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Edit: Available again, after getting the correct controller in place. Thank you for your patience. In honor of the 11th anniversary of SimCity 4's release, the NAM Team is pleased to announce the arrival of the full release of the 32nd edition of the NAM, NAM 32. New features in Version 32--January 14, 2014 NAM 32 is a full package, which improves upon the earlier NAM 31.2 release and NAM 32 Pre-Release. Note that the NAM requires a retail copy (disc or digital) of SimCity 4 Deluxe to run. The NAM Elevated Viaducts for Roads, One-Way Roads, and Avenues are now available in a draggable form, at both Level 1 (7.5 meter) and Level 2 (15 meter) heights, complete with FLEX Height and On-Slope transitions. Overpass situations involving one or more diagonal networks are not yet supported, and will not be available until a future NAM release after Version 32. Elevated Rail-over-Avenue and Elevated Rail-over-NWM Road-4 dual-networking support has been added, complete with a new station supporting both networks. The initial phases of the RealRailway (RRW) system have been added. This feature must be selected as part of a custom install. The RealHighway (RHW) system has been expanded to include the QuickChange interchange system, which blends the RHW's modularity with the ease of Maxis Highway construction techniques for certain situations, which will be expanded in future NAM releases. Additionally, several new types of FLEXRamps are available--please read the instructions in the description text. FLEX Transitions have also been given stability improvements for certain situations. Coupled with the RHW system, the NAM now offers Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) functionality, including stations. Transit station functionality has been further improved, including the beginning of the implementation of the SLURP, which will gradually raise all transit stations to NAM standards. The NAM Controller Compiler has been included with the installer, with which it now communicates, ensuring that only the installed features are incorporated into the NAM Controller, reducing file size and load times. About 50 bugs reported since the start of the NAM 32 Pre-Release have also been squished, including some that had been present since earlier versions of the NAM. It is highly recommended that users update to the latest NAM in order to enjoy a more stable experience. Installing over previous versions: NAM 32 may be installed directly over top of any previous NAM releases. It is a full release, not a patch or a hotfix. All future updates are planned to be in full package form, and there are no plans to issue patches or hotfixes in the future. Please also note that the NAM Team only provides technical support for the most recent version, which, as of this document, is NAM 32. We cannot assist users of the NAM 32 Pre-Release, NAM 31.x-series release, or earlier. Special Thanks: The NAM Team would like to extend its sincere thanks to all the members of the community who helped test the NAM 32 Pre-Release, offering feedback and helping us locate and solve bugs.

Firstly, welcome back! As many of y'all know, ST went down on 16 April, 2026 due to a billing error 2 days prior to that. The pathetic host decided to not only suspend the server, but to immediately delete it entirely, including the live site and both daily backups. There was no forewarning or communication about this sent to Dirk. From initial correspondence with the old host, they claimed the server was merely suspended and data was kept for 6 months. It seemed like the billing issue only needed correcting. However, once Dirk heard back from a higher level support, to our complete shock and dismay it was confirmed the server had been wiped. They offered to restore it if we had backups. But what use were those when they were on the server?! Everything was gone. A full offline backup was about 187 GB last time CB downloaded it and he had to do it in pieces (due to a very slow internet connection in his teeny, tiny town) and it took several days. This contains all the objects (which are all the files and pictures anywhere on the site including attachments and within the STEX) as well as the board software and the forums. There was also a separate full account backup from 2020, but we didn't need that in the end. Now, separately, the database is all of the posts in the forums, STEX, omnibus, and so forth. That comes in around 6 GB and is backed up and downloaded more often. However, the offline download was just a fallback which should never be needed since we always had full backups run online every single day. (We never anticipated the host would fucking delete everything on the server!) Ofc, in hindsight we'd've kept separate online daily synced backups too, even if those come at a cost. Without any local backup, Simtropolis as we know it would be lost forever to the infinite voids of cyberspace. Thankfully this isn't the case, so it could've been much, much worse. Anyhow, what this means for us now is we have the forums and text of the STEX restored as it was on 28 February, 2026, but all files and pictures (both as forum attachments and in the STEX) are missing from 17 June, 2024 and after. We can recover! (But, we'll need a lot of help.) CB and Dirk have rebuilt the site on a new host. There are some nice positives as a result: Already an outpouring of support from people on Discord and Reddit. We appreciate the encouragement and support. Thank you! We've moved fully away from our old host. They will get nary a nickel from ST anymore ever again (from now till the end of the universe). The hardware is at least 10x more capable, and is no more expensive than our old host. (Depending on your internet connection, the site should be more responsive.) We've got a much more economical and cleaner home (way less server side clutter). We're in more control over the server to manage all aspects of it from the ground up. CB has separately purchased a 1 TB storage cloud for online, but offsite daily backups going forwards. Future potential to upgrade the IPS board software to a newer version, but we're not in a rush to do this. However, a few bad things will be immediately apparent when y'all start looking around: Any pictures or attached files after 17 June, 2024 are missing. Any STEX files added after 17 June, 2024 are gone. All avatar updates or changes after 17 June, 2024 are lost. --------------- All topics have lost any replies after 28 Feb, 2026. Any STEX entries added or updated after 28 Feb, 2026 are gone. Any STEX downloads history since 28 Feb, 2026 is lost. Any new sc4pac tokens since 28 Feb, 2026 are lost (and will need regenerating). Any PMs after 28 Feb, 2026 are missing. Any members who joined after 28 Feb, 2026 will need to re-join Simtropolis. Initial Recovery Efforts: Topic Divider Messages We've added a Topic Divider message to all forum threads which were active as of the last database backup. That's so when reading along now and in the future it'll explain why any given subject might seem disjointed and incoherent if the same peeps aren't able to re-reply. I know one topic in which I'm now the last to reply and my answer was only partially right. I remember at the time someone replied soon later with the real answer. That's lost, but they might re-state it when they have time. Or it could stay missing. (For that particular topic, I'll reply with what I remember of it.) So the divider message serves to explain why many topics might seem choppy for a little while. An example can be seen here. Original Image and File Names for Attachments Since the database info is way more recent than the objects (files and images), we'll often know the name and size of images and files because of their pointer entries in the database, but we won't have the item that points to. So, CB has worked his magic such that a missing pic will show the ST Logo as a placeholder while also showing the original file name for the image or attachment. This will make it easier for peeps to identify and re-upload them. Note: If your image name originally contained spaces, those will be stripped out in the file name which appears as the Original Pic Name. Sample for an image: ^ Original Pic Name: Cori'sWidget.jpg Sample for a file: Attachment Missing (Cori's Exemplar Viewer Output - 2026.02.17.09.37.zip) Additionally, you can go to your own list of attachments and find anything missing. CB plans to add a feature for clicking and re-uploading files directly from that page. STEX Files and Pics (Needs figured out...) We have a separate method for recovering STEX files. That'll be a new forum (or topic) or something where anyone can post a linky to the STEX entry and then also attach the missing files and/or pics. We want to be careful here to not duplicate each other's efforts so searching in there first is a good idea. Then staff (and other peeps recruited to help) will patch up the STEX entries and then move the topic for that item to a Done forum. Or such. We'll reveal more details once we've figured out a battle plan. Also we'll be opening a topic where anyone interested to assist can register as a volunteer to help. Your Own Files and Pics Ofc, any missing STEX entry that you created can be fixed (re-adding files and pics) or recreated (if totally missing) anytime you get a chance. Same for any missing attachments in your posts or elsewhere on the site. When you repair your own STEX entry there is one additional step needed and that is to delete the message banner. (There's some fancy code in it which hides the download button and displays the File Unavailable message.) See this topic to have staff remove the file message banner after you've restored the missing content. Other Notes: Restoration Priority (From CB in Chat) 1) STEX Files 2) STEX Screenshots 3) Attached Files 4) Attached Images 5) Gallery Images 6) Homepage Feature Images 7) Member Avatars 8) Anything Else This order we believe makes a suitable priority for what we'll look to restore first. STEX Screenshots are likely going to need uploading from in-game pics, but for some we might be able to salvage using the Internet Archive (but that depends on which files have been saved to there). Closing Words (for now) We're very glad to be back. We're also pleased to see y'all back. The past month (and a bit) have seemed like many months, and we've missed ST too. While this has been a setback for the community, the key thing is Simtropolis Has Returned. We're determined to rebuild our city stronger than ever before. Oh! One final thing: We might have to put the site in offline maintenance mode for brief periods as some of the tweaks CB is working on cannot be implemented while the site is live. -Cori & CB & Dirk

