Avanya's buildings (Update 7/1: Cargo rail stations released)

[Matthias King 348]

3 hours ago, squirrelarmyuk said:

Separate logo props would suit me as well. Not only would I be able to choose the one I want for the distribution centre but I can then add the same sign to other industrial buildings around the city. 

Same here. I like it when people put out good looking sign props, because there aren't very many in the vanilla game and not all of them are good for every building.

[Avanya 2,605]

I did some testing with the signs as props you place with More Beautification and Prop Anarchy and scrapped that solution. Because they are fairly small props they easily either float away from the wall or are hidden inside the building.

I won't do the randomized option as I too find it annoying having to plop a building again and again to get the one I want.   So that leaves individual buildings for each company. Atm I'm playing around with the idea of spicing the texture on the office building up a bit more depending on the company. That makes it a little less sad to have several of the same building.  Quick mock-up of how the UPS version could look.

[Avanya 2,605]

Cargo station is almost finished, just needs some props. It's working almost like I want it to. I can't seem to get the cars to drive in at the right points no matter how I set up the cargo paths - they just enter/exit in the middle. But since they shouldn't even enter in the first place I guess it will have to do.  Trains are also a little bit longer than the track, but I think it's better than needing some anarchy mod to place it.

I'm not completely happy with the 2 office buildings, so I think I'll tweek them a bit. Make the corner one a perfect square and the office only less wide. Hopefully it won't take too long.

[Avanya 2,605]

And it's finally finished! Had hoped I could finish before midnight here, but that didn't happen.  Hopefully I haven't forgotten something. You can find the whole collection here.

*Note to self: Don't start uploading stuff after dinner - you won't finish in time*

[Matthias King 348]

Looks awesome. I'm subbing now.

I have one request: Could you post the C.I.M. box truck, heavy truck and Springer as props?

I love the logo by the way.

[GC_Vos 714]

This looks really awesome! You know with mod tools you should be able to set the exact position for vehicle spawns. I don't remember exactly where, I think somewhere under the AI?

[Tim The Terrible 586]

Awesome release again!!! Last image makes me want single track cargo station track (LOL) though. But finally a cargo station where overhead wires do not break realism!

[squirrelarmyuk 100]

How did you get the catenarys to behave? Mine have been hit and miss on the stations I've been building.

[Avanya 2,605]

@Matthias King The props and vehicles are bundled together, so if you sub to the vehicle, you get the prop too.

@GC_Vos Ah, I'll dig around and see if I can find it.

@Tim The Terrible I actually considered letting only the inner track work since it's more realistic with this setup, but I figured it would be confusing since there are two tracks.

@squirrelarmyuk I actually have no idea - the catenaries never misbehaved for me. I put a 12 unit track down and used ModTools script to make it longer.

[Cool_Z 1,547]

Looks excellent 

[Matthias King 348]

If I sub the vehicles, won't they start showing up in my game driving on the street as well?

I only ask because I don't like to use actual working custom vehicles. I find they cause too many problems.

[Tim The Terrible 586]

4 hours ago, squirrelarmyuk said:

How did you get the catenarys to behave? Mine have been hit and miss on the stations I've been building.

If I'm right that only happens when you have left-hand drive on. Experiment with that.

[Darf 1,439]

Looks excellent! Although maybe add some props for the trainyard?

[squirrelarmyuk 100]

9 minutes ago, Tim The Terrible said:

If I'm right that only happens when you have left-hand drive on. Experiment with that.

Might explain why it works fine in my test town which is vanilla and always offset in my actual cities. If it is related to the handing is it fixable with a mod?

[Avanya 2,605]

@Matthias King Hmm, I never expected anyone to want the props without the vehicles. I bundled them together to keep the amount of workshop items down. The props aren't needed for the buildings, so you can always use other truck props instead.

