TaI32 Town Set (Prerelease 3D Scrabble Edition)

[PikkaBird]

3dscrabble.png (256.94 KiB) Viewed 14681 times

The graphics aren't finished yet, but I thought I'd share the current state of TaI32. Feedback and bug reports welcome.

The current Bananas version is 100, 5th of February 2019.

TaI32 Town Set - wot is it?

As well as being a graphical replacement, TaI town and industries have improved/different game mechanics. The town set aims to create towns with modified growth and shaping which is both aesthetically pleasing and good for gameplay.

Current features include:
- Town growth is limited - all towns grow, but it takes some time for a village to become a metropolis.
- Larger/higher density buildings only appear near transport services.
- High-rise buildings cluster in one part of the city.
- Residential buildings don't appear near industries.

I'm pretty happy in my testing with how the towns are behaving, but I'd be really interested to hear if other people think I've got the balance right!

[planetmaker]

I'm looking forward to it!

May I ask to add a parameter to use normal town growth behaviour so that it plays well alongside scenario game scripts?

[PikkaBird]

May I ask to add a parameter to use normal town growth behaviour so that it plays well alongside scenario game scripts?

Already done - the town growth rate is adjustable, and setting it to 0 disables the limiter. The cargo requirements for high-density buildings can also be adjusted or disabled.

[planetmaker]

May I ask to add a parameter to use normal town growth behaviour so that it plays well alongside scenario game scripts?

Already done - the town growth rate is adjustable, and setting it to 0 disables the limiter. The cargo requirements for high-density buildings can also be adjusted or disabled.

Perfect!

[Zley_Muffle]

The idea looks great, will try ASAP (though work on CZTR takes much of my free PC time)

[train_apprecianado]

I played a few games with this and I'm very excited about the future. Going back to other building NewGRFs (TTRS for now) afterwards showcases what I'm starting to think is really lacking in the city growth for the base game. Cities in the base game grow up too fast before growing out. If you start in 1950 or so with TTRS, you can get cities with 15k people in it that is wall to wall skyscrapers, and then suddenly empty grass the next tile.

The Tai32 strikes a much better balance in having cities filled with houses first, and making taller buildings near where the dense parts would be, and having most taller buildings have a shallower footprint so you can see the space between everything.

Few notes:
- I don't think the goods or food requirement is FIRS compatible, I didn't seem to be getting high rises until I turned the high rises option to only require passengers and goods
- the high rises blend in a bit too well with the rest of the buildings, I wasn't sure what the high rises looked like until I dug through the NewGRF graphics
- no building seems to be as tall as skyscrapers in other sets yet
- maybe for the pre-release graphics the colours could fit the SimCity style of green residential, blue commercial, yellow industrial

[PikkaBird]

Thanks for the feedback.

Yes, the buildings of different size can be a bit hard to tell apart - obviously that problem will be mitigated by proper graphics. I'll look into what might be happening with FIRS and food/goods.

[NekoMaster]

Oh wow, I didn't think someone would start working on a new 32bpp grf anytime soon.

Will the style be based on anything specific or perhaps something more like a Generic/World style that Total Town renewal set?

[acs121]

Hold on. 32bpp just colours or 32bpp Extrazoom ? They look a bit like Extrazoom though.

[PikkaBird]

Hold on. 32bpp just colours or 32bpp Extrazoom ? They look a bit like Extrazoom though.

This set will be drawn in 2x zoom, like the UKRS3 trains, so hopefully it will look reasonably at home with either standard or zoom base sets and other GRFs.

[PikkaBird]

Here's a quick preview of how the first proper house graphics are coming together.

cottagespreview.png (48.63 KiB) Viewed 9564 times

The grey doors and window shutters are colour masked. 2x 32bpp really does seem to be the sweet spot for getting some detail and texture into the sprites, while keeping the TTD-style pixel graphic look, IMO!

[arikover]

Nice!

The grey doors and window shutters are colour masked.

Does that mean they will be randomly coloured in game?

[PikkaBird]

Does that mean they will be randomly coloured in game?

Yes - well, coloured as selected by the NewGRF.

[Emperor Jake]

Those houses look beautiful! I do appreciate sticking with the traditional pixel art look.