MandelSoft

LRM (Light Replacement Mod) - Support, Development and Discussion Hello, fellow Simtropolians! Since I have various files on the STEX containing LRM stuff, I decided to start a support topic. The following content is part of the LRM: Current sets (v5.1, updated on April 14, 2013: Obsolete material: * Soon to be obsolete ** Obsolete or not advised to download. I've heard lot's of people having questions about the mod and not a few people have issues with these mods. In this topic you can ask questions, and I might want to show some new developments. FAQs -- Under construction -- Best, Maarten

Stoplight Replacement Mod (SRM) Support Topic Post your support questions and bug reports regarding the here please. Best, Maarten

This game is quite simple: We start with a situation The first poster will post good news or bad news for this situation. The next poster has to post the exact opposite news, so good news is always followed by bad news and bad news is always followed by good news... And so on and so on... Example: Start: You are participating in a lottery Person 1: The good news is that you've won the lottery. Person 2: The bad news is that you've just lost your lottery ticket. Person 3: The good news is that you find your lottery ticket again and you rush to the store to claim your prize. Person 4: The bad news is that you just came in one minute late to claim your prize and they did a redraw. etc. Rules: Always start your post with "The Good News is ..." or "The Bad News is ..." Bad news always follows good news and vice versa Two Post rule applies here, as well as all other forum rules. Every bad or good news must be unique. Don't repeat previous bad news For instance, the following is not allowed: Person 1: The bad news is that you've just lost your lottery ticket. Person 2: The good news is that you find your lottery ticket again and you rush to the store to claim your prize. Person 3: The bad news is that you've just lost your lottery ticket again OK, let's get started! I opened a new forum game

January 30th, 1933 "Those pesky townspeople! They just want too much in too little time!" Greg Bresky wasn't too thrilled about the latest town expansions. Day by day, he sees his estate shrink. One year ago, he could look all the way to the Pedigo river from his house, but now, his view is blocked by all the new houses they've built in the past year. His view, ruined forever by the wheels of progress. Did he left his motherland Poland for this all these years ago? No. All he wanted was some peace and quiet, far away from the war that had ruined his homeland. Out here, he thought he had all space to do his own business, to start a farm and live a quiet life. Unfortunately, it was never meant to be. "Greg, what's wrong?", a female voice said. It was his wife, Francis. Unlike Greg, she came from around here. They found each other years ago in the local bar. She helped him to settle in across the other side of the Atlantic and they have now been married for ten years. "This new railway station will bring nothing but trouble to this town," Greg said. "It's a gateway for lazy scum and corrupt capitalists to come here and destroy our town." "I think you're exaggerating, honey." "Am I? Look around. It has already begun! We are slowly being surrounded by strangers. And it will be especially bad when Tree-ET comes to town." "Tree-ET? Sorry, I don't follow..." "Never heard of Tree-ET? They are the big company that's going to come here and cut down our lovely forest! They destroy our landscape just to line their pockets!" "Frankly, my dear, I think there are quite some people welcoming them in town. It has been hard for people to find a job here. For some, Tree-ET can feel like a blessing from above." "I don't stand by doing nothing! I'll stand my ground and fight to the very end to protect our forests here!" Francis sighed. She was witnessing one of her husband's tantrums again. Fortunately, it was not against her. But still, these conversations were something she wanted to get over with as soon as possible. "Well honey, are you done now? The curly kale stew is ready to be served." "Ah, splendid, dear! At least there are some things that never change, for the better." The two of them took a seat at the dinner table and enjoyed Francis' stew. Dinner was the best way to calm Greg down. For now... _______________________________ It has been a while, but I finally got around making a second update of Telegraph Road. In the previous post, the city has started expanding and we planned out a few things. Now I'm still trying to find my ground in the Natural Growth method, but I found that construction time in Cities:Skylines goes way too fast. Now I played this update for one in-game year, but it feels like two years or even more has passed. So as of now, 1 in-game year equals 2 story-years. I probably have to slow down, playing sessions of 6 in-game months at the time. So, here's what happened in Nordale in 1933 and 1934. First, we'll take a look in the old town center. Yup, things are still going swell... Now, one of the plans of last update was to build some extra capacity for electricity; this has now been completed with a second gas unit But the biggest plan has also been realised: building a railway station for the town. As you can see, we have a new (and cute!) railway station. And with all the new people coming in from the trains, a new station neighbourhood arose, hosting businesses and our newest residents. On the southern side, the town has grown again, but right now, the ressidential demand has leveled. At this point, all three demand groups are low and the town has found an equilibrium. But there's an opportunity around the corner: we have a lot of natural resources we can gather, and the SimNation has some interest to get some. The easiest resource to get to is lumber, so preparations have been made to set up lumber industry here. We'll see more of it soon! To conclude this update, let's have an areal shot: Just some more data: Population: 1250 Budget: Current bank balance: +$5 500 (no loans) Current weekly cashflow: +$400 - +$600 Demand: Ressidential: low Commercial: low Industry: low Water: Precise Demand and supply unknown Supply is way over capacity even with minimal facilities. Electricity: Current Supply: 30 MW Current demand: 22 MW Civil Facilities: 1 primary school 1 small police station 1 small fire station 1 clinic 1 community church 1 railway station That's it for today! See you next time and keep those suggestions coming! -- Maarten (MandelSoft)

July 1st, 1932 Sheriff Walter Grayes took a look around in his office. It was Friday evening and he had just completed this week's administration, all stored neatly marked in folders in his desk. Grayes’s administration was one to admire for its organisation. Like everything in his office, it was all neatly sorted, so you could find any record with ease. It was almost an obsession for him to organise everything; his ash tray, his furniture, bookshelves and even the stacks of files, every square inch seemed meticulously planned, as he had aligned everything with a ruler (some people rumoured that he actually did that). In front of Grayes was an empty chair. For years, out of pure necessity, he had to do this town’s law enforcement on his own. At least, officially. The community helped him out to keep an eye on anything suspicious. And fortunately for him, this small town didn’t have much criminal activity. But still, working alone was never a long-term solution. Today he'd receive new assistance. And although it wasn’t the first time that he had received a new deputy, it still made him a bit nervous. Grayes' police station. Grayes was about to light up