Configuring Gobias Sidewalk mod

[matias93 7,535]

I know Gobias eliminated his creations from the site, so there is no official support for them, but I'm betting anyone in the community has had done this before.

I installed Gobias Sidewalk mod, specifically the New York slab, the plaza texture replacement and c.p.'s SCILT for the same texture. Everything is working, but the plaza texture replacement (which changes the texture used in the Lot Editor) is using another of the pack textures. Is there any way to configure this to force an specific texture to show in the game? I thought to eliminate all non-NY slab FSH with the reader, but I'm afraid that would broke the mod and I assume there has to be an easier way.

Thanks for your answers!!

[rsc204 21,864]

Take a look at this mod of mine:

It deals with all the original Maxis textures that are sidewalk based. You should be able to use it to customise exactly which textures replace the original Maxis ones.

[matias93 7,535]

Oh, thanks! I knew I had to use your dev kit one day, I just thought it was going to be so soon!

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

I'm glad there is a suitable substitute for Gobias' sidewalks. Thanks rsc204! You are a real champ!

[rsc204 21,864]

Well, it doesn't quite work as a replacement. In order to use this mod, you must already have the sidewalk textures from Gobias to begin with. So it doesn't help for anyone who didn't get a copy of the mod before it was removed.

The idea of MTRTDK is simply to replace all the basic Maxis Base and Overlay textures that include sidewalks, with replacements including custom sidewalks instead of the Maxis originals. As my SWN (Sidewalk NAM) mod nears completion, it will be merged into that package, since it's much more comprehensive.

[matias93 7,535]

Well, I tried with the automated script, and it was way easier than I thought, with acceptable results, being a first try on GoFSH:

The slabs went absurdly huge (like 6x2 meters), even if look better and less grainy, and the textures used by the RTMT remain unchanged. I think to know how to mend the size issue, but I'm very lost about the RTMT texture

[rsc204 21,864]

Looks like a scaling issue to me. If you use the default Gobias textures, they are 512x512px in size. GoFSH knows the replacement texture is only 128x128px, so re-scales the texture, hence you see these problems. However, Gobias included special "Lot Editor" textures which are only 128x128px with his mod. If you use that in GoFSH instead, it should look perfect.

Incidentally, is that an RTMT lot you have there in the bottom right? Edit: Just realised you mentioned the RTMT issue, missed the text before under the screenshot. Just to clarify, RTMT lots can not use a texture that auto-switches sidewalks. Hence the sidewalk is baked-in to the base texture, requiring you to modify them to see custom sidewalks.

I also released a preview of this automation for the RTMT textures too (here), so you can get rid of those if you like :). Otherwise there is a more comprehensive preview of the entire Sidewalk NAM repository (here), which also includes RTMT, in addition to many NAM puzzle pieces.

[matias93 7,535]

Well, that's much more than I was expecting! My initial plan was to use Magneto's and your ML superlight asphalt replacements for NAM to solve that, but this seems to be way better. *feeling like a kid in a candy shop* -I'll try it all!

[matias93 7,535]

(Please omit the double post)

So I tried, but fall in the temptation of creating textures instead of using Gobias' ones. And the result is pretty confusing to me:

As you can see, the new texture is applied to LE lots (plazas and buildings) correctly, thanks to the first script, and the RTMT lot has also its new textures, with the second script.

But sidewalk textures, be it grass or paving, are reverted to Maxis' ones. Also, surface textures from Jenx's Quais de Seine are also unchanged from Maxis ones. I uninstalled all CC sidewalk textures, trying to avoid conflicts between mods, and put the new dat file in the last loading folder.

I'm pretty sure that those textures appeared in GoFSH when the script was running, so I expected they would be changed too.

  Edited July 10, 2016 by matias93  
quais don't show textures either

[rsc204 21,864]

I see what's happened here. You've removed the base sidewalk mod itself, even with the SWN mod installed, you need to keep the base sidewalk mod files. Just keep the file "Sidewalk NY Slab.dat" from Gobias in this case. The files MTRTDK spits out replace "GB Plaza Txt Replace HD.dat".

Having restored the base sidewalks, that should fix all the transport networks and Xannepann's quays. But, if you plop a turbo roundabout for example, you should see your sidewalk where before it was all Maxis. If you want some overhanging fillers to round things off, I've a set that works like Xannepann's quays attached here. Not everything I have currently is included in the public files. To be honest, it's all grown very large . With the exception of BAT models which have sidewalks as part of the model though, I have covered every single piece in the NAM up to the current release. So if you are missing something still, feel free to ask.

