Having trouble with Moonlight's SAM9

[SneakyDeaky 1,126]

Hi and happy holidays!

I've been struggling all morning to try and figure out a way to get Moonlight's Japanese Sidewalk Mod to look as in this picture

 

My problem is when I use SAM9 everything is right except the street texture is the old red brick texture?? I seem to have all dependencies, but they were hard to track down, so maybe not (I read as much documentation I could find and translate) I perhaps have installed it wrong and something is conflicting with something? but everything seems right in the plugin folders. Right now I have, regarding sidewalks, the latest NAM and the Brooklyn Cobblestone sidewalk mod from Gobias. And this and Cat Punch's Street Mod. Everything else is fine. 

SAM10 is the correct street texture but no props or seasonal trees. And SAM1 is the same as the picture but has a parking lot sidewalk. Here's a couple of pictures?

SAM9 with the mod installed

SAM1 

 

I'd appreciate any help I could get to figure out why I maybe be going wrong, can even upload pictures of my plugins, or perhaps my complete plugins if that would help? This mod would be perfect for the city I want to build if I can just replace the red brick?

Many thanks!

[Tarkus 6,932]

Moonlinght's original mod was designed as a replacement for SAM 9.  The NAM Team later, with permission, added the textures to the mod as the new SAM 10 with the release of NAM 31 in March 2013.  However, given that the trees and other prop work associated with the original SAM 9 replacement required the use of external dependencies, and the inclusion of content with external dependencies in the NAM is not permitted by team policy, SAM 10 does not feature them, instead having a copied-over version of our default prop setups from the other similar SAM sets. 

Moonlinght-san also pretty much stopped modding after about 2012, so aside from situations where we updated things for integration into the NAM, his stuff (and much if not all of Neko Panch's work) only covers functionality that was available in NAM 30 or earlier--prior to SAM 10 being a thing.  I seem to recall there was some talk of producing a SAM 10-supporting version of it, but I don't know if that ever ended up happening.  I'm not sure why SAM 1 is covered, since being parking lots, it doesn't make sense with those props (unless there's also some SAM 1 retexturing in some component of the mod of which I'm unaware).

You should be able to get the original to work on SAM 9, however, by making sure it comes later in the load order than "Network Addon Mod".  You'll effectively end up with two SAM sets that look like Moonlinght's streets in the process, though (SAM 9 and SAM 10), and any SAM features that were produced after the mod were supported will show through the red brick textures instead.  Alternatively, it's possible to actually swap SAM 9 and SAM 10 with some easy ilive's Reader work (a 2-minute job, even for a novice with the program).

I don't know all the details of the Neko Panch ("Cat Punch") mod to which you refer, but it's also worth noting that if it's also a Type 21 exemplar mod (Type 21 exemplars, often called "T21s", are files that associate prop setups with specific transport network tiles), unless it's been carefully calibrated in terms of IID allocation, it's possible it and the Moonlinght mod could conflict.

I'll also ping @rsc204, since he has a lot of familiarity with Moonlinght and Neko Panch's mods, and might be able to fill in further details.

-Tarkus

[SneakyDeaky 1,126]

3 hours ago, Tarkus said:

Moonlinght's original mod was designed as a replacement for SAM 9.  The NAM Team later, with permission, added the textures to the mod as the new SAM 10 with the release of NAM 31 in March 2013.  However, given that the trees and other prop work associated with the original SAM 9 replacement required the use of external dependencies, and the inclusion of content with external dependencies in the NAM is not permitted by team policy, SAM 10 does not feature them, instead having a copied-over version of our default prop setups from the other similar SAM sets. 

Moonlinght-san also pretty much stopped modding after about 2012, so aside from situations where we updated things for integration into the NAM, his stuff (and much if not all of Neko Panch's work) only covers functionality that was available in NAM 30 or earlier--prior to SAM 10 being a thing.  I seem to recall there was some talk of producing a SAM 10-supporting version of it, but I don't know if that ever ended up happening.  I'm not sure why SAM 1 is covered, since being parking lots, it doesn't make sense with those props (unless there's also some SAM 1 retexturing in some component of the mod of which I'm unaware).

You should be able to get the original to work on SAM 9, however, by making sure it comes later in the load order than "Network Addon Mod".  You'll effectively end up with two SAM sets that look like Moonlinght's streets in the process, though (SAM 9 and SAM 10), and any SAM features that were produced after the mod were supported will show through the red brick textures instead.  Alternatively, it's possible to actually swap SAM 9 and SAM 10 with some easy ilive's Reader work (a 2-minute job, even for a novice with the program).