another cigarette, when the door of his office opened. A young lad stepped into the room. The contrast between the two men couldn’t hardly bigger. Grayes was a somewhat short middle-aged man, his hair and mustache all grey and dressed in the traditional uniform. The other was a tall brown-haired man in his twenties, much more casually dressed and – unlike Grayes – full of energy. But as he saw the sheriff and his office, he tried to restrain himself, hoping not to make a bad impression. “Sheriff Grayes, I presume?”, he said. “The one and only,” Grayes answered. “So you must be the new deputy, mister …” “Winterton, sir. Nathan Winterton.” “Right, mr. Winterton. Take a seat.” Winterton sat down on the chair Grayes already set up for him. Grayes got is pack of cigarettes from his pocket. “Care for a smoke?” “No thank you, I don’t smoke.” “Suit yourself then.” Grayes lit up his cigarette and puffed out a small grey smoke cloud before continuing with his story. “So, I’ve heard you came here all the way from Ellismere. That must’ve been quite a long journey to here.” “It sure was, sir. I travelled all day by train. This town is so remote! I was lucky that the train even stopped here. You don’t seem to have any train station here.” “No. We never had the money to build one. And neither the railway company nor the government wants to fund it. We are lucky they do let trains stop here, people just have to get out on the grass and dirt.” “Yeah, that wasn’t very nice…” “If only we had the money to get us a decent station. Maybe more people would come to visit our town. Especially new businesses.” “What kind of businesses?” “Well, look around! We have mountains, we have forests and some people say that there’s quite some coal and all kinds of ores in the ground. We have all kinds of riches nature has to offer. But the industrial giants don’t seem to be interested in our town. Too remote for them. Not worth the investment. And no workforce on site. Almost everyone here works again. It seems that we got over the big crash of ‘29…” “I see. Well, this is a whole lot different than the big city I came from.” “Get used to it, kid. Here in this community, everyone pretty much knows everyone else.” “Any oddballs I should keep an eye on?” “Well, there’s William Rudd from Felix Street, or Blue Bill as we call him. Don’t be surprised to see him walking around the streets drunk in the evening. The man has a serious drinking problem. Oh, and there’s Greg Bresky… yeah, he’s a special type of man…” “What’s so special then?” “Well, the guy is actually from Poland, he moved in here twelve years ago. Everyone calls him Greg because his real Polish name is quite hard to remember… or pronounce. Wait, let me get his file.” Effortlessly, Grayes picked out Greg’s file from one of the stacks and opened it up at the page. “Right, his real name is Gre- … Grze... Grzego-… err… you better read it for yourself.” He turned the page so Winterton could read it. Winterton could clearly understand why everyone had trouble with his name as he read what it actually was: Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz. “He has seen some pretty disturbing stuff in the Great War,” Grayes continued. “He never wanted to face the horrors of war again, so he moved here to escape it all. He’s quite a stubborn man. His privacy and his farm estate are both a big deal to him and he doesn’t like people telling him what to do. I’ve had a problem with him several times.” “I can imagine. But I’d still like to meet everyone here, even those special characters.” “Sure. Even people like Greg will start to grow on you when you know them long enough. You know what, you can meet most people on Sunday in church. I hope you city boys go to church at Sundays.” “Not every week, but I’m willing to adapt here. Helps me settling in here.” “Right. Well, that’s all you have to know right now. Come. I’ll close up this place for today. Let’s grab a beer at Eric’s… of course, if you want to.” “Sure, sir.” “Call me Walt.” Bresky Estate. _______________________________ Welcome to the first update of Telegraph Road. In the previous post, I've explained how we are going to build this city. This update is mainly a demonstration of the gameplay. For this demo, I only progressed time half a year instead of a full year. So, here's what happened in Nordale in the second half of 1932. We had a large ressidential demand. A logical step to increase the town's income to invest in new projects is to fulfill this ressidential demand. A few dirt streets are quickly constructed in a few weeks. Although, it quickly turned out that there was demand for more, so an extra street has been constructed. The expansion is not done yet in this new district of Nordale, called Bellton. There's plenty of room for expansion, though mr. Bresky has expressed his concerns already... Meanwhile, the city has invested in preparations for some big projects you suggested. It was clear that a station was necessary for this town. The area has been cleared for construction, but it won't be completed until the end of 1933. Construction has also begun on the capacity expansion of the small gas power plant. The project should be completed in a few months and will provide the city for many years to come. The current power plant is running over its usual capacity and the expansion is mainly to prevent all the machinery to wear off too quickly. In short, this year has not been so eventful, but the new railway station could bring in a boost of activity in the coming years. Some data about the city, as of January 1st, 1933, just in case you want to help with some decisions: Population: 865 Budget: Current bank balance: +$24 100 (no loans) Current weekly cashflow: +$700 - +$1100 Money reserved for new facilities: Expansion power plant capacity: $5000 Railway station: $20 000 Demand: Ressidential: high Commercial: medium Industry: low Water: Precise Demand and supply unknown Supply is way over capacity even with minimal facilities. Electricity: Current Supply: 16 MW Planned Supply: 24 MW Current demand: 12-15 MW (and growing). Civil Facilities: 1 primary school 1 small police station 1 small fire station 1 clinic 1 community church So as you can see, these big projects take a huge chunk out of the available budget. But on the other hand there is a lot of money flowing in, so the town shouldn't worry that much about its investments. Most facilities are sufficient for the town as it is now. That's it for today. Due to the holidays, I don't know if I have an update for you ready next week, but Telegraph Road will return. I will take note of your suggestions. Take care and see you next time! -- Maarten (MandelSoft)

15 years already? Dang... I may not play it anymore, but I still see people still play the game and custom content is still being churned out. It looks like it's here to stay. We might as well call it ... ... SimCity4ever!

I'm afraid we don't have the funds for that yet, and it will probably drain all profit from the city. We're on a low budget at this point ____________________________________ That would've been a sufficient solution... if it weren't 1932. The tech is not up to that point yet. That would mean I have to knock down some buildings. This is exactly what makes Natural Growth difficult: you can't just demolish buildings, because you have to sell out their owners, people will protest and it's often an expensive solution for project developers. So as long as there's no need for it, or the demand isn't high enough to gather enough support, that plan is off. ____________________________________ Right, I'll be doing some writing for the first "episode" and then I'll lay out the first developments in this CJ. Stay tuned!