Miraculous News! This afternoon I've received an email from a friend Cori knows in real life from work (which I recall she told me about). They said how Cori "is out of the hospital and is doing okay". Also how it'll be some time before they're back online. There are no other details I'm aware of at this point. I've replied to say about such relief to hear they're alive. Also there's no pressure for Cori to return, but of course the door remains open to do so however they wish (and all in their own time). Thank you again all for the kind and heartfelt messages (inside the initial topic). We now know there's a good chance Cori is aware of our posts, or will be sometime. (As an aside, I'll be giving any rep received on this post directly to @CorinaMarie's profile. I'm only the messenger here passing forth this good news.) -CB

Hiya, Everyone! I'm back. I've re-read all of this thread and the prior one and I am so overwhelmed with grateful emotions to each and every one of you who have said kind things. Thank you ever so much! Please do understand it would take me forever to reply to each of you separately so I ask your forgiveness for not making my replies all personalized. However, I do feel very strongly to mention @RobertaME. I'm so sorry to hear about your brother's sudden passing. Please accept my heartfelt condolences. Loss of someone so close is very difficult to deal with. I'm glad to see you've come back and you've regained your passion for AMPS. That reminds me too about my words and actions in your thread long ago and I'm so terribly sorry how I misunderstood you and then lashed out at you. That was wrong of me and I hope you can forgive me for that. And back to all: Right now my living conditions are rather dismal, but adequate. I've been in touch with CB via Skype nearly every day and he's helped me keep my sanity. I don't have the game or any of the modding tools, but I hope to be around ST most days. It'll take a long while for me to catch up and I know there are so many exciting things going on to learn about. -Cori

A quick sneak peek of the new Turbo Roundabouts for the NAM , fresh from the presses. Here's a proof of concept in-game. Video preview made by NAM Team member Mandelsoft.

Hi everyone, For many, many years I visited Simtropolis regularly, always hoping for that one announcement: “SimCity 5 is coming!” Like many of you, I was deeply inspired by SimCity 3000 and SimCity 4 — and like some of you, I was also disappointed by the direction the franchise took afterward. For years, I dreamed of a game that could bring back that spark... and now, I'm trying to build it myself. I'm an architect by profession and a long-time fan of city-building games. Last year, I finally decided to take the leap and start creating my own game — CityArchitect. It’s a city-building game with a unique focus: not only do you design the layout of the city, but you also design the architecture of each individual building, using a powerful modular tool inspired by SimCity 3000’s Building Architect Tool — but far more flexible and easier to use. You can mix real architectural styles (from historical to modern), combine façade elements, roofs, terraces, and decorative pieces, and create highly customized buildings that still harmonize with the city’s overall aesthetic. The game is still in development, but I’ve just launched the Steam page and plan to release an early test version later this year. This first version will focus on the building creation tool and allow you to create small city blocks and place your custom buildings in them. The full city simulation is still in progress — but it's evolving every week. I’d love to hear your feedback, especially from people here who truly understand the legacy and magic of SimCity. You can also follow the development on Instagram at @play.cityarchitect . It would mean a lot if you could wishlist the game on Steam — it really helps spread the word! Thanks for reading — and thank you, Simtropolis, for being such an important part of my inspiration all these years. Let me know what you think!

