The King's Workshop

[mattb325 28,880]

Really beautiful! It's nice to see parks and paths changed up a bit after all of these years 

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Wow, I really love these! For me, they're a welcome departure from all those parks that look as if they were meant to put the gardens of Versailles to shame - much more toned down, realistic and pretty much like you'd see them IRL. This is probably as good as premade parks get!

Considering you used a consistent look on all of them, it's really interesting how the last park shown actually seems kinda soulless and bland whereas the one with the artificial lake somehow has a certain atmosphere.

I also like the little details such as the additional light post between those tennis courts on the 'soulless' park!

[The British Sausage 5,449]

This is getting RIDICULOUSLY good!

[matias93 7,535]

5 hours ago, The British Sausage said:

This is getting RIDICULOUSLY good!

Thanks for taking the words out of my hands

8 hours ago, T Wrecks said:

Considering you used a consistent look on all of them, it's really interesting how the last park shown actually seems kinda soulless and bland whereas the one with the artificial lake somehow has a certain atmosphere.

Maybe is because here we don't have so much on parks or a suitable climate for those lush environments, but I cannot manage to see that last one as 'soulless'; heck, even the first one, that is supposed to look dilapidated, looks much better than anything you could find in Santiago.

Oh, and by the way, symmetry on park design is not necessarily posh, but more of a cultural preference. Here you can find perfectly geometrical parks composed of concrete, dirt, red dirt paths and a couple of squalid plane tree saplings.

[tariely 4,496]

I'm having some problems with textures. Rivit was generous as ever and baked me some replacement ones so that I can integrate your parks in my own system:-), with my prefered textures, and I get some places in almost all parks were the default vanilla texture shows up instead ; I verified the pack is correctly installed with nothing to induce any conflict. In the L.E,. all the pieces show up correctly. I mean, when I look up the textures (gonna open the parks now). Any idea ? (I'm also asking Rivit privately.)

EDIT : After checking some of the parks, I noticed (a) that some vanilla texture pieces (for example, pict 3 top right) seem deliberate : ? ; (b) that there might be one round piece missing (pict 1top left and see below the picts) ;  and c) that a whole range of overlays presents in the L.E. i.e. with vanilla texture : from 0xf8a07505 to 0xfba0755a  (pict 4 and 5). 

Missing piece ?

 

(and I tried piece 3 from top;  it's not it :-) : goes to diags, whereas the park piece goes to straight)

[matias93 7,535]

Wild guess: those textures aren't from the last GoFSH package, but the one before that.

[tariely 4,496]

And Rivit, creator of GoFSH, would have had (made ? how do you say this in English ?) that oversight ? Hum... But I'll see what he says :-)

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

Replies

@mattb325, @The British Sausage, @matias93: Thank you!

@T Wrecks: Yeah I noticed there's a surprising void when it comes to ye old neighborhood park. I used to emulate that royal "French Garden" style myself with everything I made at one point . Something about the orderly nature, symmetrical layout really resonated with me. Thanks!

@tariely: The range 0xf8a07505 to 0xfba0755a is in fact from a new set of textures included as part of the park pack upload. The mini-repository for it is here. This will cover the playground pathway portions in your first 6 screenshots. The remaining ones should be from my SuperSHK Parking Texture repository.

Updates

2018 is here and I guess it's time for a facelift! I've updated the opening post to reflect the current state of my projects a little better as well as making sure to link everything. My entire texture repository is up for viewing all at once now as well. This includes all of the raws for the released sets as well as the lot/pack-specific textures I included with a few of the uploads.

In a blast from the past, I've found a few of my "forsaken" parks that I made sometime in summer of 2015. These were shown but never released, probably because I wanted to add a few more to the pack. Little did I know something else would consume me...

From top to bottom, clockwise:

• Big Tree Plaza, 3x5 - Some silly diagonal plaza thing.
• Urban Greenery, 4x6 - A forest park with some wide paths and ponds. I wanted it originally to be an urban forest of sorts.
• City Square Park, 6x6 - A symmetrical city park with a fountain in the middle. Nothing more than that. 
• Shady Executive Plaza, 2x4 - A small plaza section I ripped off from my re-lot of 280 Bishopgate.

EDIT: And now they're yours!

I have a couple of other lots just sitting on my hard drive, rotting away (not being used by me either ) so if there's any interest I might patch them up and put them out there.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Well, having them rot away on the STEX is certainly the preferred alternative.

[tariely 4,496]

@kingofsimcity “The range 0xf8a07505 to 0xfba0755a is in fact from a new set of textures included as part of the park pack upload. The mini-repository for it is here. This will cover the playground pathway portions in your first 6 screenshots. The remaining ones should be from my SuperSHK Parking Texture repository."  

OK, let me see if I understand this correctly  : I must put those two new folders in my plugins for the vanilla stuff to disappear ? Aaaah, relief !  

[edit : All of them both ? I mean, I'm a bit worried about the clutter if doublons...]

A passing thought, however : perhaps it would be a good idea to put some indication of that in the STEX upload ? Or maybe even to add those folders to the upload ?

..............

