Project Blue Hope The Massive Multiplayer Project for SimCity 4 By Need4Camaro Current Members Need4Camaro – Mayor of the Capital BluePort JeeKTaN – Mayor of NorthPort GodRocks24 – Mayor of Roma Other Cities Strathpine Dabbersburgh Arka What IS Project BlueHope? Originally, Blue Hope was an interactive City Journal for Sim City 4 which allowed players to plot their development upon the ever growing metropolis of Newark. They could build highways, toll roads, buildings, developments, anything they wanted and accrued points. With their points they would be allowed to develop even more down the road. Blue Hope however was run by only one member and that was myself where as I was taking request from up to 15 members at any given time. This became extremely clutter some especially on top of my already packed college schedule and real life an although it held of for quite some time, BlueHope eventually met its demise when the project grew too large for one individual to handle. Blue Hope II was constructed a year later and involved a far more sophisticated system. This time, instead of myself alone managing the development, each member was responsible for their own development. In addition to this, members could also construct their own development independently through what’s called file-syncing software which enabled every member to share the same city / plugin in the region and use a shortcut to separate the “multiplayer region” for their own content. While the city journal itself did not last very long due to lack of response plus my dedication to the real world, it actually did pull off success with as little as 5 members, 3 of which (including myself) are still active to this date with 3 metropolis’s within the region. However as urban expansion occurred, we were still faced with the difficulties of managing the megalopolis and so through time I decided to compile a different approach toward developing the region. Project Blue Hope is an effort to develop the nation of BluePort by colonization of civil engineers. Originally Blue Hope was a city journal that focused on multiple mayors and their experience in one region, but I have decided to take that a step further. BluePort is seeking civil engineers of which can develop un-colonized land into sprawling suburbs around the metropolises as well as efficiently construct mass transportation systems within suburban communities geared toward inter-city connection. We are also looking for rural and industrial developers such as farms and industry outside of the city limits. So to state, you have the option of becoming a Mayor of which you will be confined to only your own land, or a civil engineer who will have access to develop low and medium density developments around the metropolis communities as suburbs or rural farmland in the country side. Civil engineers will also have access to constructing power plants, water utilities, and transportation networks (or modify existing networks such as adding exits to highways). There is also a need for engineers to construct signage for highways and custom bats for special areas. There is no longer a score system. You do not need points to develop in BlueHope. I have lifted the limits of your city size. So you can develop as much as you want or as little as you want with the exception that ATLEAST 50% of your current city tile be occupied (by bats, population, ect) before moving on to the next tile so that we don’t have the populous land grabbing and hogging up map space. I DO ASK THAT YOU REMAIN REASONABLE HOWEVER AS THIS IS A SHARED REGION. How it works Project Blue Hope uses a special shortcut command which will allow users to load a region and plugins from an alternate folder. By this logic this folder is not the same as the My Documents\Sim City 4 folder and this means it will not interfere with the players existing regions or plugins. So you can play Blue Hope independently from your own region and plugins. This means you will not clutter your plugins with redundant or unusable plugins. Blue Hopes plugins will be independent of yours. Since we are loading from an alternate location, we have the ability to “Synchronize” this location between multiple computers using whats called a Live Synchronization Tool. What this does is synchronizes files between your computer and a server. When the server receives the updated file, it sends it instantaneously to every participating PC. This means whenever you build or make a change to a city and save it, your changes are applied and sent to each member participating without any action on your part aside from having an active internet connection. The same goes for receiving cities. You will not notice any difference between this and running a standard Sim City 4 game aside from the growing of other cities. The same goes for plugins. You can add whatever plugins you desire to and everyone will have access to them. There is a Menu Management Utility that is called “DAMN” that comes with the SSPTool that I ask that you use for your plugins before implementing them into the City Journal as not to clutter the in-game menu’s. I will go into further detail with that later. Roles in Project Blue Hope You can choose to play up to two roles in Project Blue Hope simultaneously. The reason I limit it is to optimize efficiency in each category so one member won’t be overburdened in a specific area. Mayor - You begin with two large city tiles, you qualify to earn an additional tile after at least 50% of your land is in use.
