Entry 1: Current state
First entry. This is not the accumulated result of a weekend though. I started working on this project back in spring, around late April or early May, and I have been working on and of since then. Karlskrona is a town in Blekinge County, near the southeastern-most corner of Sweden and it is situated across several islands surrounded by a larger archipelago. The town was founded in 1680 as a ice free naval port and is to this day still the main base for the Swedish Navy. Karlskrona is my hometown and I was born as well as mostly raised here. Sadly, I don't live there anymore and thats a main reason why I wanted to recreate the town, and it's surroundings, in Cities: Skylines. Basically homesickenss.
I should probably say a word or two about the map which you can find at this steam workshop link. I created the map based on a heightmap which I edited with GIMP to change the brightness and get the absolute heights to be somewhat realistic. However, the coastlines were nowhere near finished after importing into the game so I had to use an overlay mod and paint these by hand. End result is pretty good, however I discoverred som resolution issues when importing the edited the heightmap, causing some anoying, terracing and jaggedness of the slopes. Using the smoot tool in-game provides an acceptable solution to this issue. I then proceeded to add in most real life main roads, as I knew I was gonna build a somewhat realistic re-creation of Karlskrona. I also added some of the UNESCO world heritage fortifications found scattered around the archipelago to add some unique touches to the map and uploaded it onto the workshop. Pretty soon I noticed the map became pretty popular as the renowned Aussie YouTube profile, Flabaliki picked up the map and started a series of it titled "Skärgård" sort of the Swedish word for archipelago. I've much enjoyed watching his build on the map and find it really interesting how the unique geography of the map sort of forces city planners, no matter the era, to roughly come up with the same layouts and solutions.
About the same time as I uploaded the map I started building the town,in the actual game, as opposed to the map editor. During the first part I focussed heavily on making the main networks realistic with lines and markings. I also tested as many options as possible to make them work in the sometimes insane world of C:S traffic simulation. The first neighborhood I built was Långö. This was followed by work on Trossö, the downtown island, and Pantarholmen. I then linked these areas together with Pottholmen, which houses the main train station and transit hub for the town.
In the following, screenshots, including captions, of the current state of the build will be showcased.
Långö from the north
Långö and Lilla Pantarholmen (Small Pantarholmen) from the south. Pantarholmen visible to the right.
Lilla Pantarholmen, Långö, and Pantarholmen again. Note the weird junction close to the railway and bike underpass. It actually works!
Pantarholmen and Tullen to the left, the old toll place, with the unexpectidly named Tullparken.
Trossö and Pottholmen (modern development/construction site) with Långö and Pantarholmen in the background. Hoglands park, the main city park, visible to the left.
Similar view, showing more of the old bus hub at Kungsplan (Kings Place).
Hoglands Park.
The main train station, Karlskrona Central, with the adjacent bus hub.
Trossö and Pottholmen. The locomotive halls vanilla asset matches the IRL one riddiculously well. Much satisfaction.
The main marina and the highway entrance, Österleden/Infartsleden to Trossö.
Situated on Trossö, the main square, Stortorget (The Large Square) with Fredrikskyrkan (Fredrik's Church) to the right, Trefaldighetskyrkan (The Trinity Church), also known as Tyska kyrkan (The German Church) apparently after the german POWs who built it, to the bottom, and Rådhuset (The Court House) to the right. At the center of the square stands a statue of the towns founder, King Karl XI of Sweden.
A fun little anecdote is that the actual statue asset is one of the Russian Tsar Peter the Great, ironically the man who would put an end to the Swedish great power era about 30 years after the founding of Karlskrona.
A zoomed out overview of Trossö and its surroundings. A lot of messy WIP stuff still visible.
Trossö from Bryggareberget (Brewers Mountain). The area is still WIP but it features my first use of procedural object in the build to achieve the iconic triangular shapes on the water tower.
The Aspö Ferry berth. It pains me greatly that Roll-on/roll-off ferries are not yet in the game.
The Aspö ferry goes.. to Aspö. On Aspö you may find one of the aforementioned fortifications, such as Drottningskärs Kastell.
Much of the archipelago surrounding Karlskrona consists of small rocks and islands like these ones. Navigating such treacherous waters may be tricky as the Soviet submarine U-137 found out in October 1981.
The actual spot where the submarine run aground is marked on the map. If you've downloaded the map, see if you can find it.
Finally, a very zoomed out view of the entire map. I hope to be able to fill most of it at some point... in this or in the next life.
Thats all for this first entry, hope you enjoyed. Stay tuned for updates!
-
4
5 Comments
Recommended Comments
Sign In or register to comment...
To comment in reply, you must be a community member
Sign In
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In NowCreate an Account
Sign up to join our friendly community. It's easy!
Register a New Account