FIRS Industry Replacement Set - Development

[George]

How should new cargoes, which are transported in open trucks (flat bed, drop side truck or a dumper), look like?

[andythenorth]

How should new cargoes, which are transported in open trucks (flat bed, drop side truck or a dumper), look like?

As maquinista has found (in the release thread), graphics for FIRS cargos are going to be an issue for a lot of set authors. Here are the issues as I see them:

1. It's a lot of work to add cargo graphics to sets. For each HEQS dump truck I have to add 3 new sets of sprites per cargo (3 loading states), with 8 angles per vehicle. Mostly I can just use 'replace colour', but it's a hassle. Then I have to do the nfo as well...

2. What should new cargos look like? What does fruit and veg look like? Scrap metal?

Some possible answers:

- use tarpaulins or other covers on open vehicles, hiding the cargo. I use this in HEQS for some vehicles. Saves drawing and code.
- use recolor sprites in nfo. This can be a lot of work when 2CC is used. Could one coder work out the nfo for recoloring to FIRS cargos so that set authors can all reuse it?
- draw some reference graphics for FIRS cargos which all set authors can use as a base. I might do that, but anyone else would be welcome to make suggestions...

[planetmaker]

In the lack of existing cargo sprites, there's the cargo icons already done by FooBar though. They're a good guideline, I think:

png of the cargoicons of FIRS

cargoicons.png (2.63 KiB) Viewed 2718 times

Enjoy and kudos to andy and FooBar who work really A LOT on this set.

[Eddi]

- use recolor sprites in nfo. This can be a lot of work when 2CC is used. Could one coder work out the nfo for recoloring to FIRS cargos so that set authors can all reuse it?

afair the GermanRV Set uses that method, you could ask Uwe about how it is done

[George]

How should new cargoes, which are transported in open trucks (flat bed, drop side truck or a dumper), look like?

As maquinista has found (in the release thread), graphics for FIRS cargos are going to be an issue for a lot of set authors.

As soon as we decide how should it look like, they can be provided by one author and reused by others. So, I suggest FIRS devs create a topic to discuss it. In the topic there should be a list of new cargoes.

Here are the issues as I see them: 1. It's a lot of work to add cargo graphics to sets. For each HEQS dump truck I have to add 3 new sets of sprites per cargo (3 loading states), with 8 angles per vehicle. Mostly I can just use 'replace colour', but it's a hassle. Then I have to do the nfo as well...

It is up to any author not to provide new graphics

2. What should new cargos look like?

This is a question to discuss

What does fruit and veg look like?

Boxes with fruit?

Scrap metal?

Lake parts of steel, but more dirty?

- use tarpaulins or other covers on open vehicles, hiding the cargo.

This is the last solution to use

- use recolor sprites in nfo. This can be a lot of work when 2CC is used. Could one coder work out the nfo for recoloring to FIRS cargos so that set authors can all reuse it?

Me doubts

- draw some reference graphics for FIRS cargos which all set authors can use as a base. I might do that, but anyone else would be welcome to make suggestions...

This is the right point First thing we need is the list of cargoes to draw.

[George]

TTD

• Coal
  Iron Ore
  Oil
  Steel
  Livestock
  Fruit and Vegetables
  Grain
  Sugar Cane (Toyland) ?
  Food
  Goods
  Water
  Wood
  Passengers
  Mail

ECS

• Sand
  Fish
  Lumber
  Chemicals
  Fuel Oil (Petrol)
  Wool

PBI

• Gravel

FIRS

• Bauxite
  Aluminium
  Milk
  Survey Supplies
  Farm Supplies
  Engineering Supplies (Vehicles?)
  Scrap Metal
  Parts
  Packaging
  Cotton (Fibre crops?)
  Waste

Correct?

[George]

Bauxite - like ore?
Aluminium - like steel?
Milk - like rubber?
Survey Supplies - ?
Farm Supplies - Harvesters?
Engineering Supplies - Tractors?
Scrap Metal - Steel parts?
Parts - in boxes?
Packaging - like boxes?
Cotton (Fibre crops?) - ?
Waste - dirt like (fertilizer like?) with objects inside?

[Cudar]

Bauxite is the aluminium ore: Al(OH)3.

[maquinista]

I have downloaded the second FIRS released file. There is a bug when a brewery is built inside of a town. In other locations, it works fine.

Some weeks ago, I made some sprites for Spain set trains, for cooper, bauxite and sand. They have been made replacing the colors of the pixels. What do You think?

[andythenorth]

Rather a lot of waste points in this town

rather_a_lot_of_waste_points.png (241.42 KiB) Viewed 2477 times

I haven't checked the specs, but with some incredibly baroque nfo, I think we might be able to check for surrounding houses and connect waste production to that. I don't think we should. But possibly we could

[OzTrans]

A quick word (and suggestion) on the graphic set ID for FIRS ...