"A long time ago came a man on a track Walking thirty miles with a sack on his back And he put down his load where he thought it was the best He made a home in the wilderness He built a cabin and a winter store And he ploughed up the ground by the cold lake shore And the other travellers came walking down the track And they never went further, no, they never went back Then came the churches, then came the schools Then came the lawyers, then came the rules Then came the trains and the trucks with their load And the dirty old track was the Telegraph Road" - Telegraph Road, Dire Straits _________________________________________________________________________ Welcome to Telegraph Road, a City Journal that will play by the rules of Natural Growth. A city with an ongoing story and history as it grows. You're obviously familiar with most people play Cities:Skylines; they have a plan how they want to build their city and they are in control of everything. They oversee their cities in every way. But does this happen in real life? Not really. This is where Natural Growth comes in. Instead of seeing it all, you'll look at your city from different perspectives and place yourself in the shoes of project managers, entrepeneurs and citizens. This is an imperfect, but a pretty interesting approach to build a city. I've never done this before, as I used to build pretty well planned in SimCity 4 and Cities:Skylines. But I'm not afraid to take a challenge. But how does it work? Let me explain... _________________________________________________________________________ How does it work? The major inspiration for this CJ comes from the Natural Growth playing style, as described by CSGdesign. However, a different game plays by different rules, but basically, the playing style will be the following: Plan small and only on the short term. You need to think from the perspective of all actors. You will be looking at this from a low-level perspective. Sure, you can plan an estate in the hills because it offers a nice view or avoid a forest because the national government designated the area as a protected area. But you don't lay out entire districts according to a strict plan or entire infrastructure complexes. Want to build a highway? You'll have to evaluate each and every interchange you're going to build and you probably won't end up building the entire thing at once, but in parts. You're on a budget Governing is deciding how to divide limited resources. And money is an important limited resource. You can only build what you can afford. The cashflow, as well as the city's available budget needs to be evaluated for every decision and will be a limiting factor for every choice and you can't get everything you wish for. Don't think as a mayor. Think as a project developer You may want a lot, but at the end of the day, someone has to build it. And since budget plays a role, they will decide what's the most cost-effective measure. After all, you can only spend your money once and your contractors still need to get a profit out of it. Everything takes time to build Need a hospital or fire station immediately? Tough luck. It will take a year to build one of those. Build a highway? That will take a few years before it's done. Decisions don't take immediate effect and will take time to complete. So you do need to plan ahead a bit and see problems coming, because otherwise it may be too late to take countermeasures. Supply and demand The main driving factor of growth is demand. You only build things when there is a demand for it and don't build more than you need. If you can avoid over-capacity to save money, do it. Don't build for instance a wide bridge over a river because "it might be useful in the future". You build based on the demand you have now. Everything begins small and it will grow bigger and more advanced as time goes on. This will also mean that some necessary upgrades will only happen when the demand grows high enough, or they even may be long overdue. It's not paradise Be prepared to face the fact you can't serve all citizens at the highest live standards. The city may grow faster than you can build facilities. After all, you have your budget and your priorities. There will be poor, uneducated as well as rich people in your city. All decisons influence the people who live there, and they will influence the city's decisions Some decisions will make their lives better. They will encourage that. But don't forget that even buildings that make people's lives better may not be great to have in your back yard. NIMBY will play a great role here; citizens have a voice and they may take legal action to block certain plans from the city council. This is a democracy, not an authoritatian regime Play slow and small Each update only covers one game year. This means that there will probably not much progression in each update. But this leaves enough time to make decisions for each year and get all parties involved in the process. I'm planning to do one year a week, but I can't guarantee there will be an update every week This set of rules will require a slow and patient gameplay. But it offers some great opportunities: The slow pacing offers a great opportunity to tell a story about the city. Not only the city will grow in each update, but so does its history. The end result is a complete mystery for all parties involved. Since we can only look a few years ahead, we have no idea how the city will evolve in the long term. Past mistakes may be a huge pain in the ass later on, or maybe the development takes an unexpected turn. It's all a surprise! Don't you like surprises? Perfection is boring. The most interesting characters in stories are the ones with identifyable flaws. So why not having a city with flaws? I think it's going to be interesting when things actually go wrong or something unexpected happens. Who knows, maybe someone comes with a good idea that changes everything. Surprise me! You, the reader, can also join in and play a role of a citizen or project manager in this city, voicing your opinion about decisions. With enough comments, we can make this CJ interactive. The role-play could give some weight to certain decisions and that's great material to make this city feel more alive! And who knows, maybe a street in the city will be named after you. So come in and join the fun! So now that we've set the rules, let's have a look at where all of this takes place: _________________________________________________________________________ Welcome to Nordale! Nordale is a remote small town somewhere along the east coast of North America. The town is surrounded by forests and mountains in the north, and the Atlantic Ocean in the south. The town is located near the mouth of a river. In brief, you can say, the city is in an idyllic location. The map I used is a modified version of the excellent looking Aurora Borealis map by Colorax257. I massively downgraded the main infrastructure on the map to one dirt road from east to west. After all, we have to start small. I've prepared a small town here as a starting poing of our development... Our story starts in July 1932. From this point, the Natural Growth rules will apply, so this is where the real fun starts. So, what do we have? There are 750 people living in this town right now. The main road leading out of the town, highway 42, is just a dirt road. There's no funding yet to upgrade to an asphalted road, as the town can't afford its maintenance. There is a railway next to the town, but trains won't stop here, as there is no station yet. There are some basic facilities for the citizens. There is a small police station and fire station, as well as a elementary school, a clinic and a graveyard. The water supply is plentyful, though dirty water is... well... just dumped out in the open. There are no funds yet for proper water treatment. There is a small gas power plant. It can barely keep up with the demand, so it may require some new facilities to be built here... There is a waste dump present with plenty of space. In the town center, there is a church. The people in this town hold this place very dear and people gather around here weekly on Sundays. The church is at this point over 75 years old. There's plenty of demand for new homes and some demand for new commecial activities. The current budget of the city is $12 500, with a weekly income of around $400 And just to wrap it up, here are some areal shots to get an idea of the current geography The stage has been set. Let's see where it will take us next time.So, what do you think we should do? Any suggestions are welcome. Take a seat in the city council and let your voice be heard! Take care and see you next time! -- Maarten (MandelSoft)