[matias93 7,535]

After consulting with the pillow, it dawned on me that I never read the GoFSH user manual, and there it was, step-by-step instructions to create a sidewalk mod, and the results are very promising (I particularly loved the way textures are bent along curved roads, that should have been a hell of a task to code):

One of the things I haven't considered is how oversized paving textures are: the squares of the Maxis paving, that I used as base, measure 1,5 meters side, while the ones I was trying to replicate are barely 30 cms side:

So this is what I get at the end:

Low wealth                Mid wealth                  High wealth

I don't think this textures are redistributable, considering they are based on Maxis' ones, so my idea is to take a time to create new tiling images and give a second revision, and maybe to upload it here!

I just can give a huge thanks you, @rsc204 and @rivit, for such a fabulous work!

  Edited July 10, 2016 by matias93  
post published before finishing. Fooled by tab key

[rsc204 21,864]

On 10/07/2016 at 5:51 PM, matias93 said:

(I particularly loved the way textures are bent along curved roads, that should have been a hell of a task to code):

To my knowledge, that only works for the OWR curves. It's actually done with UV mapping, i.e. math. Although, the smart way to make it would be with a 3D modelling application such as gMax doing those calculations for you .

As for creating a sidewalk, glad you found Rivit's instructions, but they are also part of MTRTDK, only by default this feature is not enabled. Perhaps take a look at the scritps in a text editor, you'll see they are really very simple commands:

SRCDIR=*\Folder
DESTDIR=*\_Dev\Work
GENERATE=EDIT
FSHFORMAT=DXT3

These four commands break down as. Take files in folder, in this case Folder.
Placed edited files in temporary folder, _Dev\Work
Method of Generation, in this case simply replace Green parts with Sidewalk, Cyan parts with Grass. EDIT specifies the sidewalk and grass textures to use are both $$ wealth.
FSHFORMAT is a bit technical, but in short if the texture has transparency, you need to specify DXT3. Otherwise you won't need this for base textures.

Then a second group of commands packs the DATs:

SRCDIR=*\_Dev\Work
DESTDIR=*\
PACK=Custom Sidewalks.dat

Now the new textures should be finished. So it takes the textures in folder _Dev\Work for compiling into a DAT.
Destination, in this case the folder where the script resides, since none is specified.
Pack simply specifies what to call the new DAT file.

A more thorough syntax list is included in the documentation if you care to experiment. So you can download a big repository like SWN, if you like you can customise the script and the methods of generation to suit your needs. Obviously though, the SWN scripts are a bit complex by comparison.

On 10/07/2016 at 5:51 PM, matias93 said:

One of the things I haven't considered is how oversized paving textures are: the squares of the Maxis paving, that I used as base, measure 1,5 meters side, while the ones I was trying to replicate are barely 30 cms side:

There is often a balance between getting the effect you are going for and scale. I think these are probably alright though. Bear in mind, an SC4 tile is 16m across, you'd never make out any detail from the perspective the game offers, if scaled accurately.

On 10/07/2016 at 5:51 PM, matias93 said:

I don't think this textures are redistributable, considering they are based on Maxis' ones, so my idea is to take a time to create new tiling images and give a second revision, and maybe to upload it here!

Sure they are, Maxis/EA pretty much said it's OK for things like this to be distributed as mods. As for uploading, that's something I've also got plans for in terms of SWN. The way my repositories work, the DAT files that GoFSH creates, are then setup to be run through a second installer script. This uses NSIS, the same installer used by NAM and RTMT, among others. Eventually, users will be able to make a complete custom SWN mod, package it up into an identical installer (to the release versions) and re-distribute their works to all with the minimum of effort. I will even provide support for the mod, since it's just a clone of my mod with adjusted sidewalks. So rather than just release the Sidewalk Mod itself, you can go the full hog and offer everything you have now to others.