It will be very familiar to those who love the genre, but it will also do new things and set its own priorities and focus areas: It will be a single-player game that works completely offline. The goal is to simulate one whole, huge region at once - no need for tiny city lots or artificial city interaction dynamics. It will be affordable and will not rely on DLC. Alpha and Beta versions will be available for a reduced price. Moddability will be a priority, not an afterthought. Read more about Citybound and the technology: http://blog.cityboundsim.com/the-beginning/

Update 2018/01/21 SC4Fix has been updated with a stable build that fixes prop pox. Download on the STEX: --- I like a good challenge, so I decided to take this one up. Context Prop pox is a bug that causes decorative props in some cities to begin disappearing. The problem is exacerbated if the city continues to be played and saved, and persists even after adjusting graphics settings for prop detail or restarting the game. The prevailing hypothesis is bap's prop theory, which makes these main claims: In a normal game installation with absolutely no plugins, prop pox will never occur, even after updating. Prop pox is actually caused by plugins that redefine Maxis prop exemplars that add properties that were not originally in the exemplars. Prop pox will only manifest itself if one of these plugins is installed and the city's prop subfile* is sufficiently large. * bap refers to the prop subfile as the network subfile in his post, which seems to be a mistake. Testing this is pretty straightforward as all we need to do is clear our plugins, develop a city until the prop subfile is large enough (around 6MB, according to bap) and then use a plugin that causes pox by improperly redefining exemplars. For this I made a mostly flat large tile city with sprawling low-density developments to add as many props as possible in a short timeframe. When the prop subfile for the city was just under 6MB I made a copy of it and then allowed it to develop further until it crossed that limit. Why is this 6MB limit significant? The game determines whether a subfile should be compressed mainly by its filesize (along with a few other properties); subfiles smaller than 6MB can be compressed, but anything larger than that is saved decompressed in order to save time and computational resources when saving very large subfiles. Prop pox apparently begins most commonly when crossing this compression limit. With no plugins installed, the city was able to develop past the 6MB prop subfile limit without any pox or save corruption occurring, no matter how many times I saved or how long the simulation ran for, which I tested using wouanagaine's SC4 Savegame Explorer. If prop theory is correct, then pox should occur if we install a bad plugin and try to develop the city past that limit again. For this, bap used SimPEG's Beach Development Kit 1: In particular, you only need to extract PEG-OWW2_BDK_RESOURCE.dat as this contains the exemplar redefinitions. After installing this plugin, I loaded the test city, added some new zones to force new props to develop, ran the simulation for a bit and saved the city a couple of times. This immediately resulted in the city developing prop pox according to the savegame explorer. For your convenience for reproducing this, here are the savegame files I used: Test City, prop subfile under 6MB, no plugins and no pox Test City, prop subfile over 6MB, no plugins and no pox Test City, prop subfile under 6MB, BDK_RESOURCE installed and pox present Explaining the buffer corruption Since the savegame explorer reports buffer corruption at a particular location in the savegame, we should probably check out what's happening there to see if this improves our understanding of what causes prop pox. First we need to extract the prop subfile from the savegame using iLive's Reader: The pox-infected .sc4 save can be opened in the Reader. From there we need to extract the entry with type ID 0x2977aa47 (which is marked as Unknown, and that's fine). We also want to make sure we have the decompressed version of the subfile, so we'll save the decoded file and open it in an external hex editor since the one built into the Reader isn't great. I prefer using HxD. If we jump to the reported offset of corruption in the hex editor, we can read the bytes of the prop subfile as base-16 hex values, and the structure of the prop subfile is given in the SC4D wiki. (Note that DWORDs are four bytes large, WORDs are two bytes, and BYTEs are one.) Here's what the corrupted prop entry looks like in the hex editor: And here's what this looks like when filling it into the prop structure given on the SC4D wiki: DWORD Size: 0x00000058 DWORD CRC: 0x006C2462 DWORD Memory: 0x4CE00000 ??? : 0x59E6 ??? : 0xA084 ??? : 0x0F06 WORD Major: 0x0006 WORD Minor: 0x0004 WORD Zot: 0x0000 BYTE Unknown: 0x00 BYTE Appearance: 0x04 DWORD : 0xA823821E BYTE Min Tract X : 0x42 BYTE Min Tract Z : 0x6E BYTE Max Tract X: 0x42 BYTE Max Tract Z: 0x6E WORD X Tract Size: 0x0002 WORD Z Tract Size: 0x0002 DWORD Property Ct.: 0x00000001 SGPROP #1 DWORD Property Name: 0x89A1C16C DWORD Property Name: 0x89A1C16C DWORD : 0x00000000 BYTE Data Type: 0x03 BYTE Key Type: 0x00 WORD: 0x0000 DWORD Rep Count: 0x00000000 DWORD GID: 0xC977C536 DWORD TID: 0x6534284A DWORD IID Exemplar: 0x29000000 DWORD IID Given: 0x29000000 FLOAT32 Min X: 0x4308558C FLOAT32 Min Y: 0x43870000 FLOAT32 Min Z: 0x45386FA3 FLOAT32 Max X: 0x430A558C FLOAT32 Max Y: 0x43880000 FLOAT32 Max Z: 0x45389FA3 BYTE Orientation: 0x03 BYTE State: 0x00 BYTE Start Time: 0x00 BYTE Stop Time: 0x00 BYTE Count: 0x00 BYTE Rand. Chance: 0x64 BYTE Lot Type: 0x02 DWORD Object ID: 0x2A46EEFF BYTE Conditional: 0x00 Immediately something is wrong: there are six extra bytes