I don't know all the details of the Neko Panch ("Cat Punch") mod to which you refer, but it's also worth noting that if it's also a Type 21 exemplar mod (Type 21 exemplars, often called "T21s", are files that associate prop setups with specific transport network tiles), unless it's been carefully calibrated in terms of IID allocation, it's possible it and the Moonlinght mod could conflict.

I'll also ping @rsc204, since he has a lot of familiarity with Moonlinght and Neko Panch's mods, and might be able to fill in further details.

-Tarkus

Wow thank you for the very through guide and history lesson! I did not realize the original mod was that old. I haven't played the game since 2018 after a hard drive failure. I pretty much thought I had given up but have been drawn back into the game again during the latest lockdown. So I'm slowly building that plugin folder up again. 

I looked and realized I do have a couple of other possible conflicting mods, including a no grass mod and T Wreck's Maxis Tree Replacement Mod, I don't see how the later would have any affect, but having Moonlight's mod loaded as zzzzzzzz ML JPN Street SAM9 didn't fix the error, so it's time for a full plugin "sweep."

[SneakyDeaky 1,126]

I found the "culprit," it was the SAM feature of MGB's No Grass mod, which makes perfect sense and I feel a little foolish now, but happy the issue is sorted. 

NAM and Moonlight's mods are now working perfectly together. 

Many thanks for the reply!

[rsc204 21,806]

2 hours ago, SneakyDeaky said:

I looked and realized I do have a couple of other possible conflicting mods, including a no grass mod and T Wreck's Maxis Tree Replacement Mod, I don't see how the later would have any affect, but having Moonlight's mod loaded as zzzzzzzz ML JPN Street SAM9 didn't fix the error, so it's time for a full plugin "sweep."

It's hard to see in the pictures with the T21 hedges in place, but if the No Grass mod supported SAM9, you'll need to remove the relevant files or make sure the JPN Streets mod loads after them.

:You beat me to it!

Since you are using my NGN mod, you can simply delete the SAM9 file from there separately.

1 hour ago, Tarkus said:

Alternatively, it's possible to actually swap SAM 9 and SAM 10 with some easy ilive's Reader work (a 2-minute job, even for a novice with the program).

This is actually a good idea, even having got things working. Since NAM36 the biggest addition to SAM has been to add WRCs. We now have transitions between SAM networks and new support for connection to NWM networks is on the cards in future. What this means is, the set made by Moonlight for SAM9 is missing a lot of newer textures that exist in SAM10 (NAM). But, as Tarkus already pointed out, it's super-easy to fix this.

Every texture, T21, Path, literally everything at the core of SC4 uses IDs to link things together. SAM sets are all identically ID'd, but the 6th digit (Instance ID) determines the SAM set. So every texture in SAM 1 through 9, will use 1 through 9 for this digit. Note SAM 10 and 11 use A and B respectively, or 10/11 in Hex.

If you open the SAM10 textures in Reader (this file):

Network Addon Mod\2_Additional Network Features\Street\Street Addon Mod\SAM - 10 - Japanese Streets (Moonlinght).dat

Click on Tools / TGI Editor, select all the items in the lower section, then re-ID the 6th digit of the Instance IDs from A to 9, you can save this file with a new name, you've now a copy of the SAM10 textures, that are ID'd for use with SAM9 instead. Note using this feature of Reader is a batch operation, literally you can change every texture's ID in a few clicks. As such, I've already done this for the NAM 39 textures and attach it here:

SAM - 9 - Japanese Streets (Moonlinght).dat

However, as future updates to SAM are added, it would be best to repeat the steps outlined, so SAM9 has all the latest textures.

But if you ask me, the more ideal thing to do, is to simply ditch the textures from Moonlight's SAM9 Mod, keep only the T21s. These too work on IDs, using a couple Properties, which if you make the same ID changes in reverse (all the 6th digits change from 9 to A), you can instead convert the T21s to work with SAM10 in the NAM. The benefit being you can keep SAM9, instead of overriding it to use the same textures as SAM10, loosing a SAM set in the process. You also wouldn't have to muck around with updating textures either. But of course, in either scenario, the T21s will not support the newer pieces, only the textures. I looked today and it's 320 T21s to make the update, but actually it's something I've been wanting to do and just never got round to.

Note too, if you use either the file I attached or switch the T21s to SAM10, you can remove a lot of the SAM9 mod you'll no longer need:

Basically the 3 files highlighted above are all you need to keep, all the T21s are in the T21 file .