So, after three years of abscence, even missing out my ten-year anniversary on this website, I'm finally back, but probably not as active as I used to be. Pfew, a lot has changed on my side! The main reason I left here was that ProMods - a community mod for Euro Truck Simulator 2 - was demanding so much time that I came here less and less, and eventually even that stopped. But while SimCity 4 changed my course of education and seeded the love for civil engineering, Euro Truck Simulator 2 impacted my life in a whole different way. I'm one of the three team leaders in the ProMods team, so a lot of management jobs are in my hand on this hobby project, and this ain't much fun sometimes... But it gets even crazier: after I finished my master's degree back in March 2016, I started looking for a job, without much success. During the summer, I had the crazy idea to visit Prague on a short holiday and en passant visit SCS Software, the company who created Euro Truck Simulator 2 (and American Truck Simulator). After some e-mail exchanges, they said it was OK to visit, so I showed them the work we done in our mod. A few months later, the France DLC came out, but the old areas of France still looked the same and that was a clash of different styles, kind of awkward. So I showed them that with a few tweaks, the old areas could be updated without much effort and still looking a ton better. This caught them their attention and they called me. I was still looking for a job and they were actually willing to offer me one! There was only one catch: I had to move to Prague. I considered my options, seeing if there was a possibility to stay back in the Netherlands. I had never lived on my own, let alone abroad! But after investigating the alternatives, it actually turned out that surprisingly, moving abroad was the least complicated option. It was kind of scary at first, probably the biggest challenge I've faced in my life. And on the first day, I was kind of scared about the whole idea. But after a week or two, I actually felt home in the city. It's surprising how quickly these things become so mundane. Even the fact that everyone around you speaks in a language you don't understand (still working on that, but man, Czech is hard!). Right now, I'm working at SCS Software for over a year as a map designer and I've delivered a great contribution to the Italy map DLC. I'm still involved in ProMods, so I'm also representing the link between the company and the modding community. It has been quite an exciting year and I feel like I've grown a lot. So, how did I came back? Well, noahclem from the SC4D community invited me over at their SimCity 4 Discord server, and eventually I learned that SimTropolis had a Discord server too, so I joined. Discord is the main communication channel between ProMods members, so it was convenient to join. And I love to see all of your faces again. The community seems to be a bit quieter nowadays, but it ain't dead yet. The thing is, I actually found out that I fell out of love with SimCity 4; I find it easier to get back into Cities:Skylines again. Now, due to my modding work and my day job, I may not have a lot of time to completely fine-tune a city, but that gave me another idea. What if I play the game in a completely different way? And so, I'm now trying to embrace the Natural Growth method. The actual playing time for this method is quite limited per week, but I can make a lot of interesting fluff around it. I've done a lot of fiction writing in the time that I wasn't here and I think I got better at that, so expect that I fill in my latest project with some stories. So, I'm back in action. Maybe in a different way this time. But as you can see, everything is fine and dandy with me. I missed you guys! Best regards from your friendly neighbourhood pegasus, Maarten (MandelSoft)

As you may have seen at the topic Show Us Your ... Interchanges our forum users designed some clever, crazy and sometimes even silly interchanges. But in RL there are plenty of designs that are mindblowing. So here's a topic where you can discuss and post lists of your country/state's most crazy interchanges. I'll make a start: Top 10 Craziest Interchanges of the Netherlands Note: the freeway x freeway interchanges in the Netherlands all have names. For their names I use the acronym KP, which stands for knooppunt, the dutch word for interchange. 10. The Turboplein near Pijnacker Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=52.000993,4.451979&spn=0.000875,0.002642&t=k&z=19 To start of my list, this is the only interchange where there are no freeways involved. It's basically a roundabout, but why is it crazy? Well, that's because this is no ordinary roundabout. No, it's a so-called Turbo-plein, or in other words, a turbo-roundabout on steroids. The whole roundabout is controlled by stoplights and this is one of my doubts at this roundabout. I wonder if it actually helps. Other than that, it looks vastly oversized. The roundabout itself has 6(!) lanes, whereas the roads leading to it have a 1x2 layout (just like the AVE-2). The British have the Magic Roundabout, we have the Turboplein... 9. KP Everdingen Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.974545,5.10375&spn=0.014011,0.042272&z=15 You'll have to admit it, how often do you see a 4-way half-windmill interchange? You probably see the reason why it's not a really good interchange: it only connects four of the eight direcions. This is partially solved by the interchanges of both roads with the A12 a few kilometers northward. But at its own it just looks odd. 8. KP Leenderheide Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.405444,5.50591&spn=0.014189,0.042272&z=15 This interchange is at the start of the C/D-system of the Randweg Eindhoven. Although the two freeways are connected with a partial-Y interchange to the West, all other directions are connected with a mere roundabout. The odd thing is that this area is recently reconstructed and this is the final layout. 7. KP. Holendrecht Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=52.292418,4.942045&spn=0.027823,0.084543&z=14 This is what you get when you connecting two T-interchanges and a exit. The interchange layout says everything 6. KP Rottepolderplein Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=52.377905,4.707556&spn=0.02777,0.084543&z=14 This interchange is actually two in one. The northern interchange is a three-level stacked roundabout interchange, while the southern interchange is a directional T-interchange. The odd part is that the southern interchange was previously connected to the freeway A205, but this road was downgraded to N205, leaving a odd construction right after the interchange 5. A50 Exit 7 (Eindhoven-Centrum), KP Ekkerswijer & KP Batadorp Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.486728,5.442352&spn=0.028327,0.084543&z=14 This combination of interchanges at the north of Eindhoven shows some really impressive freeway engineering. Three free-flow interchanges and one dumbell-interchange are connected through a vast web of ramps and "basket waves". It's impressive to see all those freeways weave into each other. This is a particulairy new section of freeway (mostly rebuild). Due to its complexity this interchange system looks crazy. 