after the first three pieces of data that don't correspond to anything in the prop file structure. Moreover, this entry gives its size as 0x58 (88) bytes but the hex editor says this is 0x72 (114) bytes in it. Where are the extra 26 bytes coming from? Well, first we can discount the seemingly random six bytes that appeared at the top. Next we can scrutinize the SGPROP since that's only an optional part of the prop subfile, and sure enough four DWORDs (16 bytes), a WORD (2 bytes) and two bytes add up to 20. And just out of curiosity, let's see what exemplar IID 0x29000000 maps to: Sure enough, it's a redefined residential beach umbrella exemplar from SimPEG's BDK resources. The main change in PEG's exemplar is that the Nighttime State Change entry (one byte large) in the Maxis exemplar was replaced by a Prop Time of Day entry (two Float32s, or eight bytes large). This is similar to what RippleJet observed when testing this. Because this prop entry is corrupted, closing this save and loading it will cause the game to believe that the entry really is only 88 bytes long, it will read several garbage values in the process, and after 88 bytes have been read it will attempt to read what it thinks is another prop entry. That prop entry will have a nonsensical size entry because it's being misinterpreted due to the corruption of the save, and that prop and all props that follow it in the savefile will not be present. As for why savefiles tend to continuously shrink on every save: When loading a file with corrupted props, incorrect size data and other malformed information will cause the corrupted prop and all props that follow it in the file to be misread. These misread props are discarded by the game, causing them to disappear from the city. Since the malformed props were discarded when loading, they will not appear when saving again, causing the filesize to shrink. On this new save, however, other malformed props could corrupt the savefile again, repeating the process. Towards a vaccine It's worth pointing out that bap originally speculated that prop pox was caused by a buffer overflow or some kind of memory error in the game that caused data for a modded prop to spill past the end of its buffer in memory. To test this, I installed the game on Fedora Linux 26 using WINE 3.0-rc6 and ran it under Valgrind, a memory debugging tool for Linux. However, I found no difference in the number of memory errors reported before and after installing PEG's beach resources. Since some reported instances of prop pox involve parts of the prop subfile being overwritten, we have to look at how the game actually writes data to disk. Since other prop poxxed cities appear to have prop definitions overwriting the middle of other prop definitions, it's possible that the game is incorrectly properly calculating where it should be writing when dealing with these overridden exemplars. Unfortunately this is where things go off the rails: in order to better determine what's going on in this process, I rewrote the function responsible for writing savegame objects, and this link shows what that looks like. Since the Mac version of the game contains the debugging symbols for this to work, I've only tested this on my Mac, and porting this to Windows is nontrivial. In another insane twist, I can't reproduce prop pox using my rewritten Mac serialization code, and can reproduce it immediately when not injecting that code, but I can't confidently say I fixed it since I can't demonstrate this to very many people without a usable Windows DLL, so that's my project for the time being. I also have no idea why my code doesn't cause prop pox to occur since I tried to recreate the original implementation of savegame serialization as closely as possible. For now, I'd speculate that prop pox is caused by a quirk in how the game saves records. Since the game may not know the size of all records in advance when saving a game, it has to resort to rewinding and fast-forwarding to arbitrary offsets in order to save data. For instance, when saving a prop record, the game will: Write the number 0 as a placeholder for the size in bytes. Write the number 0 as a placeholder for the CRC checksum. Write an identifier and the record itself. Rewind to the first zero. Calculate and rewrite the size based on how many more bytes there are in the file after writing the record. Fast-forward to the record itself and read the data in it back to a buffer. Rewind to the second zero and calculate and write the CRC checksum. Fast-forward to the end of the output stream to allow more data to be written. I think that miscalculated offsets when rewinding and fast-forwarding is causing previously written prop records to be overwritten by malformed props, corrupting the entire subfile in the process. How exactly does that relate to the redefinition of the prop exemplar? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I'm working on getting my serialization code ported to Windows ASAP to see what happens there. In the meantime, if you have a Mac and want to try it out and report if you're still seeing prop pox: Grab this dylib which was built from the source code linked above (and again here). Go to Utilities in Finder and open up a terminal. I used Steam, so I used these commands: cd "$HOME/Library/Application Support/Steam/steamapps/common/SimCity 4 Deluxe/SimCity 4 Deluxe Edition.app/Contents/MacOS" echo 24780 > steam_appid.txt DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES="$HOME/Downloads/libinjector.dylib" ./Sim\ City\ 4\ Deluxe\ Editionsub Your game should now be running with some output labeled COMSerialize, particularly when saving the game. And if you want to help me out, just send me PMs with prop poxxed savegames for me to download so I can look at them.

