Possible "OpenSC4" ?

[crushproof 103]

This all sounds great, I haven't played the game in years solely because I got so fed up with load times when I had mods attached. I'm guessing any OpenSC4 would be compatible with modern devices/hardware and therefore load times should be minimal?

[cydonianmystery 96]

On 8/21/2022 at 5:54 AM, wheeeze said:

Small update: while I've been on vacation for two weeks in the first half of august, work hasn't stopped! Special thanks to @wibbert for implementing most of the base terrain rendering in the city view, plus some other fixes on my code, here's what it looks like :

On my end, I've done quite the progress on UI rendering and handling, here's what the region UI looks like. Some buttons are functional and some aren't, the positioning isn't perfect, and there are, for some reason I ignore, extra images, but the hard work on the UI rendering is behind us :

 

Amazing work! This looks really promising!

[Vitoraju 675]

On 21/08/2022 at 7:54 AM, wheeeze said:

Small update: while I've been on vacation for two weeks in the first half of august, work hasn't stopped! Special thanks to @wibbert for implementing most of the base terrain rendering in the city view, plus some other fixes on my code, here's what it looks like :

On my end, I've done quite the progress on UI rendering and handling, here's what the region UI looks like. Some buttons are functional and some aren't, the positioning isn't perfect, and there are, for some reason I ignore, extra images, but the hard work on the UI rendering is behind us :

 

 

Wow! I found this project very interesting and ambitious! I hope that new tools are developed and that it is possible to overcome the barriers of the current limitations of the game. I'll be following this thread! 

[TheMurderousCricket 5,045]

One thing I'd like to see in SC4O would be... extra ordinances.

This is what I miss from SC3000 which had numerous ordinances with a multitude of effects. Some of these were also expensive and hardly useful, simulating so-called defective laws. Public smoke ban was, for example, one of the most expensive and having least positive impact.

So having at least 20 - 30 extra ordinance slots could be great.

[AP 3,587]

@wheeeze is there any update on your progress? Hope things are going well for you!

[Nathaniel Herapen 17]

Seems to me Like everyone is opening up older beloved titles at the moment. this isn't the first open project I've heard of recently. That said, I am very much a layman with regards to this fascinating work.

[TheMurderousCricket 5,045]

Another thing that comes to my mind would be to improve the way in which BAT/civics-related data is being updated and refreshed by the game.

To be more precise, in the current status quo we are forced to demolish any buildings the properties of which we wish to edit. Altering the amount of power provided by power plants is one example in which this happens.

So creating an extra component in SC4O to, somehow, ensure that information like this is directly updated for any affected entity would be pure gold. Sparing us the need to run through all the regions and all the cities to make sure nothing is borked.

[wheeeze 90]

Hi everyone! After a long period of inactivity, I've come back to this project. In the meanwhile, it seems like three new contributors have arrived. As for myself, I spent the last week improving my homemade DBPF explorer rather than working on the game engine itself, since I found it was very much needed to work on guessing where each files goes. Thought it certainly isn't as good as Ilive's reader right now, it's getting pretty decent.

However, the documentation on the UI is rather incomplete, including on the sc4devotion wiki. For instance, many interfaces appear triplicated and I'm unsure exactly why. The answer must be in how the unhandled, mostly undocumented attributes should effect the controls. I've been trying to locate Ilive's reader's source code, if it's even public, or find the original "UI editor" that was most certainly used by the Maxis team, but to no avail. These would allow me to improve a lot on the UI.

[wheeeze 90]

About the UI, this is the kind of problem I encounter with the region view. The bottom-left corner exists 4 times! A very similar issue happens with the bottom-left corner UI in the City view. Reading the wiki and examining the source code (TGI: 0x00000000, 0x96a006b0, 0xaa920991) doesn't help me understand why this happens, except for the fact that there are in fact four elements with the same image that are defined in the source code, one of them being the child of another one, even, which makes selective hiding not an option

[nos.17 5,112]

5 hours ago, wheeeze said:

I've been trying to locate Ilive's reader's source code, if it's even public

I believe the source code can be found here.

I would certainly be interested in your DBPF explorer. That's been something that has been on my list to look into doing, but I've had other priorities in the meantime. Would that be something you'd be interested in sharing at some point?

Regarding savegame and file formats, there's a thread in the SC4D discord under general called file-formats where you'd be more likely to get answers to some specific questions.

And on the SC4D Wiki documentation - yes its pretty out of date, if you can edit things with new findings that would be appreciated! It can be a bit jank though, as I've got a short list of pages I cannot edit without a 500 web error.

[wheeeze 90]

On 19/02/2023 at 3:50 AM, nos.17 said:

I believe the source code can be found here.

I would certainly be interested in your DBPF explorer. That's been something that has been on my list to look into doing, but I've had other priorities in the meantime. Would that be something you'd be interested in sharing at some point?

Regarding savegame and file formats, there's a thread in the SC4D discord under general called file-formats where you'd be more likely to get answers to some specific questions.

And on the SC4D Wiki documentation - yes its pretty out of date, if you can edit things with new findings that would be appreciated! It can be a bit jank though, as I've got a short list of pages I cannot edit without a 500 web error.

Thank you @nos.17! About the DBPF explorer, you can check it out at https://github.com/OpenSC4-org/OpenSC4, which is the new repo. Feel free to use it. I'll certainly try to edit the SC4D wiki at some point.