In short, when I started out a few years back with sidewalks, I was trying to do what you are making now. Only, every texture needed to be created manually by removing the original sidewalks and adding my new one. I realised in the beginning, I didn't want this process to be locked to a single sidewalk. So I focused on automation, but it was all a bit clunky and relied on some serious knowledge of Photoshop and other tools. When Rivit had the idea for auto-generation, making more user-friendly versions was suddenly a possibility. Without GoFSH, none of this would be possible. Hopefully, the end goal is to liberate sidewalk mods once and for all. No longer will users have to put up with mismatched textures, any sidewalk mod can be made totally uniform. In that respect, I'm only too glad to see as many people as possible taking advantage of it.

[matias93 7,535]

Well, this went as far as it could go:

 

[rsc204 21,864]

Well, it already looks really great, unified sidewalks are the only way IMO .

I don't know how long my final modifications will take, but there will be an update to the repositories at some point. Then you should be able to compile an installer and distribute that, which will make the process of installation about 300% easier. Hopefully others who create or have created custom sidewalks will offer similar mods too.

Just a brief note on the GLR textures. They were deliberately left with the Rails showing the default sidewalk. Applying the sidewalks to them would require mammoth additional effort in terms of creating new Definition Alphas (all those funny coloured D0 files), which define where to put custom textures. There are other issues though too, in the end it simply wasn't practical to automate that part. However, the sidewalks should be applied to the Alternate Dragable GLR set, so there is a way around it.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

@rsc204 Thank you for all your help on your own thread re Sidewalk modification but I have decided to move this next question here as a) it is more relevant and b) it doesn't Hijack your own thread.

Having installed the Gobias textures and experiencing them in game, I found them a bit too 'busy' / 'fussy' for the large paved areas (they look great as sidewalks, but when that effect is brought onto the lots everything shines just a bit too brightly) so found this thread. I wonder if it is possible to go from scratch with a different approach.

What are the pitfalls of creating a more 'uniform' concrete texture to extend to sidewalks? I love Fasan's pictures and they seem to use quite a generic concrete texture with no obvious 'tiles' (unlike the gobias cobblestone or concrete textures) that does not seem to be any of the publicly available sidewalk / lot texture mods, so I was hoping to create something similar to that, and figure that if I am going to fall down the modding hole, I might as well try to make something that genuinely might be useful to others at some stage. So,  some more information / suggestion below, please anyone come back to give me some pointers on any of these aspects, apologies if it reads just as a stream of consciousness.

 

• Most of the sidewalk textures available, and indeed the one shown by @matias93 in this thread are quite significantly 'tiled'. (Even the SLA, which I think is my favourite available that I've tried so far looks more like little grey bricks when zoomed in quite close than actual asphalt). Is there a good reason for this beyond paving slabs often having mosaic like quality IRL? The reason i say this is that the two below images from Fasan seem to show slightly cracked concrete texture, reminiscent of that from the IM or IHT fillers (linked below, although it may be a totally different texture) with no obvious 'tiling' effects, it also looks a lot more calm and serene than the gobias mods I was playing with before, so If I was able to create something similar to these images but apply that more generally, I would be very happy indeed. I know many of the pictures from Fasan at SC4D were quite heavy on use of custom content and I am guessing this sidewalk falls into that category.

 

 

 

Below I have included the link to the IHT fillers that I think look fairly similar to the concrete above. Obviously any steer you can give (such as texture IDs etc) on creating something like this using @rsc204 tutorial download and the posts above. please consider no information too stupid to impart as I haven't done anything like this complex before!   

 

  Edited February 17, 2017 by MissVanleider  
added link to IHT fillers

[rsc204 21,864]

Based on the instructions I gave you yesterday, the process is just the same, only you use a different set of sidewalk textures for processing. If you are looking for the concrete used for IRM, the basic dirty one is part of the BSC texture packs, but that's not the one I think you are looking for. The Maxis textures that come with the game include 5 concrete textures, I'm guessing it's one of those you want.

Concrete Options.zip

See the attached file, I've placed all 5 textures ready for use with GoFSH for you. You can either copy the Paving20C file to use for all wealth levels, or mix and match between them if you prefer. Now starting with the MTRTDK files, you need to "unlock" a hidden function, this will turn textures into a sidewalk mod. What is a sidewalk mod? That's simply three textures that are used for networks in-game. The other parts just add those to lots and various NAM pieces. The distinction is important, for simplicity, the Gobias file (modern cobble) contained these before. We need a similar file for the new concrete. Open the BuildSidewalkMod.txt file that comes with the MTRTDK. It's a simple text file, freely editable. Now you'll see a bunch of instructions at the top, explaining how to activate the option to additionally build a real sidewalk mod. But it's really simple, the lines under "Sidewalk Mod" all start with an apostrophe character. This tells GoFSH to ignore anything that follows it. So it's useful for adding text, explaining the scripts, or in this case, de-activating a feature not commonly needed. Simply remove those apostrophes for the 12 lines under that section. Now when you run the script, it will additionally build the sidewalk mod, output "Custom Sidewalks.dat".