There's something of a size mismatch happening here. Colossal Order tells me it can give its players 36 square kilometres of space to build their cities in, 36 square kilometres in which they can expand and enlarge, spread and sprawl. That's enough space for suburbs, commuter towns and even arable land. In contrast, last year's SimCity only provided a couple of square kilometres and, in spite of the efforts of all the pages of team members listed in its credits (a number possibly higher if you consider that credits often only list staff present when a title ships), what happened within those city limits didn't always make sense. Colossal Order is confident it can make a larger, more coherent and more customisable city-building game with, well... nine people. Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-09-04-cities-skyline-is-out-to-satisfy-where-simcity-couldnt

The Sky is no limit! Inhabit a world where you define the rules. Cities: Skylines invites you to create the city of your dreams in a sprawling landscape dominated by cloud hugging structures and jaw dropping architectural marvels. Developed by Colossal Order, Cities: Skylines offers sprawling landscapes and maps with endless sandbox gameplay and new ways to expand your city. Key to progression is the ability to influence your city’s policy by incorporating taxation into districts. All this including the ability to mod the game to suit your play style makes this the definitive city building simulation. You’re only limited by your imagination, so take control and reach for the sky! Main features: City policies: Set policies to guide how the city and districts develop over the course of your playthrough. City districts: Personalize city districts with names of your choice for variety and personality. Road building and zoning Unlock buildings and services Taxation: Fine-tuning the city budget and services and setting tax rates to different residential, commercial and industrial levels and controlling what kind of areas are more likely to spawn in the zoned areas Public transportation: Build transport networks throughout the city with buses and metros Outside connections: Make industry and commercial districts flourish with new customers in the neighboring cities Wonders: the ultimate end-game content that the players strive towards Huge maps: Unlock new map tiles with unique possibilities to expand the city Water flow simulation: Add new challenges to water services. Polished visual style and core gameplay Modding tools: Built in feature designed to encourage creative pursuits.

A SimCity 4 Tutorial Cloud Oriented Region Import Method Adding Painted Streams by CorinaMarie@Simtropolis In this guide I present a method to create a grayscale image from which to render a random rolling hills terrain map that has water streams and rivers added. Here's a random sample of a map I created using this method: Note: The following is merely an alternative method to create a semi-realistic, fictional region map for SC4. Before you waste any time reading this please be aware that the defacto standards for map making are: SC4 Mapper, SC4 Terraformer, and Landscape Designer. Use them if you want something better. Also, as mentioned by @RobertLM78 in a reply in this thread there is another one by Ordio called Simcity 4 Region and Config Creator. However, many peeps have said they cannot run those programs on later versions of Windoze or other OS's so what I'm presenting here is simply another method by which one can make a decent map with minimal time and effort. I'm using GIMP for this guide because it's free to anyone. Any good image editing program will have the same tools I use in this guide. The method is quick and easy. Initial Steps 1. Load your SimCity 4 Rush Hour or Deluxe game and create a new region. Name it whatever you want. For this tutorial I'll use Cloud Map. Exit the game, or at a minimum, exit the new region by opening a different region. This is so the existing config.bmp file is not in use. 2. Create a new config.bmp file. For this tutorial mine will be 12x12 pixels. See Config.bmp: How to Make it Yours if you are not already familiar with it. 3. Save that config.bmp into the new region folder you just made. (Overwrite the existing one.) 4. You should now have region.ini and your config.bmp in your new region folder. Making the Grayscale Image 1. Go outside and take a picture of some clouds. 2. Load the picture into a decent imaging program. 3. [Optional] Crop it if there are cloudless parts you don't want in the image. In Gimp it's the Rectangle Select Tool over in the upper left of the tools box. Or you can press R. Draw a box around the part you want to keep. Then go to the Image Menu and select Crop to Selection... 4. Scale the image to the appropriate size based on the config.bmp you will be using. As we learned in @Birdin's config.bmp guide we multiply the dimensions of config.bmp by 64 and add 1. So 12 * 64 = 768 + 1 = 769. The height and width are the same since my config.bmp is 12 x 12. Go to the Image Menu and select Scale Image... That brings up this Scale Image dialog box. First click the little linked chain to the right of the Width and Height boxes to break the chain. This tells the program that we are not concerned about keeping the cropped selection proportional to the original image. Type in the Width and Height dimensions that you calculated in the beginning of this step. For this tutorial I entered 769 in both boxes. Then click the Scale button. 5. Convert to grayscale. Go to the Image Menu and select Mode --> Grayscale. 6. Export the image as a .Bmp file. Go to the File Menu and select Export As ... When the export dialog box comes up, look in the lower left for the little bitty plus sign in a box by the Select File Type (By Extension) and click it. That will open up the File Type selection box. Scroll down and click Windows BMP image. In the upper left in the name box, type in Gray 1 in front of the .bmp. Note only the name portion is pre-highlighted in blue indicating what part to type over. (Brilliant programming imo.) Remember which folder you export (save) the file to. That's indicated by my arrow in this next pic. Mine is going into My Documents. Click the Export Button. The next dialog box has some options. I simply click the Export Button. (I believe one could select the Run-Length Encoded to reduce the file size. I haven't tested that, so I leave it unchecked.) And here's what I created: 8. Close all files. I personally do not let it save my original clouds with the cropping and changes so that way I still have my unaltered original. 9. Close your imaging program. (Or if your comp has plenty of memory, just minimize it.) First Render (These interim steps are what I did when learning. I skip them now I know what I'm doing.) 1. In SimCity 4, open the new region you created. Mine is called Cloud Map. 2. Press the magic key combination of Shift+Ctrl+Alt+r. This brings up the file selection box. 3. Drill down to where you saved your grayscale image file and select Gray 1.bmp then click Ok. 4. Now wait while the map is rendered. You will see Creating New City like this: And here's our first draft render. Note that it's way too choppy. We will fix that soon. The reason I did this preliminary render is to see what part is water. Tweaking the Grayscale Image 1. Reopen Gray 1.bmp in your image editor. We will paint in our rivers and streams before we smooth out the rough, choppy bumps. Select the Paintbrush tool and set it to Acrylic 05. Leave the size at 20 point for now. I selected Acrylic cause it adds a random pattern to the edges of what you paint. 2. Click the foreground color selection box. It's right under all the tools on the left. That brings up the Change Foreground Color choices. Type 40 in Red, Green, and Blue. Yes, I already hear peeps saying: Wait, that's too dark. Stay with me on this. 3. Now paint in streams / rivers. A twitchy hand actually improves the realism. 4. Now to smooth out the choppiness of the hills. From the Filters menu select Blur --> Gaussian Blur... This also blends the rivers and streams so that's why I picked color level 40 (which equates to 120 meters height after rendering but doesn't count the blur merging). This'll be an area to experiment on your own based on your original cloud picture. 5. In the next dialog box change the Blur Radius to 10.0. Or pick your own number. Higher numbers means more smoothing and lower ones give less. 6. Export the image as Gray 2.bmp. Here's my new grayscale: 7. And here it is rendered: The map is now ready to paint trees in game or load your favorite terrain and tree and other landscape related mods. Or, tweak it some more. Further Refinement 1. Let's say I want everything to be a little lower elevation to get a bit more water. From the Colors menu select Levels... 2. Then I adjust the Gamma Level to 0.85. (I derived this number thru trial and error for this particular cloud image.) 3. Here's the new Grayscale image I exported as Gray 3.Bmp: 4. Here it is rendered: 5. And then I painted Maxis trees in every tile: Edit 2016.11.02 I've discovered a couple new things. I started with this cloud picture: Then in GIMP I did the normal stuff outlined above and then I used the Burn Tool to lighten the banks of the rivers: And I blurred it after that. Here's the grayscale I created: Another new thing I noticed is having mods for terrain, rocks, water, and beaches already installed means the import rendering colors the region view with them so I don't have to go into each tile to do that. Here it is rendered: Then I did go in and paint Maxis trees as thick as the program would allow: ^ What I really like is the banks of the rivers seem more realistic to me inasmuch as they show the effect of previous flooding. Also my heavier use of Gaussian Blur means the map is much more friendly when using a slope mod to lay out the transportation network. Where to go from here 1. You can alter the gray shade of your paintbrush to a lighter one and paint along the sides of the streams to create gentler slopes if you like. It's best to do that before adding the blur cause the blur does a bunch of evening out. (See my edit above. Using the Burn Tool works even better for this.) 2. If your cloud picture has a much lighter blue sky you might want to play with brightness, contrast, or color levels to darken it before for you start any other part of the editing. Use the Color Picker Eyedropper to see what shade any given area in your grayscale is. Providing you have not installed a Height Mod with an alteration to the scale factor and/or sea level, grayscale 83 is slightly below sea level. Lower values are farther under water. Grayscale 84 is slightly above water. Higher values are then higher elevations up to a max of 255 (white). 3. Experiment with various options in the imaging program. Render and see what you get. Learning by doing is loads of fun. 4. Experiment with altering the moisture content as discussed here to change the ground texture appearance. 5. Extract the Terrain Properties exemplar from Simcity_1.dat and play around with the variables there like ImageImportScaleFactor and SeaLevel or the Erosion settings. And Lastly Feel free to post your map creations in this thread. Ideally, post both the final grayscale image and then a region screenshot. Reply with what you've discovered that might be useful to other peeps.