We, as set coders, like to auto-detect other sets in order to support them. As graphic set IDs can change over time for a multitude of reasons, the following scheme does help to still support other sets without an updated release of our own set.

Consider a version digit as part of the graphic set ID; like 0xaaaaaaav, where ...

aa aa aa a = is your graphic set ID (7 digits); it can be anything, it's your choice, but should be unique among all graphic sets naturally.
v = version ID, starting with '1'; you can then bump up the version digit, if necessary. Don't use '0' and you have a range from '1' through to 'F' available.

Other sets can then auto-detect FIRS using a bit mask and it won't be necessary to update these sets too in case FIRS felt it was necessary to change its own ID.

[Eddi]

Survey Supplies - ?
Farm Supplies - Harvesters?
Engineering Supplies - Tractors?

i believe these should be all kinds of machinery. survey supplies could be digging or boring machines, farm supplies could be tractors and harvesters, engineering supplies could be bulldozers or other machines

Packaging - like boxes?

i'd say rather like paper (in big rolls)

[planetmaker]

We, as set coders, like to auto-detect other sets in order to support them. As graphic set IDs can change over time for a multitude of reasons, the following scheme does help to still support other sets without an updated release of our own set.(...)

Hm, shouldn't the whole last byte be the version of this newgrf according the the NewGRF wiki?

This is a series of 4 bytes. It's a convention to use the first two bytes for the creator's initials in ASCII code, e.g. 54 57 for "TW". The last two bytes should be numbers, typically the first number identifying which of the author's sets this is, and the second number being a version number.

Sure enough, usually 15 versions for a single newgrf should be enough for the whole lifetime, but...

EDIT: fixed quotation

[Roujin]

Sure enough, usually 15 versions for a single newgrf should be enough for the whole lifetime, but...

... better be safe than sorry, no?
32 bit was also enough for long time...

[FooBar]

Massive replies here...

Sugar Cane (Toyland) ?

In our case the sugar cane is the plant and not the sugar itself. Otherwise the list seems quite correct indeed.

Bauxite - like ore indeed, just a different colour
Aluminium - I drew it as sheeting on a roll, but it can be virtually anything.
Milk - more like water me thinks
Survey Supplies - can be anything; some covered wagons would work best here.
Farm Supplies - again, can be anything from fertilizer to tractors. covered wagons?
Engineering Supplies - same, from the smallest nuts and bolts to heavy equipment
Scrap Metal - all kinds of metal parts of irregular shapes. Very hard to draw, see my cargo icon...
Parts - can be anything, most likely in boxes indeed. I think parts like to stay dry so we might want to add that property to the cargo classes of this cargo
Packaging - cardboard boxes, wooden crates, glass containers, etc.
Cotton (Fibre crops?) - those white thingies. Likes to stay dry as well.
Waste - for health reasons transported in closed containers. The ACTS system is very nice for rail transport. For road transportation you have ofcourse your regular garbage trucks. The waste itself looks like this. Again very hard to draw.

There is a bug when a brewery is built inside of a town.

Savegame please.

Rather a lot of waste points in this town

Interesting. I did set the probability to FF as I wanted one in every town (default TTD maximum probability is F)... I think I've overdone it...

A quick word (and suggestion) on the graphic set ID

I agree with planetmaker on masking out the complete last byte and not only the last nibble. The specifications don't recommend the last byte as versioning byte for nothing I guess...

So you'd have aa aa ss vv. With aa aa the author's id, ss the set's id and vv the set's version.

[el koeno]

Perhaps some cargoes (e.g. the various types of supplies and packaging) could simply be transported in generic wagons: in containers, or covered with tarpaulins. I'm not sure if this is desirable, or possible, but it would make it easier on set designers, right?

BTW: Cotton is generally transported in bales I think.

[planetmaker]

Perhaps some cargoes (e.g. the various types of supplies and packaging) could simply be transported in generic wagons: in containers, or covered with tarpaulins. I'm not sure if this is desirable, or possible, but it would make it easier on set designers, right?

A set designer always has this choice. Actually that's something a set designer usually does at least also additionally in order to cover cargo definitions which are not yet present (via the cargo classes) or in order to just save drawing work.

[maquinista]

This is the wagons for waste. I have drawn it before the FooBar's suggestion about waste wagons.

I think that it could be covered/sheltered freight (200) and bulk (10). This would allow waste only in covered wagons.

[planetmaker]

Would waste really need to go in covered wagons? I honestly doubt the need for that...

[colossal404]

Transport waste with garbage truck