Civil Engineer – You are not bound by the city limits. You are able to develop Light and Medium dense suburban or rural developments within the region. You may even be requested to develop suburban schemes around existing metropolis’s. You may not alter existing infrastructure such as highways or roadways aside from adding capacity or access methods.
Civil Engineers can also develop utilities to empower existing metropolises with power, water or a dumping area for trash and setup neighbor deals between empty tiles and offer them to existing mayors. Department of Transportation – You are eligible to setup railroads, state routes, toll roads, or any method of inter-regional transportation outside of city limits and propose your plans and projects to mayors to win bids and process your plans in their city. You may NOT alter existing infrastructure without proposal first however.
DOT is ALSO responsible for making Highway Signs. Not only for the suburban and rural areas, but also for Mayor owned city limits as well. Mayors have the option to vote upon which posts or style they would like to use but DOT will perform all creation and placement. Regional Coordinators – You are responsible for watching over regional conditions and propositions of upgrades. You will be responsible for expanding the regional map should we approach our limits.
City Journalism – You will be responsible for maintaining and updating the Project Blue Hope city journal by collecting information from updates and expansion across the region that each team has performed and collect it into a news update on the city journal itself.
Investors – You are still able to act as companies or corporations in project Blue Hope. You can propose to build certain buildings in a specific area. For example you can build oil rigs and refineries in the rural areas if you’re an oil company and propose to build your headquarters tower in a city owned by a mayor or a large plaza in a unincorporated suburb.
How to join Contact me on MSN Live Messenger at Christforbluehopecj@live.com requesting to join Project BlueHope and tell me what role(s) you wish to partake.
Download Windows Live Mesh on a Machine running Windows Vista or 7.
Follow the Installation instructions below
Play your role.
Installation Requirements To Run Project Blue Hope, you will need the following A PC with Windows Vista or 7 (XP will not work)
Minimum of 5 Gigabytes Free on a Hard-drive & Recommended 2 Gigabytes of RAM
An active Simtropolis Account
An active Windows Live Account
Windows Live Mesh from here
Use of the Short Cut represented below.
Windows Live Mesh Download and Install Windows Live Mesh
Upon Acceptance into the City Journal, you will receive a request by email to share a folder via Windows Live Mesh. Accept this and choose to store it locally on your PC
A shortcut to the FileShare folder will be placed either on your desktop or in your personal user folder (Click your name on the start menu)
Open the shortcut…You will be asked where you want the folder to be downloaded to. I highly suggest the My Documents folder, however; you can select anyplace of your desire. I HIGHLY SUGGEST NOT INSTALLING IT ON REMOVABLE STORAGE DEVICES SUCH AS FLASH DRIVES OR EXTERNAL HARD DRIVES AS THESE DRIVE PATHS CAN CHANGE AND THEY WILL NOT BE UPDATED IN WINDOWS LIVE MESH OR YOUR SHORTCUT COMMAND.
Blue Hope’s folder will download to your PC. After it is complete, use the shortcut command to access it. DO NOT ACCESS PROJECT BLUE HOPE VIA SC4 BEFORE ITS INSTALLATION IS COMPLETE AS IT WILL RESULT IN MISSING FILES FOR ALL USERS ON THE PROJECT.
Shortcut Command Make a Copy of your current SC4 Shortcut, this shortcut is advised to only be used on your desktop. Any other shortcut programs you might have might not work correctly.
In this Copy of your SC4 Shortcut, rename it to Project BlueHope so you will know the difference
Right click the shortcut and select “Properties” – you will enter a new window with the Shortcut’s Properties and we will be modifying the Target: and Start in: fields.
On the Target: field, you’re going to extend it. The first part of it is already correct, but after it, OUTSIDE of the quotation marks you’re going to input –UserDir: and then quotations and the location of the installation of your BlueHope folder which is located inside the FileShare folder, and if you installed the FileShare folder in My Documents then the shortcut command would look just like this –UserDir:” C:\Users\(YourUserFolder)\Documents\FileShare\BlueHope/” – you need the forward slash at the end of BlueHope. And the quotations exactly where specified or it won’t work. So the syntax of this entire field would look like this… "Directory to SimCity 4.exe" -UserDir:"Directory to BlueHope Folder located in Fileshare/"
On the Start in: field, you’re going to have to erase the \Apps from the end of the string. This is for the purpose of the “DAMN” menu’s.