4. A27 Exit 33 (Hilversum) Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=52.202005,5.197735&spn=0.01394,0.042272&z=15 This is one of those examples of a never executed plan. This was ought to be an interchange between the A27 and the never realised A80. This should have been a larger interchange. If you don't know that, a large part of the interchange makes no sense, like the clover-ramp. I've heard this interchange is going to be rebuilt to a more simple form. 3. KP Prins Clausplein & KP Ypenburg Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=52.052068,4.379082&spn=0.027974,0.084543&z=14 These two interchages, KP Prins Clausplein (the only full stack interchange in the Netherlands!) and KP Ypenburg (a partial-Y interchange) are connected by a basket wave. But that's not all. The whole C/D-system contains 3 exits, where one (a partial cloverleaf) is located right in the middle of KP Ypenburg. It's this part that makes the interchange look strange. 2. KP Kleinpolderplein Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.932015,4.439743&spn=0.007012,0.021136&t=h&z=16 This is one of the older interchanges of the Netherlands. The bottom of the interchange is a roundabout, which connects to the underlying street network. The rest is some sort of spagetti of ramps. Can you see the basic interchange design? I don't see it. Fun fact: the A13 has a setup of 2x3 lanes, which hasn't been widened for 52 years! (but it does require a widening) 1. KP Ridderkerk Google Maps location: http://maps.google.nl/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.875246,4.572372&spn=0.014042,0.042272&z=15 This looks like a spagetti interchange, although you can recognise some parts of stack and cloverleaf interchanges. One of the overpassing ramps is three lanes wide, which is one of the widest in Europe. The A15 is here a TOTSO-route, going along with the A16 for a little while. At one end, the A38 connects to the interchange. The A38 is the shortest freeway in the Netherlands (only 1 km!); it's not even signaged! There were plans to make this freeway longer, so it connects to the A3. But since the A3 is never realised, so does this plan too. Therefore this is the oddest interchange of my country. It was a hard decision between KP Kleinpolderplein and KP Ridderkerk, but since Ridderkerk is newer and has a larger capacity this is my number one. If you have your own list or have comments, don't hesitate to post! I'm very curious... Best, Maarten

Hello fellow SimTropolians! I've recently bought Cities: Skylines and I like the game. I've seen there are quite some mods out for C:SL already, which is great. However, I've not been able to find the following about modding: Most mods add models or content to the game. However, I want to replace some models and textures, especially regarding road props and textures. I want to extract some of the original assets for this. Not only do I see the name structure of the files I want to override, but I can also find out how they work. So, is there anybody here who knows that? Best, Maarten

Part 2!] How to create Puzzle Pieces? A basic tutorial about making Puzzle Pieces in SimCity 4 Original written by Joris (jmvl), NAM member Edited and translated by Maarten (mrtnrln), NAM member 1st edition (Dutch): August 2009 1st edition (English): August 2010 Contents 1. Introduction 2. What's a Puzzle Piece? 3. Requirements - 3.1. What does SimCity 4 need? - 3.2. What do I need? - 3.3. Reserving ID's 4. Creating textures - 4.1. Creating PNG files for your textures - 4.1.1. Transparency - 4.1.2. Cut you texture down to size - 4.2. Convert PNG to FSH 5. Fill up the DAT-files - 5.1. General - 5.2. Empty tiles 6. Creating paths - 6.1. Where are paths saved - 6.2. The structure of a SimCity 4 Path File. - 6.2.1. General - 6.2.2. Header - 6.2.3. Paths - 6.2.4. Stoppoints - 6.2.5. Other important notices - 6.3. Pieces without paths - 6.4. The SC4 Path Creator - 6.4.1. Introduction - 6.4.2. Single Frame View & Multi Frame View - 6.4.3. The "Path View" - 6.4.4. Saving path files 7. The RUL 0x10000000 file - 7.1. What is the RUL 0x10000000 file - 7.2. Where can I find the RUL 0x10000000 file - 7.3. Editing the RUL 0x10000000 file - 7.3.1. Important notice before editing the RUL0x10000000 file - 7.4. The structure of the RUL 0x10000000 file - 7.4.1. Introduction - 7.4.2. The TAB-Ring section - 7.4.3. The "IntersectionInfo" section - 7.4.3.1. The Header - 7.4.3.2. The Layout section - 7.4.3.3. The Defenitions section - 7.4.3.4. Rotating/Mirroring your Puzzle Piece - 7.5 Defining rotated/mirrored versions of your Puzzle Piece - 7.5.1. The Basics - 7.5.2. Be creative! 8. Mirroring Puzzle Pieces Horizontally 9. Creating New Menu Buttons 10. Q&A - Pathing problems - RUL 0x10000000 problems - Other problems 11. Further details 1. Introduction This tutorial mainly handles the technical aspect of "flat" puzzle pieces. "Flat" pieces are two-dimenstional objects, for example the RHW ramp interfaces, the NWM transistion pieces and the Smooth Curves. "Non-flat" pieces are for example the elevated networks and the Maxis Highways. The only difference between the two is creating models for the pieces. "Flat" pieces are far more easier to create than "non-flat" pieces. Why did we write this tutorial? Joris (jmvl): "When I was learning how to make puzzle pieces in SimCity 4 back in March 2009, I discovered that the available information about this subject was scatterd and not clear enough at some places. Therefore, I wrote some notes about creating puzzle pieces back then. However, I learned more about puzzle pieces and applied my knowledge immediatly, I had no time and motivation to keep up my notes. Therefore I decided to write a document for myself (and maybe for others too) in May 2009. However, I didn't write a thing until june 2009, when Maarten (mrtnrln) asked me by PM at SC4 Devotion what technical aspects there where for creating puzzle pieces. I said to myself: 'It's now or never!' Then I wrote this document about how to create puzzle pieces for Maarten, for others and for myself. Thanks to this manual we shall never forget the procedures for creating puzzle pieces." Maarten (mrtnrln): "This tutorial was really helpful to me at the time. Back then I made a few puzzle pieces for the RHW v4.0, like the B-style RHW Splitters and the Cosmetic Pieces, that are now used a lot by people. In June 2010 people ask how to create puzzle pieces. I have this tutorial around on my harddisk for months, but it's in Dutch, so the majority of the community isn't able to read it. Therefore, I translated the whole document and posted the translation at SC4 Devotion, so anyone can read it. We'll never have enough tutorials, and never enough custom content creators either." I hope you find this tutorial usefull. If the document contains any mistakes, unclear or missing information, please send me an PM. I will correct these issues as soon as possible. You can also contact me for any questions or suggestions. Notice about the Y and Z co-ordinates In this tutorial, the Y-axis or Y-co-ordinates are always used as the height-axis of an object. This is because in the Reader, the Y-axis is also the height-axis. However, in gMax and the SC4 Model Tweaker, the Z-axis is the height axis. See table below: Reader axis:gMax axis:XXYZZY2. What's a Puzzle Piece? A puzzle piece is a ploppalbe (placed manually) transit object. It's fully