[Leo -- 186]

On 19/02/2023 at 7:16 AM, wheeeze said:

Thank you @nos.17! About the DBPF explorer, you can check it out at https://github.com/OpenSC4-org/OpenSC4, which is the new repo. Feel free to use it. I'll certainly try to edit the SC4D wiki at some point.

Dead link.....

  Edited February 20, 2023 by Cyclone Boom  
Fixed it. Thanks.

[nos.17 5,112]

@Leo -- just remove the comma from the end.

  Edited February 20, 2023 by Cyclone Boom  
That was the problem. Fixed now, thanks!

[Leo -- 186]

On 2/19/2023 at 5:52 PM, nos.17 said:

@Leo -- just remove the comma from the end.

I'm dumb and blind

[ironjaw 54]

Came here just to post this. I've been waiting 20 years for such a project. I am rooting and thanking you immensely for putting in your time to make OpenSC4. All the best

[RoosterBooster 5]

I just saw that there was going to be an OpenSC4 and I had to post this wishlist.

1. Tram networks.

2. Expandable city boundaries

3. More disasters like plane crashes (which were removed from SC4 because of 9/11)

4. A more user-friendly way of choosing whether you citizens drive on the left or right.

5. And a full 3d worldview, if that is possible.

[Ulisse Wolf 4,399]

2 hours ago, RoosterBooster said:

1. Tram networks.

Trams are already included with Network Addon Mod

[TheMurderousCricket 5,045]

2 hours ago, RoosterBooster said:

I just saw that there was going to be an OpenSC4 and I had to post this wishlist.

1. Tram networks.

2. Expandable city boundaries

3. More disasters like plane crashes (which were removed from SC4 because of 9/11)

4. A more user-friendly way of choosing whether you citizens drive on the left or right.

5. And a full 3d worldview, if that is possible.

1. See above 

2. I don't think this is necessary and I can't really see how one could execute it... A city tile neighbors with other tiles so expanding it would, at the same time, require contracting all adjacent tiles...

3. Agree. Plus, making them less destructive. A single tornado can practically obliterate entire large-tile city, which I believe is an overkill.

4. This can be adjusted through NAM as well, though perhaps is indeed not fully user friendly.

5. That's a big, fat no for me. Can you really imagine re-rendering tens of thousands of buildings and props to make this happen?! 

[rsc204 21,806]

34 minutes ago, TheMurderousCricket said:

This can be adjusted through NAM as well, though perhaps is indeed not fully user friendly.

No it can’t, rather the NAM should be set to match your game’s install so it works correctly.

As for more user friendly, the problem is where you bought your game. It was handled during install with the disk version, but Steam and Origin don’t support this setup. GoG has a special tool (.exe) that can be used to switch locales/driving side, it couldn’t be simpler. Switching between them on an on-going basis will never be as straightforward since the mods needed may very well vary for a LHD or RHD game. 

[RoosterBooster 5]

On 5/21/2023 at 9:39 PM, TheMurderousCricket said:

1. See above 

2. I don't think this is necessary and I can't really see how one could execute it... A city tile neighbors with other tiles so expanding it would, at the same time, require contracting all adjacent tiles...

3. Agree. Plus, making them less destructive. A single tornado can practically obliterate entire large-tile city, which I believe is an overkill.

4. This can be adjusted through NAM as well, though perhaps is indeed not fully user friendly.

5. That's a big, fat no for me. Can you really imagine re-rendering tens of thousands of buildings and props to make this happen?! 

1. Wait OpenSc4 is going to be compatible with mods for original SC4?

2. OpenSC4 is not the original SC4, it doesn't have to play by Maxis's/EA's rules.

3. I agree as well.

5. Graphics don't make a game, gameplay does. Just throw a a few dozen more polygons on the assets to bring it up to PS2 standards and you're golden.

On 5/21/2023 at 10:17 PM, rsc204 said:

No it can’t, rather the NAM should be set to match your game’s install so it works correctly.

As for more user friendly, the problem is where you bought your game. It was handled during install with the disk version, but Steam and Origin don’t support this setup. GoG has a special tool (.exe) that can be used to switch locales/driving side, it couldn’t be simpler. Switching between them on an on-going basis will never be as straightforward since the mods needed may very well vary for a LHD or RHD game. 

This is OpenSc4, I'm sure the folks working on it can make a LHD or RHD option.

[Ulisse Wolf 4,399]

6 hours ago, RoosterBooster said:

1. Wait OpenSc4 is going to be compatible with mods for original SC4?

Yes. Also because the file reader is known as it is structured and then implement it in OpenSC4 projects

[RoosterBooster 5]

Is it ready to download and play? or is it still unfinished?

[Ulisse Wolf 4,399]

3 hours ago, RoosterBooster said:

Is it ready to download and play? or is it still unfinished?

It is incomplete but if you are good with programming you can contribute with the projects

 

[Danmyman 2]

Hi everyone, can I ask what’s the status for this? I haven’t seen any activities on the github repo for the past year

[Null 45 3,020]

1 hour ago, Danmyman said:

I haven’t seen any activities on the github repo for the past year

The project is inactive.

[Ulisse Wolf 4,399]

4 hours ago, Danmyman said:

Hi everyone, can I ask what’s the status for this? I haven’t seen any activities on the github repo for the past year

The project died because of bad management of personnel