Example below …
Make SURE before launching BlueHope that this shortcut is correct because if it isn’t, SC4 will automatically delete the contents of the folder you specified and install the default maxis regions there instead… which could also result in the complete loss of the BlueHope region – I fortunately do retain backups just in case something like this should incur.
DAMN Menu’s The “DAMN” Menu’s enable users to input custom content without cluttering the default maxis menus. This is imperative for organization and retaining ease of access to the default maxis content. The DAMN folder will be sync’d separately from the FileShare folder as it is to be downloaded into a separate location. The location will be your installation directory of the SC4 Game’s Plugins directory, NOT the BlueHope or My Documents Plugins directory. For those of you who will be importing BAT’s, you will also need the SSP Tool so you will be able to modify the DAMN Menu’s and add a menu for your BAT. The SSP Tool can be downloaded here. The DAMN plugin can be downloaded here. Install the SSP Tool first and then the DAMN plugin afterward. Note: By default, the DAMN Plugin is going to look for plugins in your default My Documents\Plugins directory so if you’re going to make or add to a menu, you will have to input the plugin FIRST into your default My Documents\Plugins directory, make the menu, then move it to BlueHope’s plugins. Note: You MUST remove /apps from the Start in: field of your Blue Hope shortcut for the DAMN menu to function, otherwise you will not see the menu’s IMPORTANT: You will need to access the installation directory of Sim City 4, right click it and select properties, and then select the Security Tab. Select Administrator and make sure that “Full Control” is checked, if not then check it. The same goes for Users and Trusted Installers. Sync the “DAMN” folder to your PC via Windows Live Mesh
When the shortcut appears on your desktop or user directory, open and apply it to your C:\Program Files\Maxis\SimCity 4 Deluxe\Plugins directory and NOT your My Documents or Blue Hope plugins folder.
Access the “Support” folder in the DAMN folder then open and run the “DAMN-Indexer.exe” file.
The Menu’s will appear inside your news ticker.
With these steps performed, you will have full access to Blue Hope. Instructions Mayors You begin with 2 Large City Tiles of which you MUST use the mayor name of your Simtropolis username.
After ATLEAST 50% of your land is filled up, you can take another tile adjacent to an already occupied tile.
There are no limits to how large your city can grow, but I do ask that you please remain realistic with your development. Major cities don’t grow masses of skyscrapers until they have the population to sustain them.
You can claim suburban districts as well so long as they are adjacent to your tile and more than 50% of your land is in use.
Civil Engineers All empty tiles adjacent to active city tiles are at your disposal for designing suburban districts.
You may use BATS and other options to create malls or other suburban entities.
You can even design and present projects to the City Journal or to mayors and see them through
You may NOT alter existing infrastructure with the exception of adding access methods to them
You MAY add utilities such as Power Plants, Water Plants and Trash Disposal and offer their services to Mayors or other suburban cities.
You may also design rural infrastructure such as agriculture in distant areas.
Department of Transportation You are to design and connect State Routes, Railroads, Interstates, Toll Roads, and other means of transportation between cities.
Provide interstate-grade signage for all access-controlled roadways throughout the region, both inside and outside Mayors city limits. Please consult with Mayors regarding what style signs they would like in their city.
You may propose inner-city projects within a Mayor’s city but you may not alter anything without their permission first.
Exit number schemes are as follows – The Southernmost end for North/South highways starts at 0 and counts up. The Western most end for East/West highways starts at 0 and counts up.
Regional Coordinators You are to overlook the region and design future expansion projects such as adding more available land to develop upon. It will be much like creating a region only you are adding to it.
City Journalism You are to collect the most recent updates from members who have either made changes to the region, or their cities and post them onto the City Journal.
You can implement fancy ways of updating such as News Papers filled with public opinion on the changes.
You have the option to feature tours of the region in UDI mode and compiling them into videos.
Investors You may use BATs or Maxis Content to represent your development.
You may propose to build anything of your desire, regardless of its function. That includes tollroads, rail systems, oil rigs, refineries, banks, bridges, anything.
If this occurs on mayor owned land, you MUST receive their approval first.
With that stated, Project Blue Hope is designed to be a fun environment. No score system or limits but the product of the SimTropolis community designing one massive region to see what we might be able to create. Play fair!