Banished, a city-building strategy game by Shining Rock Software is released today. What is Banished? Welcome to the world of Banished! In this city-building strategy game, you control a group of exiled travelers who decide to restart their lives in a new land. They have only the clothes on their backs and a cart filled with supplies from their homeland. The objective of the game is to keep the population alive and grow it into a successful culture. Options for feeding the people include hunting and gathering, agriculture, trade, and fishing. However, sustainable practices must be considered to survive in the long term. Gameplay The townspeople of Banished are your primary resource. They are born, grow older, work, have children of their own, and eventually die. Keeping them healthy, happy, and well-fed are essential to making your town grow. Building new homes is not enough—there must be enough people to move in and have families of their own. Banished has no skill trees. Any structure can be built at any time, provided that your people have collected the resources to do so. There is no money. Instead, your hard-earned resources can be bartered away with the arrival of trade vessels. These merchants are the key to adding livestock and annual crops to the townspeople’s diet; however, their lengthy trade route comes with the risk of bringing illnesses from abroad. There are twenty different occupations that the people in the city can perform from farming, hunting, and blacksmithing, to mining, teaching, and healing. No single strategy will succeed for every town. Some resources may be more scarce from one map to the next. The player can choose to replant forests, mine for iron, and quarry for rock, but all these choices require setting aside space into which you cannot expand. The success or failure of a town depends on the appropriate management of risks and resources. Survival Surviving the winters will be among your greatest challenges. Your tailors can make clothing, your people can build houses and burn firewood. But necessities have a price—Cutting down forests reduces the deer population you can hunt. Although your foresters can plant new trees, the cures for many diseases can only be found in forests that have existed for decades. Farming for many seasons in one place will ruin the soil. Taking fish and game faster than they reproduce will lead to extinction, and your starvation. Wandering nomads can join your town to grow the population quickly, but allowing them in increases the chance of illnesses from far off lands!