And yes, let's have those new parks rot away on the STEX !!! 

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

@T Wrecks: Indeed it is haha. 

@tariely: The repository was linked in the upload under the Texture Replacement section on the STEX description. I haven't added that section to the original parking textures release though. I should look into doing that soon...

As far as clutter and duplicates are concerned, there is no need to have the original texture files if you generate a replacement set.

[licoricebomb 93]

First off, I'd like to say that I think all of these parks look amazing and that, like mattb325, I think they fill a gap that desperately needed filling in terms of style.

However, I noticed that they have this little quirk, which I've never noticed with any park or any other lot before:

 

Naturally, this posed a traffic problem, and I had to remove the park. Disappointing, as you can see it was the centerpiece for that suburb (as these lots deserve to be, imo).

I wasn't sure what else to do about it except bring it up here. If this is a normal and/or intended behaviour for these parks, please let me know. I haven't tested this with any other park in the set.

[matias93 7,535]

Just to be sure, did you demolish some network to put the park there? And if you did it, did you also let the simulation run for enough time to allow your sims to change their routes to existing streets? They are a bit slow on this, and tend to drive through even built lots if there are on their old routes to and back from work.

[licoricebomb 93]

7 minutes ago, matias93 said:

Just to be sure, did you demolish some network to put the park there? And if you did it, did you also let the simulation run for enough time to allow your sims to change their routes to existing streets? They are a bit slow on this, and tend to drive through even built lots if there are on their old routes to and back from work.

Not at all, that park was one of the first things I placed on this tile after founding the city. I'm sure this is not a simulation issue, as you can see for yourself from the two shots that this persisted for longer than it should have taken the simulator to recalculate, even if that was the case. (And as you can see, it has added some trips. Both shots show the route query tool being used directly on the park.) I don't think I removed the park from my city until sometime in year 03, at which point buildings around it were abandoning due to commute time. But at any rate, nothing was ever there except that park, and when I demolished it, the problem disappeared. Maxis parks on the same block do not produce the effect.

Good call though, because I've been confused by the traffic simulator having a delay after demolishing networks before. I've learned my lesson now not to let it trick me.

[tariely 4,496]

I am sorry to rain on the texture parade again  but that didn't totally solve the problem :

I just did not find the round piece go2dstraights in pics 1 and 4 in the L.E. despite roaming up and down the overlay menu.

I can check if the vanilla textures [left of pic] can be replaced manually in the L.E. (as the square one in pict 3 top-right is --but not the rectangular one, which apparently belongs to the tennis piece) ; but I don't think I Can Live :-) with the Ysplit being vanilla (and the other textures in the 0xf48a07505 etc. range. There's another occurrence of that in the parks but I desisted :-).

How come those won't be replaced ??? HEEEEELP. I WANT to use those parks !

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

@licoricebomb: I think that is a side effect of having a transit-enabled stub on that particular park (may affect the other parks that have that property too). I'll look into it.

@tariely: Sent a PM, hopefully I can better assist you this way.

[licoricebomb 93]

That's what I thought. So, which of those parks have TE stubs?

For what it's worth, I really love that pedestrians can cross through the park. It's just not a great thing for road traffic.

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

@licoricebomb: The Tony R. Park (6x7), Toby Ferrian Sports Complex (10x10), M. Mushy Athletic Park (12x12), Silur Community Park (15x10) all have stubs.

I was able to replicate the behavior that you showed me and indeed, all lots with transit-enabled sections have this issue.

A normal park. No traffic passes through.

Hovering the query over the transit-enabled park gives an indication of the amount of traffic passing through.

Big parks are kind of funny.

The culprit was the Transit Switch properties found in the descriptor. Removing those properties restored the parks to a more normal state, which was the way I originally intended it to be. They still have the network-enabled stubs at the end but are no longer prone to disrupting traffic.

Expect a fix to come to the STEX soon. Sorry for the inconvenience! 

[licoricebomb 93]

Cool! I'm glad you were able to find a fix so quickly. No need to apologize. You haven't inconvenienced anyone by taking the time to make these parks. And, now you just taught me something about lotting.

Hey, does your Green Green Tennis Greens park have a TE stub?

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

@licoricebomb: Glad you could learn something from my mishaps.  The Green Green Tennis Greens park does not have a TE stub.

I've updated the park pack to v1.02, and the transit stuff should be resolved.

 

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

Updates

Volume 2 for the Community & Regional Park pack is moving along quite nicely (while the dependency list grows little by little )!

Today's agenda is *drumroll* tennis parks!

Totally Not Tennis Park is what happens when the local community gets sick of boring and small tennis parks . The one on the right is Totally Tennis Park, a boring and small 4x3 tennis park for your medium-wealth communities. 

Dragon Springs Tennis Park (still WIP) is a high-wealth fully-fledged tennis facility for your rich sims. This is an 8x8 symmetrical park with a very distinct court configuration.

For this one I went with girafe's newer canary palms as well as created a set of custom circular parking textures.

Because I liked this layout so much, I created a desert version of it as well, dubbed the Desert Valley Tennis Center. The layout is the same for the most part, though there are several distinct differences besides just losing the grass. For example, there's more paths behind the courts in the rear and the positions of the plaza and facility are switched.

