Mushy's Random BATs

[art128 4,618]

Looks like another nice little project. 

[metarvo 710]

I see you're taking a little break from industry and going commercial here.  Nice choice of architecture, and it's a plus to have more of these kind of buildings be on narrower lots.  I tend to agree with Nos.17 about MD CS-§; commercial buildings aren't automatically offices just because the density or the height increases.  It could even be a mixed-use commercial building (CS and CO) if they existed in this game, but since they don't, only one can be chosen.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Do you know what the building is actually used for? 

The vans make me feel like CS would work. Like if it was a store that sold appliances and the vans were delivery/repair vans. As much as we need more CS$ this building strikes me as being mid wealth. Can you share the google maps link too?

[matias93 7,535]

I saw it as a sort of postal office, like a delivery facility where packages are ordered and distributed. That sounds like CS-$$ or even civic in terms of modding...

[MushyMushy 3,617]

It's been determined that the building will be offered as I-HT and CS$$, with different textures of course. This white one will be the I-HT one while I'll probably go for a slightly darker color scheme for the CS$$ one.

Not a ton of progress but I'm liking the way it is shaping up.

---

Some of you might remember my two car packs...

Not a very professional image and these would fit much better on a custom texture with 6 spaces per side (like the Japanese one), but uh... progress?

[Tyberius06 12,189]

Hi!

I like the building and the cars. And as I see it's a concept of yours to BAT everything. However I would like to ask, would it be too much work if you were make separate props (the main building and the cars/vans - specially the vans, I like them very much, and would like to use them as props) and release them as a prop pack for lotters? I guess the same would apply to your previous BAT as well, but that on is ready, however it has many nice parts which would be nicer as separate props. I could use that building as well...

Anyway, I like what you are doing!

- Tyberius

[MushyMushy 3,617]

2 minutes ago, Tyberius06 said:

Hi!

I like the building and the cars. And as I see it's a concept of yours to BAT everything. However I would like to ask, would it be too much work if you were make separate props (the main building and the cars/vans - specially the vans, I like them very much, and would like to use them as props) and release them as a prop pack for lotters? I guess the same would apply to your previous BAT as well, but that on is ready, however it has many nice parts which would be nicer as separate props. I could use that building as well...

Anyway, I like what you are doing!

- Tyberius

Certainly, all of the cars I have been using on these BAT-ed lots are actually from my car pack folders, I just haven't released those packs because it's a lot of work, but as shown below the building I am working on it again. One of the vans shown in the building picture is currently modded and in the game (just didn't put in the Lot Editor picture), but I think I have 3 or 4 more vans to mod in... it's a rather extensive pack. As it stands I currently have 35 different car models in the Japanese set, but that number could fluctuate. The American set (which is quite a bit less developed) will be considerably larger due to the greater variety of cars.

[matias93 7,535]

3 hours ago, MushyMushy said:

 

Don't you think it looks a lot like a tiny version of 994 Vargas Avenue? I think some creative relotting could work genially between them two.

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Progress! 76 cars and counting...

Download size will surprisingly not be that crazy, considering the fact that these are HD cars. Current ZIP size is 1.25 MB, and I'm looking to (approximately) double the number of cars, so possibly somewhere in the 2.5+ MB range. Of course, the different angles are all separated so it'll very likely top 10 MB for all of the angles (once they are released), but that's still not terrible.

---

10 hours ago, matias93 said:

Don't you think it looks a lot like a tiny version of 994 Vargas Avenue? I think some creative relotting could work genially between them two.

It actually makes me think Jason's 220 West Congress BAT, partially due to the wall coloration, although 220 is taller than mine.

-Mushy

[Bastet69008 1,102]

Looking greaaaat!

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Nothing good has ever been posted in this thread.

 

Because it is all exceptionally great! Those cars are no exception, they are just gorgeous to look at.

[DavidDHetzel 1,816]

22 hours ago, MushyMushy said:

It's been determined that the building will be offered as I-HT and CS$$, with different textures of course. This white one will be the I-HT one while I'll probably go for a slightly darker color scheme for the CS$$ one.

Not a ton of progress but I'm liking the way it is shaping up.

Any chance for aplop version that has rail service on the left side?

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Wonderful work man!!!!!

[Edvarz 1,984]

Those car props look fantastic! I'm thinking about a couple of mods like the SFBT street mod and the SAM 1 override that could benefit from them.

[matias93 7,535]

2 hours ago, Edvarz said:

Those car props look fantastic! I'm thinking about a couple of mods like the SFBT street mod and the SAM 1 override that could benefit from them.

or going completely insane and making a replacement for all maxis car props, but that would literally take years to a single modder, given the number of props involved (combinations of cars, not only standalone vehicles)

[Edvarz 1,984]

2 hours ago, matias93 said:

or going completely insane and making a replacement for all maxis car props, but that would literally take years to a single modder, given the number of props involved (combinations of cars, not only standalone vehicles)

That would indeed be insane, they would have to either be exported as clusters, or made into clusters using model tweaker, the exemplars would need to be made RKT4, timed differently for residential and commercial clusters, added into families, etcetera... but it has been done in the past, so maybe it could happen some day?

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Hmm... not sure. You'd need clusters to mimic all the Maxis clusters there are - one car, two cars, three cars, four cars, up to the full five-car cluster. I don't know off the top pf my head how many variations Maxis made for the non-full clusters. However, I doubt that they actually did the single car in all five different spots, for example.