fuctional for traffic and UDI vehicles. Because puzzle pieces have their own paths, you can determine how traffic is going to move over these pieces. Sometimes, a more technical term for puzzle pieces is used: "Interchange-base Related Item" (IRI). Puzzle pieces often used for objects you can't just simply drag some sort network to create it. Puzzle pieces can be placed in TAB-rings, which contain rotation rings. Thanks to TAB-rings, more than one puzzle piece can be accessed by one menu button. Technical speaking, all puzzle pieces are 3D-models; each section of a puzzle piece is one S3D model. The puzzle pieces and their location in TAB-rings can be determined by codes in the RUL 0x10000000 file. Puzzle pieces should not be confused with Transit Enabled LOTs (TE-LOTs). Both have their own paths, and both pieces can be accessed by traffic. However, there's a big difference between a TE-LOT and a puzzle piece. Puzzle pieces are ploppable sections of transport networks, whereas TE-LOTs are LOT-based. TE-LOTs are ment to look like transport networks, but in fact they aren't transport networks at all. TE-LOTs are often used for toll boths and "Transit Switches" (like stations). In the Zones View, TE-LOTs are invisible, whereas the puzzle pieces are completely visible. 3. Requirements 3.1. What does SimCity 4 need? In order to make a puzzle piece working in SimCity 4, the following is required: - New codes in the RUL 0x10000000 file. - One S3D model for every tile of the puzzle piece. - One S3D model for the preview model of the puzzle piece, containing all models from every tile. - One path file for every tile of the puzzle piece. - One EffDir file for the preview of the puzzle piece. - One LTEXT file for the description (shown in-game) of the puzzle piece. - FSH-files for textures. (Without textures, you would barely notice the puzzle piece. That would be a waste http://sc4devotion.com/forums/Smileys/JasonSmilies/wink.gif ) 3.2. What do I need? In this section, you can find software and web applications you can use to create your SimCity 4 puzzle pieces. Some programs (marked in bold text) are essential, others are mere tools that make creation of puzzle pieces easier. All of the following applications are used in this tutorial. There's a difference between software and web applications. Software requires to be installed on your computer, whereas webapplications can be used by a webbrowser (Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, etc.) Software: - SimCity 4 + Rush Hour or SimCity 4 Deluxe. Without this program, creating puzzle piece has no use. - iLive's Reader 0.93 (or higher) - SC4 Path Creator 1.60 (or higher) - Batch PNG to FSH Tool NOTE: After installing the PNG to FSH tool, open the directory where you installed the tool and open groupid.txt. Replace the entire content of the file by 1ABE787D and save the file. - A text editor, like Notebook. Web applications: - JMVL SimCity 4 Online Transit Modding Tools 3.3. Reserving ID's To prevent any conflict with other pieces and NAM plugins, you require to reserve unique ID's for each puzzle piece you make. We always reserved our ID's for the RHW Mod by contacting Alex (Tarkus). In fact, it's quite unclear in the NAM Team who can be contacted for reserving unique ID's. The best place you can request for free ID's is at the corresponing topic in the NAM Creations section. The ID's you have the reserve are Instance IDs (IIDs) and HighwayIntersectionInfoID (HIIID or H3ID). IIDs are used for identifying the files packed in DAT files. IIDs have to be unique, because otherwise they overwrite eachother. You'll need a whole range of IID's, because your puzzle piece contains more than one model or texure. It's important that you reserve a start-IID and a end-IID. Every puzzle piece has a AutoTileBase IID. This is the first IID from the tile in the upper left corner of your puzzle piece. The size of the IID range depends on the size of your puzzle piece. You can easily dertermine your IID by using the IID Grid Table Maker. You simply fill in the AutoTileBase IID, the width and the heigth of your puzzle piece and after clicking "Show IID Grid Table", a table appears on the screen. H3IDs are used in the RUL 0x1000000 file. These IDs are required for linking the technical layout of the puzzle piece to the models, paths, etc. and for placing puzzle piece in different rotations (and mirrored versions). Usually 4 H3ID's are required (one for each rotation), but when puzzle pieces can be mirrored, you require 8 H3IDS, and ever 16 H3ID's when one way traffic is involved. Please check first how much H3ID's you actually require before reserving them. Most of the times, the IDs are assigned projectwise. All NAM features and related mods have an IID that start with a 5, since this whole IID range isn't used by Maxis plugins. Each project has their own IID range. The RHW Project for instance has an IID of 5C###### to 5E######. The H3IDs are also assigned projectwise in a simillar way. Also, before reserving IDs, it's wise to say what you're creating. Maybe someone else is making something simmilar and we can try to fit the piece into the existing IID scheme. A third thing that has to be unique is the name of the Effect Dir (EffDir). This links the correct preview model to the RUL 0x1000000 code. In theory, this name ought to be reserved, but in reality this is not the case. There's a huge combinations of names that can be used, and the chance that someone uses your EffDir name is very small. One syntax you can use for your EffDir name is: preview Some examples: EffDir Name:Puzzle Piece Name:preview_rhw4misrampsstyleaxdlRHW-4 to RHW-6C with 2 MIS sections leftpreview_rhw4misrampsstyleaxdrRHW-4 to RHW-6C with 2 MIS sections rightpreview_rhw2_to_2misRHW-2 to 2 MIS sections As you can see, there's a logical connection between the EffDir and the puzzle piece name 4. Creating Textures 4.1. Creating PNG files for your textures A puzzle piece is nothing without textures. It's quite important to create the textures before starting to make the rest of your puzzle pieces. After you have reserved IDs you can start making textures. You can use any advanced image editing program (not MS Paint, but PhotoShop or the GIMP) to create textures. It's also wise to make a dedicated directory where you can save your textures. Then you can easily find them. All textures should be eventually saved in PNG-format (you may want to keep an multi-layered PSD-file or something similar for later texture editing). Depending on the quality of the texture, one tile has the following size in pixels: Quality:Size (in pixels):SD128 x 128HD256 x 256 Usually, SD textures are used, due to smaller filesize. Also, the difference between end results of HD and SD textures is not that big. 4.1.1. Transparency FSH-files are the texture files of SimCity 4. FSH-files contain two layers: the colored texture layer and the black-and-white transparency layer. White parts of the transparency layer show the color image of the texture in SimCity 4, while the black parts are invisible. Technically speaking, you need two images of your puzzle piece for your textures. However, PNG-files can contain transparent pixels. If you want to have transparent parts in your PNG-image, do the following: 1. Open your texture with an Image editing program. 2. Fill in the transparent surface with a color that's unique in the image (only the transparent surface has this color). Try to make it similar to the puzzle piece, so any errors later are less visible. 3. Check the RGB value of the background color and note it somewhere. If you can find a hexadecimal code (a numbering system that goes from 0-9-A-F), skip the following two steps. 