[tariely 4,496]

I can't hardly wait to get my greedy little paws on those in the L.E. to see how you do that half-circular parking and replicate it shamelessly, as it is more or less what I have been trying to do (albeit more roughly)  in my present railway stations relots ! 

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

Replies

@tariely: Hehe, those new textures will be included with this upload so you'll be free to explore to your heart's content! I really have to thank @rivit for his Bender tool as it makes creating a curve like that supremely easy to do. 

Updates

The parks continue at a near burnout pace...

Remember these "little" filler parks? I created them originally as a set of filler parks but withheld their release because I wanted to do something more with them.

These parks have turned into a somewhat of a semi-modular set which you can fill the in-betweens of your neighborhoods (especially the rich). The new additions here are the 3x3 curve piece and the 5x5 corner piece. While the curve would look a little funny as a standalone park (though you can use it that way), the 5x5 corner park is a decent addition to any high wealth neighborhood.

This wealthy suburban neighborhood is an example of what a real use case for combining these parks are. 

With enough space, you could create a very large, winding park with these quickly.

Spoiler

o(≧▽≦)o o(≧▽≦)o o(≧▽≦)o o(≧▽≦)o o(≧▽≦)o

I've got some other goodies in the works too:

Diagonal and FA soccer/football fields! Additional filler pieces will be provided as well to allow these to fit somewhat snugly with your roads.

A diagonal baseball/softball one is also in the works.

Let me know what you think so far!

[The British Sausage 5,449]

Those football fields would compliment FrankU's Dutch Park set.

[tariely 4,496]

Aaaah, yes, Modular 'R' Us (a bit of a piraty effect here, arh arh !). You're giving me ideas for my own EBLT texture type set of paths...

Not so sure about the sport fields but I'm sure you'll convince me.

[kingofsimcity 5,739]

Replies

@The British Sausage: I wasn't aware of that actually! A pleasant surprise indeed!

@tariely: Maaybe I can convince you with these next ones...

Updates

The "desolate" park's original form has been mostly finalized...

The larger baseball fields have been replaced with some smaller softball fields. Lights and bleachers have been added, though I've always found it disappointing that they don't actually light up...

The park on the left is another one of those nondescript walking ones that play nicely with the semi-modular set. I only kept it because I liked the oval loop.

Moving onto a remaster! This is the updated version of my 2016 Green Green Tennis Greens challenge upload. I've tweaked the pathways a bit, removed the little makeshift restroom and switched all of the trees to HD girafe ones. Additionally, I've replaced the light posts with LRM posts which look far, far superior at night.

Finally, I've done additional work to the sports courts.

Different wealth versions of softball courts! The higher wealth ones features tidier fields, light posts and better landscaping. The low wealth one is pretty unkempt, with wildflowers growing over and the main play area being relegated to a dirt patch.

Baseball fields get the same treatment too! The high wealth one boasts a fine paved viewing area, full dugouts and a fully marked baseball diamond. The amount of extra facilities decrease until the low-end one, which is just an informal community field with a set of fences and a dirt circle.

I've just broken 30 lots for this set so yeah...it's gonna be a doozy this time!

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Wow, great stuff here! I really love the different wealth versions! Up until now, you could either have e.g. a council housing estate without any facilities, or with facilities that look somewhat out of place. This has now changed! And it doesn't look grungy, either. IMO, they strike the perfect balance and look like the neighbourhood (and the mayor) do their best, but don't really have much money to spare. Poor, but not a slum.

Those smaller modular parks could also be very useful in a medium-wealth version. In my country, we often have larger areas filled with mid-rise tenements (roughly 4 to 6 storeys for the most part) that form longer continuous lines or staggered setups. Quite often there are grass areas and public footpaths for pedestrians and cyclist that lead through these areas and often form connections between parallel streets or cul-de-sacs so pedestrians don't have to walk around the entire block. Quite often you'll also find playground structures, sandboxes, ping-pong tables and the like along these footpaths for the residents to use. Your modular parks would be quite suitable to mimic that in SimCity, but the high-wealth versions are a tad too ritzy and not utilitarian enough for that use. Just a thought.

I love the work you're doing, and I can totally see myself making good use of these parks. Thank you so much!

EDIT

Have you thought about the way you're going to mod these parks yet? I could see some use in making park/LM effect depend on wealth level, with the low-wealth version having very little effect to prevent your low-wealth settlements from being replaced, but since it's your stuff, it's of course your own decision and no one else's to take.

[tariely 4,496]

@kingofsimcity Not convinced by the lighting (especially the tennis(es?) : I've often played at night and that would be completely impossible here).  but otherwise : YES ! I was convinced from the beginning, you know...  And I like the oval path park too. Those parks are not desolate, just bare, a nice canvas for us props or MMP's bugs... 

[Jasoncw 11,840]

These really do look like the sports fields that I see in real life. I had felt like the sports fields were the better done of the maxis lots, but maybe they weren't actually as well done as I had thought!

[bladeberkman 714]

I’m living for these parks!