north country dude

Great, I am Buffhamster on Steam and the mods were some terrain and rail texture enhancements, check 'em out. Roads are still a bit tricky and somewhat more involved, and the skybox uses .hdr files, but luckily I found an app called "Picturenaut" which will be helpful.

Awesome, I see you have a lot of Transport Fever vids on your channel. I made a few mods for that game and working (slowly) on a couple more, one for the skybox and one for music.

Thank you for sharing this awesome development. I have always enjoyed the Civilization series and this looks to be quite interesting, but I wonder why somebody didn't just make a game mod based on Civ 5, ...? Ah, this is why: here is the link I used: http://www.civilization.com/en/games/civilization-beyond-earth/

Subtitle: Shoes for Industry!! I decided to open this topic after reviewing the comments on my recently released Lots and Texture packs on the STEX. First, I would like to thank everyone who gave positive feedback and suggestions. Second, to the people who did not like the long list of dependencies, I am sorry, but, then again these Lots(and probably many other wonderful creations) use fairly common props and textures. These props and textures are often, if not always, released prior to the author's Lot and BAT release in order for people to get a chance to prepare for it. Thirdly, when someone releases a Lot that contains dependent props, BATs and textures created by other people, they absolutely cannot merge or package these files into their own and post it with their Lot. This is called plagiarism and usually results in that person getting banned from this website. Now for the main reason of this topic. This topic is for discussion and/or suggestions of current and future projects that I plan to release or have already released. The overall main project is the creation of a series of realistic 'core industries' and 'support industries' for cities. The idea being that most, but not all, cities come into being for a reason, usually because of a particular industry. The industry can be almost anything related to the production of goods. Some heavy industry types: Mining and Smelting(coal,iron,metal ores,etc.) Steel(used in creating buildings, vehicles, and various products) Paper and Timber(more building products, and,...well,...toilet paper) Oil Refining(not just for fuel, but many other products like Plastics, solvents, and various chemicals) Factories for Cars, Buses, Trucks, Trains in addition to the production of goods. Shipyards both military and civilian. And so on..., The Rail Yard The main purpose of this Lot was to showcase the Railyard and Rail Spur Volume 1 texture pack. The Lot is based on a Freight Station( a railyard sorts freight cars ) with a moderate 6000 unit capacity. The building and lotconfig exemplars seem to be working o.k. and the default locomotives and train car props also appear and disappear on schedule. I still haven't seen the game's freight train go through yet, just the track checker. Duisburg Steel Mill This was also a test of both Railyard and Rail Spur texture volumes. But since there are currently no train car props set at 45 or 22.5 degree angles, I couldn't place anything on the angled tracks. The transit enabling only follows the main line through the Lot. Nothing happens on the 3 spurs running into the steel mill except for the prop locos and train cars appearing and disappearing on schedule. When the Lot reached a prop count of 870, the LE began screwing up and 'forgetting' stuff, so I decided that The Duisburg Steel Mill was visually finished and began the second part of the test. (Coincidentally, the Railyard Lot has about 912 listed props, but works o.k. with the LE. No clue on this one.) https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//SteelMill-1.jpg align=baseline> Providing a large number of jobs for working sims is the meat of any city. That was the designed purpose of this Lot and the main idea behind the 'Core Industry' concept. The Steel Mill provides 5300 jobs, the freight handling capacity was set at 2000 units in order to simulate the the raw materials arriving and finished product leaving. I haven't figured out how to make the Lot produce freight traffic, and I'm not entirely sure that any freight is moving into or out of the Lot since it was built from a Landscape Lot in the first place. Any clues or help on that subject would be greatly appreciated. The Core Industry Concept and Future Projects This concept originated while I was playing SC4 and noticed that the Industrial zones kept producing the same lot types over and over again. This is similar to the problem with residential zones overproduction of the Wren Lot. After a while, the industry zones would end up with too many chimney and tank lots, and the few times that a sizable 6x6 industry would show up, it would follow no real logic. When I looked at the available lots in the LE, I found that there wasn't really any coherent plan behind the Industrial Lots. The main product of the 'dirty industries' seemed to be only one thing, pollution. The goal in the game seemed too focused on getting rid of the heavy industry in favor of the 'cleaner' High-Tech industries. This didn't make sense to me, since every city can not be Silicon Valley. The materials for high-tech industries have to come from some where, including the materials for the construction of the city itself and all of the vehicles used by the Sims. And so began the Core Industry concept. Core Industry Lots will have a tendency to be on the large size, but that is not something new to the game itself. Just look at the sizes of some of the Reward and Airport lots for example. Core Industry Lots should also provide a large number of jobs and generate a lot of freight traffic( still working on that). The Duisburg Steel Mill is an example of this concept. Realistic Railyards and Spurs Another short coming in the game seemed to be the way it handled Freight Rail. Most 'heavy' industries rely on freight rail and shipping to receive raw materials and freight trucks to deliver the finished product to local markets and, again, freight rail and shipping to distant markets. Why can't the industrial Lots have access to the rail system except through the puny little 'Freight Station'? Why isn't there a realistic representation of a railyard in the game?(Maxis promised this but didn't deliver it with Rush Hour) And why oh why is everything 'doubletracked'? Most rail companies avoid double-track unless absolutely necessary because of the expense. If you try creating a realistic railyard or industrial spur with the textures provided by Maxis, you end up with something that doesn't look quite right. Hence the creation of the Rail Yard and Rail Spur Texture pack series.( It can also be used for Passenger Rail! ) Future Projects and Ideas I'm not concentrating solely on Railyards and Steel Mills here, but will be looking into other types of industry, like Paper Mills, Factories, Open-pit Mines, etc. I'm also trying to research ways to get these lots produce freight traffic( if they don't already ), and looking into 'Path Files' so that the game's automata manuever through the lot a little bit more realistically. Comments, suggestions, and help are actively encouraged!