@Darf You mean for the building or for detailing in game? On the building I ran out of props. A lamp for each loading bay door, the lines and then the rooftop props ate all the 64 props easily. I really wish we could place more props on large buildings.

[Feindbold 1,190]

Wow this looks huge!

[barcasam7 185]

This is amazing. What I love about your assets is that they can be used in all type of cities. Thank you for creating them. 

[gfvsims 169]

This is absolutely amazing, Avanya! I can't wait to use this (just have to grow my current town a bit larger first).

[Avanya 2,605]

FedEx version is up - I still don't know how I forgot all about this

[Avanya 2,605]

Another update for my Semi Desert Theme! I wasn't really happy with it and while the pavement and road update looked nice for surburban areas it just didn't work with larger industrial areas. The cliff texture used before also had some bits of grass and plants and didn't have that sandstone look I was after. Lastly the sand and water has been improved and the scale of the cracked oil texture is better now. All in all I'd say it looks much better now.

P.S. It really looks the best with the custom LUTs linked in the description - the default tropical just isn't that pretty  

[Avanya 2,605]

In case you missed it I released a material handler with a shovel yesterday.

Today I've worked on the cargo station for Miyagi Motors - most of the modelling was done, so it wasn't a ton of work. I had just left it as I couldn't get the rotated track to work. Still got some tweeking on the paths to have it work like I want it to. It's pretty easy to create bad traffic with this setup, so I'd better add a disclaimer when releasing it, but I want to keep it like this as it's the most true to the VW plant. It will require Network Extentions, but otherwise it shouldn't need any mods and barely any custom props. I've also made a back for it (currently just a park) and some sort of road anarchy is needed to connect the two. I'm considering making a park/RICO industry version of the station itself too as a pass through for rail. 

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

That road and rail underneath the plant looks badass cool.

[Turjan 1,048]

Yup, this looks awesome!

[Avanya 2,605]

Thank you guys! The cargo station is now released, so you can all create the worst traffic near a cargo station ever!  It's actually not as bad as I had feared as long as there's not a ton of trucks which need to cross the tracks. I did some testing with a fairly large complex which didn't end in horrible chaos. The back is a RICO building with few employees compared to the rest - I made it RICO mainly because it's easier to find when it's in the same category as the rest of them.  I'll see how it works out and do changes if needed.

And damn, I'd forgotten how nice that brick texture looks! At some point I'll have to do some more buildings with that - just love the color too much ^^

[Ocram's Razr 964]

Semi-desert looks beautiful! I will be sure to use it. Your cargo station looks really good and sprawl is something this game needs (your warehouses help even more).

I agree, that brick texture looks good. Where did you get it? I might make some lofts with that texture, after I finish my Miami Art Deco skyscraper.

[Avanya 2,605]

Thank you! ^^

I'm pretty sure it's just a brick texture from textures.com, but I did a lot of tweeking of the colors (lightness, saturation, hue). Getting colors to look the way you want them to in game can be a challenge.

Today's been productive! I've started modelling my next project - this one will need to use sub-buildings as it just fits within 16x16.  The last few cities I've worked on I wanted to make some nice power stations, but there aren't many assets on the workshop, which look good and won't try and kill your pc.  So a power station is in order! This will be a coal plant and when it's done I'll make a nice bulk storage for coal, which can be connected to this or used on it's own. Still alot of modelling to do, but the overall shape is there.

[DeltaGamer 13]

Cool plant! Any chance you'll be making another type of power plant? Nuclear maybe ?

[Badi_Dea 476]

I too noticed a disappointing lack of quality power stations, that's one of the reasons I decided to start making assets. Looking forward to seeing more of it!

[Matthias King 348]

This is looking interesting.

I'd love to see a realistic natural gas plant next. I need one.

[Avanya 2,605]

Nuclear and natural gas are definately also some I'd love to do. I'm considering doing some of it as modules, so you can expand your power plant as your city grows or build a huge one where everything looks like it fits together.