4. Open the Windows Calculator and enable the Scientific Mode (View/Scientific), 5. Fill in every value separately in decimal mode (Dec) and convert it into a hexadecimal value by selecting "Hex". Note the values down. 6. Open the Alpha/Color Blender from your web browser. 7. Click on "Browse" button next to "Alpha/Color Blended image file" and select your puzzle piece PNG file. 8. Open the "Advanced settings" tab and change both hexadecimal values to the Hex values you noted down. 9. Click on "Get Color PNG" and overwrite the puzzle piece PNG file you just edited. 10. Presto! You now have a PNG file with an transparent background. 4.1.2. Cut you texture down to size Puzzle pieces can be no bigger than 16 x 16 tiles due to the limitations of SimCity 4. Also, a puzzle piece texture must be 1 x 1 tile big. Fortunately, the Image Cutter can do the job for you: 1. Click on "Browse" button next to "Image" and select your puzzle piece PNG file 2. Fill in the AutoTileBase IID 3. Fill in the resultion in "Maximum height per image" "Maximum width per image" (default settings: 128 x 128) 4. Click on "Get Cut Images" and save the ZIP-file. 5. Unpack the ZIP-file, and there you have it: Your puzzle piece cut into pieces with a size of one SC4-tile. 4.2. Convert PNG to FSH PNG files can't be used for textures in SimCity 4. Therefore, these files should be converted into FSH files. The Batch PNG to FSH Tool converts PNGs to FSH textures and saves them into DAT-files. The Batch PNG to FSH Tool recognises transparancy in PNG images and uses them to build the transparency layer of the FSH file. Let's create some textures: 1. Open the Batch PNG to FSH Tool 2. Click on "Add" and select the textures you want to convert: //www.simtropolis.com/library/Omnibus/CreatePuzzlePieces/png2fsh01.png 3. Check if your PNGs are really transparent. If you see this, your image is really transparent: //www.simtropolis.com/library/Omnibus/CreatePuzzlePieces/png2fsh02.png 4. Fill in the corresponding Instance IDs and set the End format to A-E. This prevents the "Sidewalk Bug" to occur. 5. When you are finished, select "Save dat" to save your DAT-file. IMPORTANT NOTE: create a dummy DAT-file where you save your new textures (give it a name like "Textures_Add.dat" or something simmilar). Otherwise the Batch PNG to FSH Tool overrides the complete contents of the file. 6. Copy your textures into the DAT-file where you save your final puzzle pieces somewhere in the NAM folder. 7. Save the file and you're done! 5. Fill up the DAT-Files 5.1. General Now our DAT-file only contains FSH-files. But there are more things required to make a puzzle piece working in-game. We are going to generate some S3D, EffDir, Exemplar, LTEXT and some dummy-SC4Path files (we are going to define the paths in the SC4Path-files in the next chapter). The Puzzle Piece Maker generates all the files you need for "flat" puzzle pieces. The Puzzle Piece Maker currently has no support for "non-flat" puzzle pieces. The only thing you can do when creating these pieces, is copy the models from another file, re-index it and edit it manually in the Reader, but this method is not recommended for beginners. We simply start with creating a "flat" puzzle piece with the Puzzle Piece Maker: 1. Fill in the AutoTileBase IID in the "AutoTileBase IID"-field 2. When the textures have another AutoTileBase IID (which is often the case for mirrored pieces), fill in the AutoTileBase IID from textures in the "AutoTileBase IID textures "-field. 3. Fill in the width and the height (in tiles) of your puzzle piece in the "Width"- and "Height"-field.' 4. In case you make a mirrored version of your puzzle piece, check the "Mirrored version"-checkbox 5. Select "A-E" at "End Format IID" 6. Choose 0 or 3 at "Resource Key Type". RKT 0 uses one model for all zoom levels, while RKT 0 uses a different model for each zoom level. 7. Fill in the text that's shown in-game (when placing the puzzle piece) in the "Description (LTEXT)"-field. 8. Fill in the EffDir name in the "Effect Dir name"-field. This must be an unique name. You'll need this name later when creating the RUL 0x10000000 code for your puzzle piece. If you forgot the name of your EffDir, you can find it in the EffDir file under Section 13. 9. Fill in the Exemplar name (the name each exemplar of your puzzle piece gets) in the "Exemplar Name"-field. You can use the EffDir name for this (without "preview_") 10. Make sure that "Use 'default' SC4Paths" is selected in the "SC4Paths"-section. 11. Make sure every file type is selected. 12. Fill in the download location in the "Download Location"-field. This is the location where your ZIP-file is saved. 13. Click on "Build DAT Entries". A ZIP-file is now generated. 14. Extract the ZIP-file. Make sure it's extracted in a directory with the same name as the ZIP-file. 15. Open the Reader and open the DAT-file where you saved your textures. 16. Select "Edit/Insert (Batch Method)". A new screen appears 17. Click on "Browse" and go to the location where you extracted your ZIP-file and select "batch.txt" 18. Click on "Insert." You get a message all files where succesfully imported. 19. Don't forget to save the DAT-file! 5.2. Empty tiles? Often you don't want a square puzzle pieces. Some tiles of your puzzle piece may be empty. If they are, please follow these steps: 1. Find the S3D files you don't want to use and note down their IIDs 2. Now also select the SC4Path and Exemplar files. 3. Right-click on the selection and select "Delete Entries." 6. Creating paths Finally we have our DAT-file filled with the required files. But it's not finished yet; The SC4Path-files should be defined, as said before in chapter 5. Since we've selected "Use 'default' SC4Paths" in the Puzzle Piece Maker, all path-files have dummy paths. In this chapter we're going to change that. 6.1. Where are paths saved? Paths are defined per tile, just like the S3D-models of the puzzle piece. Paths are saved in ASCII text in SC4Path-files. The IID of these files correspond with the S3D-model with the same IID (these two are linked together). With the IID Grid Table Maker you can make a table with all the IID's of your puzzle piece, which may help you to find the right IID for your SC4Path files. 6.2. The structure of a SimCity 4 Path File 6.2.1. General A SC4Path-file has in general the following structure: - Header - Path 1, path 2, path 3, etc. - Stoppoint 1, stoppoint 2, stoppoint 3, etc. SimCity 4 always reads the SC4Path-file one line at the time. Commentaries always start with "--". This line will be skipped by Simcity 4. 6.2.2. Header The header defines properties that will have effect for the whole SC4Path-file. The header is the only section in the SC4Path-file that should not contain commentaries. Only in this tutorial, I'll ignore this rule just to explain what everything does. The structure of the header of a SC4Path-file looks like this: Code: (SC4Path-file Header) SC4Paths -- Introduction line. All SC4Path-files start with this line. 1.2 -- Version number of the SC4Path-file (1.0, 1.1 or 1.2) 1 -- Number of paths in this SC4Path-file. 0 -- Number of stoppoints this SC4Path-file contains. 1 -- The "3D-Key" (0 or 1) Notes: - SC4Path version 1.0 and 1.1 don't give as much support as version 1.2 does. Also, the structure of version 1.0 and 1.1 is different compared to version 1.2. It's recommended to use version 1.2 for your path files to prevent any confusion. - The "3D-Key""defines if you can choose your own path in the U-Drive-It mode. "0" enables this option, while "1" disables this option. It's advised to use "1". Technically speaking, "1" stands for 3D network pieces and "0" for draggable network pieces. 6.2.3. Paths Depending on the number of paths, the SC4Path-file has a seperate section for each path. The paths define how people and vehicles move on a puzzle piece. The structure of one path section looks like this: Code: (SC4Path-file Path Section) -- car_1_2_a -- This comment is used for the name of the path by several modding programs 1 -- "Transportation Type Identifier" 1 -- Path ID. This must be unique! 