I have no idea. You're on your own, friend. You are going to have to research how transit functions work in SimCity 4 and Rush Hour, if you get stuck ask the NAM Team. They will probably tell what I did wrong and what I may have gotten right, after all, I was just trying to present ideas for the use of railroads within a game that didn't really allow much expansion for them. Take the "modular rail-yards" idea, that is something that could be expanded on and I welcome anyone to do so. With the fractional angle textures, I think more can be done with it. All it takes is someone with the ambition and knowledge to make it work, but not me. I do not support any of this stuff anymore as the dependencies they depended on have scattered to the wind, some can still be found, but I no longer create or support custom content for SC4. As you can see, even Imageshack has changed and has begun losing the pictures I had placed there. The last post I made indicated my disability 2 years ago, it has steadily gotten worse since then. Therefore I can only support custom content for 1 game at a time and currently I have "archived" all SC4 content, as in, I no longer have it on my system. I have been focused on writing some science fiction, some graphic art*, and fooling around with Bethesda (Fallout) content for the time being. (The GECK is really tricky to be proficient with and I am not even close.) * art work under the username Buff-Hamster here: http://www.deviantart.com/digitalart/?q=Buff-Hamster That, is why I released the "Work Bench" content in 2012. Use it as you will or use it for ideas, I freely give it away as it belongs to EA anyway (read the ELUA sometime) I have freely given the NAM Team all rail texture content as I am sure NAM content has progressed well beyond anything I had done in 2006-2012. They are an excellent team to work with and I recommend their work as the highest quality available. Under no circumstances ask for dependency lists for this stuff, because I have no idea where it is anymore. There are clues in the 7 pages of this topic as to the dependency titles and where the stuff was last seen, and most of it still exists on the STEX and the SC4Dev site. What doesn't exist was probably not that important. Legally, I can not even ask that if you do use, change, or update and re-release any of the content I have submitted, that you at least mention it, but morally, and probably according to Simtropolis policy*, I only ask that you should at least give attribution, after all, it is all anyone can really ask. * that TOS contract you agreed to the moment you clicked "I agree", yup, that was a binding contract and they can deny you service (ban you) if you break it. Same with the Game EULA, another binding contract you signed when you clicked "I agree" So now, I will kindly ask that a Moderator or Admin lock this topic or turn it over to someone else.

Huge fire erupts in Lac-Mégantic, QC, Canada, as an oil train derails. All of downtown is burning right now. video 1 video 2 video 3

We can only pray. They are currently trying to contact the missing in the hope that they are away on vacation or just weren't home at the time. In another report, someone pointed out that the tracks were not in good condition for a "hazmat" train. It was noted that the line was overgrown with weeds in places and lacked the proper ballast,...this data is unconfirmed at this time. In one of the videos, you can see a rail line where only the rails are visible through the grass, whether or not this was the actual track that was used by this train is unclear, but other views of the area do show that the track was not in the best of conditions.

LOL That image is too, too funny. Noooo! British and European Intelligence services are just as guilty as the NSA? Say it isn't so!