BUT they probably have something in place to prevent that single car from being identical all the time. Let's say they have 20 car models and 10 clusters (two for each version). Then, of course, you'd want the one-car clusters (let's pretend one has the single car parked in spot 2, the other one the single car parked in spot 4) to show different cars in the respective spots. Would you render 20 different cars for 1-car cluster 1 and another 20 different cars for 1-car cluster 2? Highly inefficient IMO. I'd guess their 1-car cluster is actually a single prop family that has its delimitation box manipulated to be identically sized to all the other car props, such that the car family is positioned in parking spot 2 in one case, and in parking spot 4 in the other case. That would be two prop families that only differ in LOD offset - basically a question of "make => adjust offset => save" and then "change offset again => save again".

When you have all the cluster models in place, it should be possible to write a simple patch that would override the Maxis exemplars with prop exemplars that reference MushyMushy's cars instead of the Maxis cluster models. All the timing information and the hard part of the modding would then be done by the Maxis originals, with only the new models showing up instead. No need to reinvent the wheel, right?

I'm not at my SimCity PC atm, but if @MushyMushy should be interested and would like to have an idea of how much work this effort would entail, then I could take a closer look... I'm just rambling and speculating here so far.

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Quick post, replies later. Been gone a while, long story, also later.

Started this today.

Inspiration, not a recreation:

Logo still needs some touching up, but I'm hoping to plaster it above the entrance (glowing white at night).

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Looks great man. Keep it up!

[art128 4,618]

Interesting! Will you make a version without the tower too? I'd be interested in having the parking building. 

 

[Hanson784 165]

Wonderful work with all your creations!

As a fellow 3D car BATer who likes bringing an added level of realism to the streets of SC4 I'm really looking forward to your Japanese and American car pack. Great work with the transparent window textures too; nice to see in the interior of the vehicles. 

[matias93 7,535]

WOW, that's great!! What about a transit hub version, with basically the same model but with less parking, more bus capacity and a subway station added?
(reference building)

 

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Quick Replies (it's late):

@art128 - That would be something worth considering. I would likely need to reconfigure the garage layout slightly and probably remove most of the fancy sunken base addons, but it's something that could happen.

@matias93 - I could probably make the fake lot with the bus station have subway service as well. I'm also looking at increasing the bus capacity slightly because the Maxis bus stop has abysmally low capacity now that I've actually looked it up.

@Aaron Graham, @Hanson784 - Thanks!

---

Making headway...

It still isn't scaled up vertically yet (I think I've said it before, but I generally save that for the end of the modelling process), but I'm still feeling like the tower part is kind of... stubby? It currently has 9 windowed floors, but I'm thinking about adding 2 or 3 more. It's also shaping up a bit. It's designed to be an "end cap" for a 6 tile wide block. It will look odd if it doesn't have roads on 3 sides of it.... and due to how dark the back is it would probably be best to have a building back up to it on that side.

I also realized it might be somewhat difficult to picture the building's scale (6x4 tiles, so 96x64m) without some sort of reference, so I made this quick Z6 HD render with some cars to give a rough idea. My reflective paint finally has something to reflect...

[SC4L0ver 394]

Wow! What a beautiful building.   Really looking forward to it, as well as for your car packs and the narrow japanese building. Those look astonishing.

Also, are there any news about the euro truck pack? Keep up the good work!! 

—SC4L0ver.

[weixc812 509]

Yey, I love this BAT. It looks so great!

[MushyMushy 3,617]

@SC4L0ver - Thanks! I haven't worked on those trucks in a while but I think the last time I did I was working on exporting them... I'd have to look.

@weixc812 - Thanks!

---

Put a lot of time into the glass and the ground plane over the past couple days. The glass itself still needs a dedicated texture, but for now it's fine as a representation. The waviness of it and the ground plane are done though. I also added a railing on all levels to prevent your mindless sims from walking off the sides...

[Scarton 57]

Great work! It resembles a few hospitals I have seen.

[raynev1 1,886]

Wow , it looks very nice .

[mattb325 28,880]

It's awesome! You know, it probably would make a good hospital

[Odainsaker 2,134]

It's a neat building that strongly reminds me of Honolulu's popular Ala Moana Building with its landmark La Ronde revolving restaurant, the first of its kind in the U.S.

On ‎1‎/‎17‎/‎2018 at 6:55 PM, MushyMushy said:

Put a lot of time into the glass and the ground plane over the past couple days. The glass itself still needs a dedicated texture, but for now it's fine as a representation. The waviness of it and the ground plane are done though. I also added a railing on all levels to prevent your mindless sims from walking off the sides...

In a darkly amusing way, this little quote also takes me back to the Ala Moana Building:  After the revolving restaurant, the building's other two notable features were, firstly, an operable system of vertical exterior louvers to shade the glass curtain wall and, secondly, a heavy netting rig later installed off of the second floor to catch any jumpers what was in the 1960s Honolulu's tallest building.  This net was the "People Catcher," saving the lives of the suicidal, drunks, daredevils, and those dizzy from the high spinning restaurant.

If your mindless sims walk off the sides...

Maybe a high railing would have been easier.  Both the aluminum louvers and the People Catcher were eventually removed.