Graphic randomizing

[elmoonlite]

When many trees or buildings repeat things look very bland.
I was wondering if things would look a little more lively if the display of things is randomized a bit.

One way to implement it would be to slightly change the hue and or brightness of each item.
The randomization should be based on a game-static seed, so it looks the same every time you run it.
Though maybe it could be interesting to have it change differently based on seasons or time of day.
And perhaps also base it on position for consistency, e.g. if you remove something and place it back later it will look the same.

You could add optional masking layer(s) for each asset, so you can define which bits change color instead of the whole thing at once.
A black and white mask for just which pixels can change, or even grayscale to indicate how much each bit can change.
For example, trees and foliage would probably still look okay with a very different hue, but buildings could look odd, and there might be a sign or metal or other bit that you do not want to change at all.
One could even implement it with lovely old-school color cycling instead of animations.

I realize this is a very touchy subject. Some people will like the original look, but others might prefer a bit more spice.
Graphic randomizing should probably be an optional setting, something you can enable or disable, or even customize it.
Also, it might affect performance, so optional could help with that too.

I think this could be something fun to develop, hopefully not too much work and with possible pleasing results.

[kamnet]

Just curious, what base graphics set are you using?

[elmoonlite]

To be honest, I haven't actually played yet >_<

I only just found out OpenTTD exists and it looks lovely. Just looking at the screenshots my eyes went all heart shaped, I just love me some isometric pixel art.
I used to play several tycoons last millennium, but not religiously, I'm no expert. Though I always like to build, plan and organize things.

I was looking at the screenshots on https://www.openttd.org/screenshots , and some of them were very uniform and a bit bland, with the same image repeating over and over, e.g.:
- https://www.openttd.org/screenshots/1.9-coldice_1.html (repeating trees mostly)
- https://www.openttd.org/screenshots/1.9-coldice_2.html (repeating bushes, trees, water, grass, road tiles)
- https://www.openttd.org/screenshots/1.9-coldice_3.html (repeating buildings all exactly the same, and a big boring stretch of water)

And then my developer brain took over and I started typing ideas.
Don't get me wrong, the screenshots look lovely, I just wonder if it would look even better with something breaking the repeating patterns and large uniform grass and water areas.

As a young parent with work and too many dev plans already I doubt I will find time soon to sink in the hours to really enjoy playing it or contribute to the project or just explore the codebase on GitHub, so I just left a post with an idea. Maybe someone likes it, maybe not. It's not for my own benefit

[OzTrans]

When many trees or buildings repeat things look very bland.
I was wondering if things would look a little more lively if the display of things is randomized a bit.

We are already doing that ... The houses below come in 4 rotations, they seek out a road frontage, thus the mail box need not be in the backyard. Further the roofs have randomised patterns and the verandahs come in 16x16 randomised colour schemes. Then, everything comes in snowy variants too.

Randomised Housing.png (232.99 KiB) Viewed 3075 times

[kamnet]

To be honest, I haven't actually played yet >_<

Ooof.

I was looking at the screenshots on...

These screenshots are from one person who is using a lot of graphical modifications (NewGRFs) which are freely downloadable from within the game. There's several base graphics sets and hundreds upon hundreds of different mods for trees, buildings, landscape, vehicles, industries and more. Players are releasing new stuff every month.

Once you start playing the game and get a good handle on the mechanics, you'll probably enjoy diving into the buffet feast of add-ons and mods that the game offers.

[Eddi]

One way to implement it would be to slightly change the hue and or brightness of each item.
The randomization should be based on a game-static seed, so it looks the same every time you run it.

the game definitely supports using different colours based on a persistent random seed. just a question of whether the NewGRF set you use makes the effort to implement it.

[elmoonlite]

Oh I see, I was just unlucky enough to base it on some screenshots that did not show it.
(I realized this was a possibility, but did not spent enough time to find any other in game resources to the contrary)
The screenshots OzTrans posted above clearly show randomization breaking up the patterns. That looks way better!

How about the color cycling though? For shores, rain, water pouring down a roof, a flag or tree slightly moving in the wind.
...googling gifs...
I see the water waves and shores already use color cycling or something similar.

Seems openTTD pretty much already implements most ideas I had (and a ton more)

On openttd.ord I only see screenshots, I could not find gifs or other animations.
I bet watching it all move really makes it come to life.
I'll have to google some animations, or watch YouTube playthroughs...
...time passes...
Arghhh!
It's even better seeing it all move, just like I was afraid of.
I wonder if I dare open this can of worms.
It looks like something that once I start playing I can't stop.

[Eddi]

there is colour cycling, but it's very rigid. there's a "water cycle" (e.g. ocean), a "fire cycle" (e.g. steel mill), and some little ones like lighthouse and runway lights.

there's other ways of animating though, that are more flexible.