umm, because you do have things that need privacy and to be kept hidden from the general public? Like, medical appointments, email addresses, credit card numbers, birth dates, social security numbers, bank account numbers, tax info, ATM PIN numbers, anything a government can get, a cyber criminal can also get. Yes, those things are also discussed in phone and text conversations. Would the government let the public access such information? EDIT: Plus, if only non-domestic calls were being monitored with the exception of a few by mistake, how relevant is this to everyday people? mmm, yeah,...except it wasn't a "government employee" who blew the whistle on PRISM, it was a government contractor,...someone outside of the government. And currently, Congressional hearings are uncovering information that domestic calls caught in the web of PRISM are recorded and archived for later use, all without the intercession of the FISA court. Sure, okay, you're welcome to that viewpoint. I was completely aware of the "common usage". Problem is, it has absolutely nothing to do with the issue. The people who are protesting this issue have nothing against technological advancement,...in fact many embrace it and use it to protect their 4th Amendment rights and maintain their privacy. I am completely for technology, and calling me a paranoid Luddite couldn't be farther from the truth. Again, what in the world does the NSA sidestepping the FISA court, violating American 4th Amendment rights, and conducting illegal operations against American citizens(who are not subjects of criminal investigations) have to do with "fear of technology"? What I am against is abuse of power and privilege, not technology. With that given, how in the world can you get to Paranoid Luddite? Who is making these claims that technology is to blame for the NSA breaking the law? That argument is just absurd, pointless, and completely off topic. Just check the links I posted that help you maintain your privacy and safety online(how is that "against technological advancement"?) Claiming that in today's society, technology precludes any privacy, is absurd. Claiming that if you have nothing to hide, you needn't worry about intrusion, is also absurd. You can have and need a certain amount of privacy. With current and emerging technology, and a little common sense, you can protect yourself from intrusions into your private life. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

umm, because you do have things that need privacy and to be kept hidden from the general public? Like, medical appointments, email addresses, credit card numbers, birth dates, social security numbers, bank account numbers, tax info, ATM PIN numbers, anything a government can get, a cyber criminal can also get. Yes, those things are also discussed in phone and text conversations.

If I was careful with my privacy I wouldn't be on Facebook, or using Gmail, or using Google, or even working with Android or iOS as operating systems. Hell, if I was careful about my privacy I wouldn't even be here. Not using the internet is the only way to protect your privacy to a reasonable degree. The moment you connect to the internet though, the only thing protecting you is your relative obscurity because you are one of the many millions of people online. And trust me, anyone who is a little tech savvy can find an absurd amount of personal information just by looking up their username on a forum. Anyone who is a little tech savy would know that the "hacking" websites offer the best advice for protecting your privacy online. I tried Facebook but was inundated by "friend requests",...from people I never heard of, result? a deactivated Facebook account,(curiously they won't let me delete it). My Gmail account is a spam dump. A ruse, if you will, as the actual email account for our household is through our ISP and guess what?,..NO SPAM! Google has been blocked from tracking me and the same plugin stops even this site from tracking me across "social networks"(blocked 5 websites on Simtropolis, 2 social networks and 3 commercial companies) I use AdBlockPlus and NoScript on my browser and enable the "https everywhere" option and all the websites I go to load fast and easy. I don't use Android or iOS and instead rely on a pre-paid cell phone. I don't need toys, I need reliable tools. All the tablets and computers in this household connect to the Internet through a secure WiFi link to the Satellite modem.(there is no cable, DSL, or fibre where I live) There are simple choices you can make to protect yourself from unwanted intrusion into and theft of your personal data. Yes, you can protect yourself and your privacy to a reasonable degree on the Internet by being proactive. Trust me, if you don't take a proactive view toward protecting your personal data, you will get burned. "Relative obscurity" is not a guarantee, whereas proactively guarding your privacy is. Good advice, as for Google, check this out: Abine teams up with privacy companies and Mozilla to take a stand against NSA surveillance Even if a person is nonchalant about the NSA tracking issue, you would still want to prevent intrusion from commercial sites, spam generators and identity thieves, yes? I use DoNotTrackMe, would that work for your system as well? @krbe: "acck thhbbtff"

my point exactly, except you do have a certain amount of privacy if you are careful. You NEED a certain amount of privacy, otherwise your bank accounts would be drained, credit destroyed, and incriminating evidence plastered all over your good name and reputation if you didn't take steps to protect yourself. seems you missed the point entirely and reply in the absurd. The point was that protecting your privacy has absolutely nothing to do with the current views of Luddites. The truth is that if you are foolish enough to post all the details of your private life on Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc., then you deserve everything a cyber-criminal can throw at you. If a cyber-criminal can do it, so can a government. hmm, yes. Either he doesn't know how, or he doesn't care. I prefer to give the benefit of doubt. There are many ways to protect your online privacy, in fact it becomes necessary to do so and that has absolutely nothing to do with "Luddite paranoia". The same methods used to protect you from criminals are the same ones that will protect you from government intrusion and interference. But apathetic responses like, "with todays technology you have no privacy", will leave you open to attack not just from governments, but criminals as well. As far as the information you give out to commercial services, that data is supposed to be protected/encrypted. Yes, they will sell that data to other commercial enterprises, but if you get "slammed" you have a legal recourse. I know this from actual experience. I have been "slammed" for services I did not authorize or ask for, I have had my bank account drained through PayPal hacking. I got all that money back,...eventually. Now I know better how to protect myself online and keep my privacy. It can be done. So, yeah, online privacy against any intrusion is a necessity no matter how advanced the technology is. In this one salient point, giving up my right to privacy is crossing the line.