3 hours ago, SneakyDeaky said:

And SAM1 is the same as the picture but has a parking lot sidewalk

Just like Tarkus, I am a little stumped as to what the intended function of such a mod would be? SAM1 is the runt of the litter, because it's a parking texture, it only supports four or five actual textures. I'll try to find a moment to dig into that mod and work it out, but for now my hunch is, it's probably not really useful, especially if you are using this for SAM9/10 already, it's essentially redundant.

3 hours ago, SneakyDeaky said:

Moonlight's Japanese Sidewalk Mod

Just to note, the actual Sidewalk Mod, is basically a variant of the Gobias Sidewalk you have installed. You can only have one sidewalk mod, there is no (easy) way to have different sidewalks for different networks, although using the same method as my SAM11 mod, it can be done.

The mod we're talking about here is the SAM9 mod.

2 hours ago, Tarkus said:

I don't know all the details of the Neko Panch ("Cat Punch") mod to which you refer, but it's also worth noting that if it's also a Type 21 exemplar mod (Type 21 exemplars, often called "T21s", are files that associate prop setups with specific transport network tiles), unless it's been carefully calibrated in terms of IID allocation, it's possible it and the Moonlinght mod could conflict.

Neko's mod (JPN Sidewalk Mod), isn't as it's name suggests a Sidewalk Mod, rather another T21 mod. Probably worth pointing out a T21 mod, simply "attaches" props to game networks, in many ways these are like lots, but with a special format.

From what I learned setting up a Japanese Region/Plugins, these mods play nicely, likely having been designed to work together. Likewise combined with the Japanese Traffic Lights and NAM Facelift Mod, with a lot of trial and error, everything can be setup to work together in harmony. The enemy is Load Order and being the content isn't wholly localised, it's not immediately obvious. That said, if making a Japanese themed region, heck even more generally, there is nothing like it mod-wise. In it's day it was utterly comprehensive, but sadly lacks support for a lot of new NAM features since it's creation. Getting them all to play nice is hard (discussed here in 2017):

Note this region was made when the z___NAM folder was still a thing. So all the underscores are used to control load order, more underscores = loads later. As you can see, this is not simple stuff. I don't even really know if you need the JPN SideWalk Mod to use v2, but this setup makes everything work together.

[SneakyDeaky 1,126]

17 hours ago, rsc204 said:

It's hard to see in the pictures with the T21 hedges in place, but if the No Grass mod supported SAM9, you'll need to remove the relevant files or make sure the JPN Streets mod loads after them.

:You beat me to it!

Since you are using my NGN mod, you can simply delete the SAM9 file from there separately.

This is actually a good idea, even having got things working. Since NAM36 the biggest addition to SAM has been to add WRCs. We now have transitions between SAM networks and new support for connection to NWM networks is on the cards in future. What this means is, the set made by Moonlight for SAM9 is missing a lot of newer textures that exist in SAM10 (NAM). But, as Tarkus already pointed out, it's super-easy to fix this.

Every texture, T21, Path, literally everything at the core of SC4 uses IDs to link things together. SAM sets are all identically ID'd, but the 6th digit (Instance ID) determines the SAM set. So every texture in SAM 1 through 9, will use 1 through 9 for this digit. Note SAM 10 and 11 use A and B respectively, or 10/11 in Hex.

If you open the SAM10 textures in Reader (this file):

Network Addon Mod\2_Additional Network Features\Street\Street Addon Mod\SAM - 10 - Japanese Streets (Moonlinght).dat

Click on Tools / TGI Editor, select all the items in the lower section, then re-ID the 6th digit of the Instance IDs from A to 9, you can save this file with a new name, you've now a copy of the SAM10 textures, that are ID'd for use with SAM9 instead. Note using this feature of Reader is a batch operation, literally you can change every texture's ID in a few clicks. As such, I've already done this for the NAM 39 textures and attach it here:

SAM - 9 - Japanese Streets (Moonlinght).dat

However, as future updates to SAM are added, it would be best to repeat the steps outlined, so SAM9 has all the latest textures.

But if you ask me, the more ideal thing to do, is to simply ditch the textures from Moonlight's SAM9 Mod, keep only the T21s. These too work on IDs, using a couple Properties, which if you make the same ID changes in reverse (all the 6th digits change from 9 to A), you can instead convert the T21s to work with SAM10 in the NAM. The benefit being you can keep SAM9, instead of overriding it to use the same textures as SAM10, loosing a SAM set in the process. You also wouldn't have to muck around with updating textures either. But of course, in either scenario, the T21s will not support the newer pieces, only the textures. I looked today and it's 320 T21s to make the update, but actually it's something I've been wanting to do and just never got round to.