A few words from Cori: While she's not quite ready to return to ST immediately, @CorinaMarie has contacted me privately and asked me to post the following from her: In terms of being able, this relates to both Cori's ongoing house moving and limited internet access, and her current health and stamina. She has assured me she will be back to resume an active role on Simtropolis in time, but cannot give more than a guess of a few weeks. (Like for my OP in this thread since I'm only the messenger, I'll give any rep received to this post directly to Cori's profile.)

Located on the island of Cephalonia in the Ionian Sea, few beaches across the globe can compare to Greece's breathtaking Myrtos Beach. Due to it's remote and rugged location, the beach is completely inaccessible by foot - the only way to reach it is to traverse your way down a series of steep hairpin curves. Once you make it there however, you'll be rewarded greatly with pristine, warm Mediterranean waters, perfectly soft white sand, and of course, incredible views. Our journey gets started off with us making accommodations at a timeless Greek villa - our room overlooks the edge of the beach, giving us a fantastic view of the sunset. We'll be staying here tonight, and tomorrow we're off to the beach. We set off for the beach early in the morning, driving through endless fields of daisies and poppies along our way. However, just as we roll down our windows to take in the smell, the clouds darken and it starts pouring. It looks like our day at the beach could very well be in jeopardy. Fortunately for us however, it was nothing more than a quick rain shower. The sky eventually begins to clear up and the beach starts to come alive with tourists. We stake out a prime spot on the beachfront and soak up the sun - no better way to spend an afternoon! Myrtos Beach is more than just a beach - it's an experience. Activities such as hang gliding are extremely popular throughout the area, so we throw caution to the wind and decide to give it a shot. We make our way back to the beach just as the day begins to wind down. Once nightfall approaches, we get a little peace and quiet once the beach starts emptying out - being sure to take it all in one last time. A perfect end to our day. I hope you enjoyed your visit to Myrtos Beach! Don't forget to comment, like, and follow True Earth if you haven't already! -korver

In a major milestone for Simtropolis, the STEX has now reached a grand total of 100 million downloads! Over the past 12 years, members of this community have shared and continue to share content of dazzling and diverse quality. Join us in celebrating this remarkable achievement! There may be a few surprises in store over the next few weeks (all will be revealed)... Click to view the discussion thread. Click here to read the interviews with BATters.

An Overdue Correction Site Reputation Scandal Summary My image (and to a lesser degree, CB's) has been tarnished here on Simtropolis for what we allowed to happen over the past few months. Before I go into the details, do note that no other member's name is mentioned here and they are not to be discussed anywhere on the public parts of Simtropolis even if you know who is who in the following. Beginning back in October last year, a member started a spree of adding numerous Like reactions and positive reviews to a small group of peeps' older posts and files including mine (later in December). Now, this wasn't against any established site rule as it never before needed to be stated. However, what we didn't notice is how each day that has been pushing the legitimate info off of the sidebar (which many peeps use to keep up with what is current). Worse yet, this completely skews the total reputation standings as well as the weekly, monthly, and yearly counts. It is also discouraging to other peeps who have not earned as many points in those time frames. In hindsight, we realize we should have been paying closer attention to what was occurring. Since we didn't, we are now doing our best to rectify our mistake as this sort of manipulation cannot be allowed. I must admit I enjoyed getting all that rep at the time and really didn't consider how it would be perceived by other members. So, part of the resolution was removing the 1,761 rep which they gave me that was not properly earned. Ofc, the rep four other peeps gained from this illegitimate method was also removed too. In the following graph you can see the extent of what happened. Only my name is listed here specifically. We realize we've let y'all down by not taking action sooner. We apologize and hope you'll understand we are not perfect. -Cori (& CB) P. S. Additionally, Rule 5 has been updated as follows with the new part being 5e and the explanation: 5. Prohibited Actions It is strictly and expressly prohibited to post or upload: a) Anything referring to CD keys or no CD cracks. b) Any content malicious to computer hardware or software, such as viruses. c) Any content that violates another person's privacy. d) Anything relating to the pirating, or copying, of any software game title. It is also strictly and expressly prohibited to: e) Abuse of any site feature, including manipulating the site's reputation or review system to unfairly escalate any other member's ranking. More specifically, there was a situation from October, 2020 to January, 2021 in which a particular member misused the system to elevate the reputation of several other members (and one admin) by doing something called deep liking. How this worked was they added a positive reaction to a large number of older posts over a period of time which then improperly skewed the leaderboard information for all time rep as well as for the weekly, monthly, and yearly totals. This was then corrected by removing all of the ill-gained rep and this rule is to enforce the same should it ever occur again. Invoking this rule will still fall under the common sense rule and will be our judgment call for whether or not it has occurred. In other words, it's not unusual in any given day for a member to discover someone's content and add a significant number of positive reactions or reviews on that particular day. This is still perfectly reasonable. Where the above will apply is when there is a sustained pattern such that it is obvious the reactions/reviews are intended to alter the overall standings in a significant way. ^ While this is a new rule addition, it only applies to a sustained effort to improperly alter the reputation counts on a large scale. Adding reactions is still highly encouraged. That can be multiple to one person in one day or even over a few days as you discover their content. What this rule applies to is a longer duration.

Simtropolis has grown by over 100k members in the last 10 months! Is a lot of this growth due to SimCity (2013), or perhaps due to a SimCity 4 resurgence post-SimCity (2013)? Perhaps both! I wonder if we'll ever reach a million...

For the first time ever, the NAM Team has decided to surprise people . . . by not surprising them. The 31st Network Addon Mod release will be made available to the public on March 1st, 2013. Mark your calendars, as this will be one you don't want to miss.