1 -- Entering wind direction 3 -- Leaving wind direction 0 -- "Junction key (0 or 1) 2 -- Number of path co-ordinates. 2.5,8,0 -- Path co-ordinates no.1 (x,z,y) 4,-8,0 -- Path co-ordinates no.2 (x,z,y) Notes: - The path name has the following structure: -- ___. You can leave the path name out of your path-files, but it's advised to use them anyway, because you can easily have an overview of your path files. - The "Transportation Type Identifier" tells SimCity 4 which vehicle will be using this path. There are six known "Transportation Type Identifiers": - 1. "car" (all road-based traffic, except for pedestrians and GLR) - 2. "sim" (pedestrians) - 3. "rail" (heavy rail vehicles) - 4. "subway" - 6. "el-rail" (elevated rail and GLR) - 7. "mono" (monorail and (G)HSR) - The Entering and Leaving Wind Direction tells SimCity which direction a vehicle enters the tile and which direction it leaves. The wind directions are: - 0. West - 1. North - 2. East - 3. South - 255. Special (Neighbour connections, dead ends, etc.) Fortunately, the SimCity 4 Path Creator has these wind direction IDs on the sides of the screen, so you can easily what the Entering and Leaving Wind Direction of a path is. For instance, the red path in the image below enters the tile at the south (3) and leaves the tile at the north (1). //www.simtropolis.com/library/Omnibus/CreatePuzzlePieces/sc4paths01.png - The "Junction Key" determines if a switch appears for this path in the UDI mode (1) or not (0). Although this feature is only used for rail networks, it should always be present in the SC4Path-file! - Every path should start and end at the edge of the tile, except if the Entering and/or Leaving Wind Direction is 255. Otherwise, this path will not appear in SimCity 4. 6.2.4. Stop points Depending on the number of stop points, the SC4Path-file has a seperate section for each stop points. The paths define where vehicles stop to prevent colisions. It's very important that the stop points are defined after all paths. Otherwise SimCity will crash. The structure of one stop section looks like this: Code: (SC4Path-file Path Section) -- stop_car_1_2_a -- This comment is used to recognise the stop points for users. 1 -- Left Hand Drive (2) or Right Hand Drive (1) 1 -- "Transportation Type Identifier" 1 -- Stop point ID. This must be unique! 1 -- Entering wind direction 255 -- Leaving wind direction 3,6,0 -- Stop point co-ordinates (x,z,y). There's always one stop point co-ordinate! Notes: - The path name has the following structure: -- stop____. You can leave this note out of your path-files, but it's advised to use them anyway, because you can easily have an overview of your path files. - Stop points also determine which vehicles give way to other vehicles and controls which traffic flows may go at stoplight intersections. 6.2.5. Other important notices - Paths that contain errors don't show up or are red flashing when using the "ShowPaths"-cheat from ExtraCheats.dll. - The Path and Stop Point IDs are 1 or higher. - The Path IDs and Stop Points IDs don't depend on each other. That means you can use an ID twice: one for a path and one for a stop point. They both will have an unique ID. 6.3. Unpathed pieces/Dummy Paths Sometimes there's no need for a puzzle piece tile to have paths. Unfortunatly, when a tile has no SC4Path-file, SimCity4 will be laggy during the construction of the puzzle piece. To prevent this from happening, you can make a Pathfile only containing a header and a dummy path. Fortunately, the Puzzle Piece Maker makes these dummy path files, so you don't have to edit the SC4Path-files for the tiles you don't want to contain paths. 6.4. SC4Path Creator 6.4.1. Introduction In the early days of SimCity 4 Transit Modding, we didn't have any visual application for editing path files. Fortunately, one of our members, Daeley, has created a Java-application for this job, the SC4Path Creator. This tool significantly simplifies the creation of paths. The program also contains some very useful functions, such as flipping and mirroring paths, the ability to see multiple SC4Path-files at once and using a texture as background, which makes the creation of paths even easier. 6.4.2. The Single Frame View and the Multi Frame View The Single Frame View contists out of a Path Editor, which I'll explain in detail in the next section. The Multi Path View is ment for puzzle pieces that contain more than one tile. When your piece only constists out of only one tile, you can skip the next paragraph. In the Multi Frame View, you can see all the path files at once. You first have to define the size of the grid to the size of your puzzle piece. It's advised to use '128' as rect size instead of the standard value '150', so you have the right scale. Every tile opens a new Single Frame View window when you click on it, so you can edit the paths. NOTE: When you open a Single Frame View window of a tile and then return to the Multi Frame View, you can add or delete pathing co-ordinates by simply clicking on the tile. 6.4.3. The Path Editor //www.simtropolis.com/library/Omnibus/CreatePuzzlePieces/sc4pathcreator.jpg With the Path Editor you can edit any path in any desired tile. Each path has it's own color, so they can easily be recognised. In the menu "Path Options\Select Texture", you can select a texture image as background, to simplify the path creation. Most other functions are speaking for themselves. Still I want to bring some other things to notice: - When you have more than 6 paths at one tile, some paths will appear in the same color. - When you flip or mirror a path, the Entering and Leaving Wind Direction aren't changed automaticly. You need to edit those manually. - When you create a new path, the Path ID is set to 0 of that path. You need to set this ID manually to an unique number. - When you add some pathing code into the Code Editor, check the header if it's set to the right number of paths. If not, the path you just added will be deleted when clicking on the "update"-button. - When you've added some code and clicked on "update"-button and you see no change, then there is a bug in your code. - Although SC4Path files can contain notes, the SC4Path Creator only allows it at the first line of a new path. When you make notes at any other place, you'll see no change when you hit the "update"-button. - The SC4Path Creator 1.60 doesn't support stoppoints. Any stoppoints made will be deleted. It's advised to make the stoppoints at the end. - The SC4Path Creator 1.60 unfortunatly has no save function. When you shut down the SC4Path Creator and didn't save the code anywhere else, you can start all over agian. 6.4.4. Saving path files Of course, you'll need to save your paths somewhere! When you finished creating paths with the SC4Path Creator, you can save them with the Reader in a DAT-file by following these steps: - Select the text from the Code Editor in the SC4Path Creator. You can use CTRL+A (Select All) to be sure everything is selected. - Copy the code (CTRL+C). - Select the corresponding SC4Path-file in the Reader. - Click on "Edit". - Select the code that's already in the SC4Path-file to override it (NOTE: CTRL+A doesn't work in the Reader). - Paste the new code (CTRL+V). - Hit "Apply" - Save the DAT-file when you're done.

Too bad I have Windows 10 AND the disc version of SimCity 4. It looks like it's no SimCity 4 for me anymore then (and I'm not feeling too motivated to get it digitally now, since I rarely play it these days)... It's quite sad to note that Linux now supports SimCity 4 better than Windows does, while Windows is usually the better bet for games...