Note too, if you use either the file I attached or switch the T21s to SAM10, you can remove a lot of the SAM9 mod you'll no longer need:

Basically the 3 files highlighted above are all you need to keep, all the T21s are in the T21 file .

Just like Tarkus, I am a little stumped as to what the intended function of such a mod would be? SAM1 is the runt of the litter, because it's a parking texture, it only supports four or five actual textures. I'll try to find a moment to dig into that mod and work it out, but for now my hunch is, it's probably not really useful, especially if you are using this for SAM9/10 already, it's essentially redundant.

Just to note, the actual Sidewalk Mod, is basically a variant of the Gobias Sidewalk you have installed. You can only have one sidewalk mod, there is no (easy) way to have different sidewalks for different networks, although using the same method as my SAM11 mod, it can be done.

The mod we're talking about here is the SAM9 mod.

Neko's mod (JPN Sidewalk Mod), isn't as it's name suggests a Sidewalk Mod, rather another T21 mod. Probably worth pointing out a T21 mod, simply "attaches" props to game networks, in many ways these are like lots, but with a special format.

From what I learned setting up a Japanese Region/Plugins, these mods play nicely, likely having been designed to work together. Likewise combined with the Japanese Traffic Lights and NAM Facelift Mod, with a lot of trial and error, everything can be setup to work together in harmony. The enemy is Load Order and being the content isn't wholly localised, it's not immediately obvious. That said, if making a Japanese themed region, heck even more generally, there is nothing like it mod-wise. In it's day it was utterly comprehensive, but sadly lacks support for a lot of new NAM features since it's creation. Getting them all to play nice is hard (discussed here in 2017):

Note this region was made when the z___NAM folder was still a thing. So all the underscores are used to control load order, more underscores = loads later. As you can see, this is not simple stuff. I don't even really know if you need the JPN SideWalk Mod to use v2, but this setup makes everything work together.

A really interesting post! The most "modding" I've done is with the Lot Editor, which I really enjoy. I'm currently working on some seasonal relots, but I decided to download the live reader and take a look at it. 

Theoretically could it be possible to use Moonlight's T21's with the cobblestone textures? Is it also possible to remove some aspects of the mod, say I wanted to remove the white fencing/guardrails for instance, is that possible without getting brown boxes? 

 

Regarding the SAM 1 parking lot overide, could that have been the earliest version of Moonlight's mod, before it became a SAM 9 overide? Either way I've removed it. 

I didn't know about a Japanese Traffic Lights mod, I'll go find that now. I downloaded the LRM v4 very recently and set that up, but I think I'm getting another conflict with the JPN sidewalk mod, as all the night lights are very bright and neon, glowing like Christmas.

 

I have never used the LRM before so I'm, not sure if this is correct or not when used with another sidewalk mod, or even if it can be used with sidewalk mods?

Many thanks!

[rsc204 21,806]

1 minute ago, SneakyDeaky said:

Theoretically could it be possible to use Moonlight's T21's with the cobblestone textures? Is it also possible to remove some aspects of the mod, say I wanted to remove the white fencing/guardrails for instance, is that possible without getting brown boxes? 

In theory you can just give any of these T21s a different ID, that "lot" would then be applied to the new ID. The problem there, if SAM8 used different dimensions to SAM10 (honestly not sure without checking), the same Prop Placement may not work.

But removing Props is very possible, you just need to identify the Prop Exemplar ID used, then remove the equivalent Prop IDs from the LotConfigPropertyLotObjects on the T21s. If you aren't using these Props anywhere else, you could just nullify (link to a Null Key), the Prop Exemplar itself. This is much quicker to do in practise but will remove all instances of it, not only those on the T21s.

5 minutes ago, SneakyDeaky said:

I downloaded the LRM v4 very recently and set that up, but I think I'm getting another conflict with the JPN sidewalk mod, as all the night lights are very bright and neon, glowing like Christmas.

This effect is actually not a bug, but simply the result of having better lights. A light-cone is actually a model, which shines a "texture" in the direction it's been assigned. The original Maxis ones were more of a dim glow around the bulb, so lotters would use many of them to light up a lot. When you install the overrides, suddenly each one of those lights is very powerful and if you combine too many in a small space, there is too much light. In fact, LRM works best with a light every other tile, just as they are spaced on Streets and Roads. So the solution is to re-lot such buildings so they have fewer lights and work better with LRM.

