redo the same process for Diagonal Streets. Repeat the process described above, but with NetworkAddonMod_Diagonal_Streets_Plugin.DAT (It's in your NAM's Plugins folder and the IID range is 0x5F5#####).

Time-consuming? Yes, but this is the reality of texture modification. Of course, it'd take even longer if you were making your own textures from scratch, but the process of putting them into DATs is completely different and a whole lot easier (there's null45's Batch PNG to FSH program). This is just copying an existing texture so that it replaces another existing texture. Here's a tutorial on texture editing: http://sc4devotion.c...hp?topic=4140.0 The process is completely different, and the programs used (except for the Reader) are also completely different. Ideally, you'd wanna be using Batch PNG to FSH and the Reader and something on the order of Photoshop or equivalent.

And for reference, the standard format for (almost) every transit network IID is 0xMNPPPPWZ, with M being 0 for non-NAM tiles and 5 for NAM tiles, N being the network or project ID, PPPP being the piece ID, W being the wealth ID, and Z being the zoom ID. For the wealth ID, 0 for zero-wealth/unzoned, 1-3 for low to high-wealth low density, 4-6 for low to high-wealth high-density (which is usually unused and the unzoned texture is used in its place), and 7 for agricultural (also unused). 8-F is essentially 0-7 repeated, but that's used in only very special situations in NAM-only networks (asymmetrical network crossings, for example). For the zoom ID, it's 0-4 (which should be obvious). 5-9 is typically used for networks that have overhangs, and A-E is used as a textural reference for when the network in question is crossing under an elevated network (Street x Elevated Rail crossing) so that the crossing model can have a texture to refer to.

For the record, the only time you want to use 4-6 for the wealth level is if you want to change the high-density wealth textures to something else. As of today, RHW is the only transit network whose IID scheme also includes wealth IDs 4-6. This is to cover up the sidewalks when you're zoning very close to high-density zoning. It also means you can theoretically have high-density wealth grass, if that was what you were aiming for.

  Edited August 27, 2012 by Ganaram Inukshuk  

[Magneto 316]

Well, I already have the white sidewalk mod but your instructions in the spoiler are exactly what I was looking for! The more you have control...the more you're addicted

Thanks a lot

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

Let's just say that the point of me just giving the instructions to perform what (to me) is a very simple DIY modding project is so that new modders can have some hands-on experience, as opposed to having a seasoned modder do all the work.

If my instructions have worked for you, it means I've done my job. Good luck.

[Magneto 316]

AGreed. Thanks for sharing GAnaram!

[Magneto 316]

It also means you can theoretically have high-density wealth grass, if that was what you were aiming for.

For the record, it worked like a charm. The only thing I find a bit dumb is that each texture has to be copied 6 times to cover each density/wealth type (I put everything at low density and medium wealth)...Isn't it possible to use some smart referencing trick to allow each texture to be used for each occurrence of the wealth range (from 1 to 6), in order to gain noticeable filesize?

[jdenm8 362]

.Isn't it possible to use some smart referencing trick to allow each texture to be used for each occurrence of the wealth range (from 1 to 6), in order to gain noticeable filesize?

No there isn't, because the game references these directly. It's looking for a FSH file with this particular IID, and nothing else will suffice, the game will flatly ignore it and use the "weathless" texture with the wealthed footpath under it instead. A good example of this is the Peg Dirt Road + STR intersection. As it doesn't have any wealth textures, the game will apply the wealthed footpath texture underneath the wealthless network texture.

[Magneto 316]

Thanks for your reply Jdenm8!

[TPB 562]

When there isn't specified wealth texture, the game uses  wealth 0, so if you dont mind grass + sidewalks on agricultural and unzoned land, you could just set the 0 texture to your desired texture and remove the rest, and all of them would look that way.

 

Of course if you are doing this as an override that's not possible : ) You would have to modify the actual NAM files, I think.

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

I think this thread's outlive it's usefulness, though. Besides, I've already made those same exact statements in a number of other threads. Let's leave this discussion over to the current texture discussion threads...