You can do this for each of the attached concrete textures, to find the one you like most in-game. I wouldn't run the SWN scripts until you've made your decision though.

Complicating matters is a little thing called Multi-FSH. You see all the Maxis concrete textures use them. It means simply that one of four textures is randomly selected, when they are on a lot. This keeps things looking more random overall. Ideally, you want to keep the Multi-FSH textures for lots if you use one of these choices for your sidewalks, it will look better. Multi-FSH doesn't work for Network textures, so the sidewalk mod itself can't take advantage, only lots. That's probably going to get more complex to explain at this point than necessary. If you do end up using one of the 1-5 numbered folders, let me know which, I can send you a special file that'll help make your lots utilise this feature. I can also generate a special set for SCLIT for you, I have so many unreleased bits here, I'd be happy to take care of those for you.

Some may like to know that one of the things that keeps SWN from appearing, is that what we can do with automation is constantly evolving. Behind the scenes a lot of work has been going on, it will be possible to have Multi-FSH support for TGN and many parts of the SWN mod, eventually. That may have to wait for a further update down the road. But the groundwork is already in place for it. The key difference being that you can keep a unified look, whilst bringing back some of the variation that was lost as part of unifying the textures. People didn't seem to ever pick up on it (I've been showing off teasers for almost a year), but that's how I can do things like this:

It's subtle, but the grass textures on lots and bordering networks are not uniform nor repetitive, that's Multi-FSH in action.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

@rsc204 this is wonderful thank you. I should have enough from your helpful responses today and yesterday plus the details in the SWN tutorial to make a start at least. I really appreciate your help and will endeavour to make some progress this weekend. I haven't read in too great a detail yet as A) being paid to do something that isn't this right now  and B) Don't have any access to SC4 or the tools, so can't really follow an algorithm / step by step but I'm sure this will be doable when I get everything together in one place.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

5 hours ago, rsc204 said:

Based on the instructions I gave you yesterday, the process is just the same, only you use a different set of sidewalk textures for processing. If you are looking for the concrete used for IRM, the basic dirty one is part of the BSC texture packs, but that's not the one I think you are looking for. The Maxis textures that come with the game include 5 concrete textures, I'm guessing it's one of those you want.

Concrete Options.zip

See the attached file, I've placed all 5 textures ready for use with GoFSH for you. You can either copy the Paving20C file to use for all wealth levels, or mix and match between them if you prefer. Now starting with the MTRTDK files, you need to "unlock" a hidden function, this will turn textures into a sidewalk mod. What is a sidewalk mod? That's simply three textures that are used for networks in-game. The other parts just add those to lots and various NAM pieces. The distinction is important, for simplicity, the Gobias file (modern cobble) contained these before. We need a similar file for the new concrete.

 

Open the BuildSidewalkMod.txt file that comes with the MTRTDK. It's a simple text file, freely editable. Now you'll see a bunch of instructions at the top, explaining how to activate the option to additionally build a real sidewalk mod. But it's really simple, the lines under "Sidewalk Mod" all start with an apostrophe character. This tells GoFSH to ignore anything that follows it. So it's useful for adding text, explaining the scripts, or in this case, de-activating a feature not commonly needed. Simply remove those apostrophes for the 12 lines under that section. Now when you run the script, it will additionally build the sidewalk mod, output "Custom Sidewalks.dat".

 

You can do this for each of the attached concrete textures, to find the one you like most in-game. I wouldn't run the SWN scripts until you've made your decision though.

 

Ok so i have most of what i need i think.

I have edited the script found in the MTRDK automated preview folder to remove the apostrophes.

I have gofsh. Presume i need to basically pick the version of maxis concrete that i like the most from the 5 and copy that file to the MTRDK automated preview folder? Essentially i am a little lost as soon as i launch goFSH because i'm finding it difficult to know where i should pick up from in the the MTRDK readme.