A new viaduct station on the works:

Cities: Skylines is a modern take on the classic city simulation. The game introduces new game play elements to realize the thrill and hardships of creating and maintaining a real city whilst expanding on some well-established tropes of the city building experience. From the makers of the Cities in Motion franchise, the game boasts a fully realized transport system. It also includes the ability to mod the game to suit your play style as a fine counter balance to the layered and challenging simulation. You’re only limited by your imagination, so take control and reach for the sky! Main features: Multi-tiered and challenging simulation: Constructing your city from the ground up is easy to learn, but hard to master. Playing as the mayor of your city you’ll be faced with balancing essential requirements such as education, water, electricity, police, fire fighting, healthcare and much more along with your citys real economy system. Citizens within your city react fluidly, with gravitas and with an air of authenticity to a multitude of game play scenarios.Extensive local traffic simulation: Colossal Orders extensive experience developing the Cities in Motion series is fully utilized in fully fleshed out and well-crafted transport systems.Districts and Policies: Be more than just an administrator from city hall. Designating parts of your city as a district results in the application of policies which results in you rising to the status of Mayor for your own city.Extensive modding support: Build or improve on existing maps and structures. You can then import them into the game, share them as well as download the creations of other city builders on the Steam workshop.

Statement on the Future of Simtropolis Statement on the Future of Simtropolis (This is good news) Thank you again everyone for all the support. From each of you replying in this topic big and small, along with those who've contacted me privately. I dearly appreciate every single message, and it's helped me unmeasurably ever since that shockingly awful day which was 16th July, 2022. We are heartbroken by Cori's absence. It has affected us in various ways, and we share the grief and loss of someone at the very heart of the Simtropolis we know. Me and many of us are still struggling coming to terms with things, and this past week has been a very turbulent time. Cori was (and still is) such a close friend. Our aim was to steer the SC4 community into calm and peaceful waters. To promote a friendly culture for how wherever we each are in the world, we can share a collective city-building interest within an inviting and welcoming environment. Aiming to make it more open for anyone joining, to feel like they have a new home and be included in our online family. Looking back and where ST is right now based on your replies, I believe we have achieved this. As such, these 5 years have been worthwhile and not wasted. Having said this, my initial thoughts over the first few days were questioning how I could possibly continue in my admin role. I was seriously doubting how I could find any motivation whatsoever, and felt so emotionally drained. Cori being my close companion, who we did everything on site together in all aspects, including with SC4 modding projects. I wasn't sure how I could possibly move forwards and remain strong in the same role, when CoriBoom had been instantly shrunk by 50% in size. I did not want to simply still wear a red badge and slip into the forlorn desolately dismal shadows. That would be against everything Cori and I stand for. However, thankfully I'm pleased to say over these past few days with being supported by you all... I've found the strength to say how I'm willing to continue as a Simtropolis Admin. My aim will be to keep going in the same style Cori and I led the site. Also with the realisation how Cori wouldn't want ST to collapse because of her seemingly indefinite absence. Cori will undoubtedly live on with the wide-ranging contributions she made, and it'll be my goal to maintain her legacy. In fact, I believe this can extend to our collective community objective. Any of us can be guided by the way Cori blessed ST with her endearing presence. And while no singular person can ever entirely replace the void Cori leaves, we're not even trying to replace the irreplaceable. Instead we can unite and make the future of ST in a similar bright light as it currently is. Every little helps for this goal. Some of you might decide to check the SC4 forums more often, and see what topics can be replied to. Or maybe even delve into custom content creation for the first time. We can all do something, with each of us like jigsaw pieces to form the overall picture. Quite likely in the time ahead, there'll be a staff reshuffle. This won't be rushed into, but I'll be looking to bring onboard a few new staff members (and possible promotions to be admins alongside me). For all current staff who are still active, I really appreciate how you're around and supporting too. We're not police officers, so it's all about the tone of how we conduct ourselves primarily as guides. I promise how in every step I take on site, I'll be inspired by how Cori would want ST to be run. From chatting with her almost every day for the past 5 years, I've got an excellent understanding of what she'd want me to do going forwards. There are also unfinished SC4 projects which we didn't get around to completing. This includes ModPacc Zero which will be my main focus to finish, as a bug fixing and enhancement package for the game's foundations. In time I hope to explore some other projects such as CARE which is an agricultural themed set, and there's an experimental method to implement more persistent automata. Cori often had grand ideas which were brilliant on paper, and so just need some time to accomplish. This is all what she'd want to be done, and so it gives me motivation to still learn, explore, and discover. Also as a few of you said, all the knowledge in her forum postings will remain visible for each of us to read whenever, along with new members getting into SC4 for the very first time. This is not lost. As long as Simtropolis is around (even if less active than the past), it'll always be here. Additionally I'll forever remain the other half of CoriBoom™ for everything I do on site. Also if there's even a small chance how Cori might still read this somehow, please know at any time in future, you'd be unconditionally welcomed back alongside me (and us all) with open arms. We love you Corina. -CB (Note: Any other replies to this topic are still very much welcomed now until eternity. This helps give additional strength to us all.)

Wiltern Theatre Stiles O. Clements & G.Albert Lansburgh Los Angeles, California 1931

Another request. This one is pretty special to the person who requested it. In 2016, 49 innocent people were massacred by a lunatic in the pulse nightclub in Orlando. A memorial was slated to be built next year (which will probably be delayed given the impending economic depression). The proposed memorial includes a tall, caged open air tower/museum on one city block and a semi-circular contemplation area around the actual nightclub several city blocks away. Because it spans several blocks, that makes it quite niche to broadly represent in SC4, so I have scaled the entire thing back and included it on one lot. Somber by day...... ....'Fabulous' by night.