If you look at the streets almost in the middle of your picture, the distribution of lighting creates a great effect. The bright orange (is that a road) in the bottom right however, is probably too dense, but because the lights are Orange not White, the effect is actually quite OK. I think LRM and the JPN Sidewalk Mod are probably conflicting, you may be seeing mixed effects where some parts of one appear in certain situations, but the other mod appears in others.

11 minutes ago, SneakyDeaky said:

I have never used the LRM before so I'm, not sure if this is correct or not when used with another sidewalk mod, or even if it can be used with sidewalk mods?

Hard to answer without a definition of Sidewalk Mod, the term is used quite generically. At it's core a sidewalk mod simply replaces 1-4 game textures, that are then applied when game-networks are zoned, such a mod wouldn't conflict with LRM since they replace different things.

LRM does two main things, first it replaces all the Maxis/NAM Lightcones with more realistic ones. A light-cone is simply the light itself, it doesn't include the Lamppost. The second is an included T21 mod which uses the LRM models to apply them onto game networks. However, the JPN Sidewalk Mods already include lights, but it's the light cones it needs from the LRM v4 package to work. So LRM and these "Sidewalk" mods will conflict, you are probably best just keeping the lightcones if you want a more Japanese look.

[SneakyDeaky 1,126]

On 28/12/2020 at 11:54 AM, rsc204 said:

This effect is actually not a bug, but simply the result of having better lights. A light-cone is actually a model, which shines a "texture" in the direction it's been assigned. The original Maxis ones were more of a dim glow around the bulb, so lotters would use many of them to light up a lot. When you install the overrides, suddenly each one of those lights is very powerful and if you combine too many in a small space, there is too much light. In fact, LRM works best with a light every other tile, just as they are spaced on Streets and Roads. So the solution is to re-lot such buildings so they have fewer lights and work better with LRM.

If you look at the streets almost in the middle of your picture, the distribution of lighting creates a great effect. The bright orange (is that a road) in the bottom right however, is probably too dense, but because the lights are Orange not White, the effect is actually quite OK. I think LRM and the JPN Sidewalk Mod are probably conflicting, you may be seeing mixed effects where some parts of one appear in certain situations, but the other mod appears in others.

Yes, as I've got used to it the effect can be quite stunning. Especially for downtown areas. I like the bluer look of streets with this mod, it reminds me of somewhere else, not just Japan. I can't think where but it's very cool. 

The small issues that arise, as you said, are when you get an older custom building with a lot of lights. I see that after a lot of testing that there are few more Maxis and community bats to add to my ever expanding lot editor list

Many thanks for your reply, I'm using your SAM 9 dat, everything is working fine. You know, actually, I got one more question for you, if you don't mind? Take your time to reply, but is there a way/ or an existing mod, that can expand the sidewalk texture to pedmalls? I could just ultimately lot my own series for myself, but sometimes I see in a journal where the sidewalk texture has expanded to pedmalls and most base textures, so I'm assuming (perhaps wrongly) that there is already a mod for this? 

 

[rsc204 21,806]

Yeah but it’s not really lotting, instead you must override the sidewalk/network textures. If you want to expand that beyond those which appear automatically with zoning, such a mod can require a lot of textures. For a coherent feel, I find it best to also override the default Sidewalk Lot textures too.

In trying to solve this same problem myself, I ended up working with Rivit on an automated solution. Rather than make a sidewalk mod for xx sidewalk, a package was put together anyone could use, to quickly create a set for any sidewalk.

The Automated Sidewalk Mod linked also in my signature, is a downloadable repository anyone can use to make such mods for their sidewalks. You’ll also need a copy of GoFSH to make the custom textures. Follow the instructions here (tutorial) or here (YouTube tutorial) to extract your Sidewalk textures, for use with this process. Since you're using NGN, when selecting the textures (GoFSH), point the Grass ones at the equivalent sidewalk textures using the ? buttons. That way, GoFSH will create your textures without any grasses, only sidewalks to match.

It looks like you’re using one of Gobias’ HD Sidewalks?, if so be sure to use SD textures (with GoFSH), when creating the mod. You can find those in the file GB Plaza Txt Replace Lot Editor.dat that comes with the mod, starting with HD textures won’t give good results. Also worth noting, the ID's won't match those in the tutorial, but you only need to find the correct SW texture, since these mods are not multi-wealth.

This finished mod is very comprehensive, but you may also want to consider using the Jap NAM Facelift mod too, which covers some legacy pieces mine doesn't. The Pedmalls are covered by both, in your case I'd stick with the SWN ones my mod creates. But Puzzle-Based WRCs, Viaduct Roads and a few other things may be useful.