 

[rsc204 21,864]

You need to look at the readme from SWN instead, it's much more comprehensive. Setup the textures as you did previously with the Gobias Sidewalk textures, only using the new concrete ones. You can use new folders for them all or do one at a time if you prefer, either way works.

Then simply run the MTRTDK script from GoFSH, this time the output will contain the additional sidewalk mod file.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

Ok, im lost in acronyms i think - where is the SWN? i think i must have missed that one completely in what can only be described as a very blonde moment!

 

 

[matias93 7,535]

Is the Automated Sidewalk mod, the one in MGB's signature

[MissVanleider 1,851]

27 minutes ago, matias93 said:

Is the Automated Sidewalk mod, the one in MGB's signature

Haha i guess thats my problem! the signatures dont display on my phone which is how i'm browsing 

[MissVanleider 1,851]

Edit / my original formatting here made the page display horribly for me at least. My question was answered below so now removed to restore the way the page looks //

  Edited February 18, 2017 by MissVanleider  
Page displayed wonkily

[rsc204 21,864]

1 hour ago, MissVanleider said:

although i assume i need to replace paving10c.bmp and paving30c.bmp with the texture you sent so i have 3 copies in the 'custom' folder with 3 different filenames?

Yup, I didn't do this to save on duplicating the files in the attachment. Of course you could mix and match the concretes too, but I get the feeling you're after a single-texture unified approach.

1 hour ago, MissVanleider said:

by clicking any of the little two dot icons by any of the goFSH viewer windows as it only wants to import .bmp files

So when you first open GoFsh, there are three main "squares" or windows. You can only use the one in the bottom left to open a FSH file, I would guess you are using one of the others, which is designed for .BMPs instead. Checking back I failed to make that clear in the instructions, sorry.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

@rsc204 perfect thank you, i felt like i tried them all but obviously not! I now have my custom folder set up with the dirt textures and 3 copies of the grass and concrete. So time for a cup of coffee and then the next step 

[MissVanleider 1,851]

Seems to be working, i went with the 'option1' concrete and think it looks pretty good.

The sidewalk and the (surprisingly to me) quais peices have the texture, i'm running the swn now for the NAM components.

My questions now are how to unify some of the things that i had working before such as the paeng parks 205 which now show the maxis plaza texture, which had previously adapted to show sandstone when i had sandstone, and latterly SLA when i used that.

 I'm guessing that is where SCILT or catalysts sla extension or some such comes in?

[rsc204 21,864]

Unlike most models, Xannepann used special props that adapt to your sidewalks, these are quite rare sadly. If you don't have it, check out this "patch" by Vortext, which makes them match even better. You need to be registered at SC4D to download the post's attachment.

Any remaining lot textures would be covered by the other files that MTRTDK created. You should have the Main sidewalk mod and one or two additional files from that. However, if you are sure you want the #1 concrete, rather than use those, I'll make a special one with those Multi-FSH textures I mentioned.

In my experience, very few lots actually use SCILT, but I can make you a set for those whilst I'm at it, since it's all set up here. In fact, I can go one better, I'll come back with some goodies later for you.

[MissVanleider 1,851]

@rsc204 Thanks so much, i' didnt actually mess with the full mtrdk yet as you directed me to the tutorial for the SWN therefore all i have done is the script to create the sidewalk with the custom sidewalk script (the bit where i deleted some apostrophes) and then the script for the swn for the NAM bits.

I may have missed something out, skipped a step or doubled up on something, do i go back to the mtrdk tutorial and just concentrate on the texture bits of that?

[MissVanleider 1,851]

Also this may be a symptom of something i have done wrong, the extenders you made seem to be acting very strangely in that they all have a railway texture on, and the initial 'tile' for each appears to be the maxis base texture surely i have made some error here

[rsc204 21,864]

45 minutes ago, MissVanleider said:

they all have a railway texture on

No, that's me sorry... you have an outdated texture mod, which uses a texture ID that is no longer required. I repurposed it for the extenders, hence the conflict.

That mod could be my Rural GLR or the variants included with either the SEN (Sandstone Euro NAM) or SLA Addons. None of these mods should still be in your plugins folder if using the SWN (Automated Sidewalk Mod). The other possibility, is that the texture is part of the SWN preview edition. In fact looking at it, that may be the problem.

If you give me a while I can get everything together for you from here. I just need to dig into some old archives and find a solution that won't break anything else.