Roodbos

[DarkLoki]

Roodbos

I have been thinking of starting a region here for some time but I had some problems, no time, no photoshop skills, bad english, not good enought etc  . But what the heck, lets try anyway, I downloaded the following map and it really had potential for a good MD I tought so I will try to show you the evolution of the Roodbos region. I do not really like pre planned cities, I just start small and slowly expand and see where things end. I hope I will show the entire evolution from small village to sprawling metropolis.

Lets start with a region map:

It's the Redwood shore map from c.p. It has got amazing mountians, canyons, rivers, plains and a buildable shoreline. I used the olympic terrain and treecontroller mod, it looks very good and varied. The only "downside" to this map is the size, I changed the cities to large cities but the result was that the western part of the map is now a strip of small useless small city tiles.

The history of this region starts with a smalle settlement on the plains in the middle near the sea, the topography of the river is still unknown so the first settlement was located near the dangerous sea. The Roodbos has vast reserves of timber but before and in order tot acces the timber the region was settled.

The landing on the beach, it is not yet possible to dock your boat here but for now this will have to do.


The road cuts trough the forest to the first settlement called Verzand, the forest protects is from the elements.

Land prices do not really exist yet so lots are large. A little bit of industry provides for some basic goods.

Soon the first trees were felled in order to make way for the first farm in the region, making sure the village can support itself is very important. Shipping food in is not very reliable.


This first farm supplies the village with meat and milkproducts. Not that there is more food available new people immigrated to Verzand.


That's all for this update, I hope you like 

[Battlecat]

That is an excellent start!  Love you choice of terrain and trees, they're my favorites as well.  I'm looking forward to watching your region evolve! 

[threestooges]

Your English is fine and your pictures are too. I like the approach you are taking by following the process of development. The pictures look good (and photoshopping is not something that is necessary for a good pic). I would suggest that you fully minimize the menu unless it is necessary for the pic and perhaps even edit out the little button too (just open it in Paint and move up the bottom edge a bit). Nice start.

[DarkLoki]

Battlecat - Thank you . I can understand you like this terrain too, it's very lush and detailed. I really liked your previous MD (i'm afraid i forgot the name  ) that also showed a slowly evolving region. (Atleast I hope it was yours)

threestooges - I am glad my english is good enough. I will make the pictures without the toolbar in the next update, removing the little button by just moving the edge is very clever

Roosbos Update 2

A diet of meat, cheese and milk gets a little bit boring after a while. To get more variety another lot was stripped of its trees and made into a vegatable farm. The ground here was once deposited by a river and is very fertile so the yields were very good.


The polulation increased again and so another cattle farm was created. Chopping down all the trees makes the inhabitants of Verzand eat a lot.

The new watermilk tower delivers the milk tot every home.

In order to get the economy going it was time to get logging operations underway. The trees that were felled in the proces of making the new farms was the first batch to be processed by the new sawmill.


In order to ship the products of this new factory the beach landing was turned into a small port, unfortuately the waters are very shallow near the coast.


The sawmill produces a lot of sawdust, this was not thrown away but is burned in the new power station. Verzand can now supply itsself with food, milk and power, that wil certainly spur more growth


That is all for this update, i think that in the next update the speed will increase 

[FrankU]

DarkLoki,

Nice devolopment! It makes me curious about the future.

I advise you to use Region Census for making region pictures without all the Maxis menu items.
Your English is at least as good as mine and my experience is that readers on this site understand my posts.
Photoshop is not neccessary. I never use it for SC4 pictures, although I am quite familiar with the program.

You use some nice lots and props for the timber and the harbour. Good choice.

[Battlecat]

Nice update once again!  I like the way you're portraying a developing economy there, looks very cool!

Oh and to answer your question, yes my last MD was a slowly evolving region called Terra.   

[thundercrack83]

Wow, great stuff, DarkLoki--you're off to a very great start!

I can't wait to see what else you have in store for us, my friend!

Take care,

Dustin

[DarkLoki]

FrankU - Thanks, I am glad you like the lots. Downloading plugins for simcity is something I am not very fond of but i am glad is it paying off. At first i wated to use region census but the region view in the game looks much better, in region census the cities are nog aligned correctly . I'm glad to hear my english is good enough, it's sometime frustrating make clear what you mean in another language.

Battlecat - Whow i already have a follower  . Good to hear you like the style of the MD, I always try to make cities like this, i think it makes the game more interesting. If you pre-plan your city you can have a very good transport system from the start but in a city that  slowly gets bigger the challenge to keep the traffic going in the crowded centre is much bigger. In this city the industry is located near the port, that is a logical location for it right now but in the future it will probably be in the way of developement.

thundercrack83 - Thank you for your nice comment 

Update 3

Not much new things in this update, evolution is a slow proces

For instance, new houses are being constructed along logging roads. What a change for people that are immigrating from the city, no concrete anymore but living in the middle of the nature. Remember to keer your kitchen windows closed or the squirrels will steal your food


More mouths to fill means that the food production has to increase. Someone deceided to become a full-time farmer and constructed a farmhouse nestled in the fields and the forest.


On the other side of the village a second field a second field is brought into cultivation.


Logging roads start to extent further into the forest while crossing beautifull scenery


But ofcource the roads are not meant for tourist but to exploit the resources of the forests. Loggers are now organizing themselfs into groups and clear patches of the forest that they claim ownership on.


Live is hard in Verzand, luckely commerce recognizes this and has provided the hard working population with cheap beer and karaoke


Bonus image; an overview of the area that is now under developement.


And that is all i have for you this time

[Battlecat]

Still looking great!  I quite like how you've gone "extra low" density with your residential along the logging roads.  It's very realistic. 

Say, one thought since you seem to be focusing a great deal on logging, which makes sense with forests like those!  You might want to have a peek at the Mountain Theme Pack materials from Pegasus (www.simpeg.com).  He's got some plopable logging scene related items such as tree stumps and log hauling equipment that you might find handy for details. 

But still, you're doing very well with the tools you already have!  Looking forward to the next update. 

[CommodoreTech]

Very very good! I love all the rural roads. Every blends in perfectly. I really hope you keep this going so it becomes a metropolis or something lol

[DarkLoki]

Battlecat - Great to hear you like the low density developement, I try to achieve some degree of realism so I am glad you agree on that. Thank you for the tip on the prop from Pegasus(weird link), they look really awsome, just the details that i needed  .

CommodoreTech - Thank you! I also really like the roadtextures, without them it would never look realistic. I hope I will work on this long enough to get it a metropolis.

Unfortunately I did not yet have the time to prepare another real update, I was also hoping that the str would be released soon but that does not seem to be the case. In order to keep this MD alive I will show you some pictures from other cities that I have worked on. I hope you like them,

Maxisland

This is a city that I made on the maxisland region:


Let's start our little tour in the suburbs west of the mountians:


Nearer to the main city a commuter rail line runs trough the houses:


The rail line connect to the elevated rail that provides quality transport in the midtown area, in this picture the el-rail runs above the roofs of a developement of cheap aparment buildings:


This is a everyday scene in midtown:


Yes, the el-rail is very important for the city, locations near the station are often very popular, the station support some high density area's:




And to finish here are some pictures of the main park of the city:




I think the next update we kan return to Verzand

[FrankU]

Looking nice, Darkloki!
The STR is out, by the way... take a look at the LEX in your neighbourhood.

[Battlecat]

Nice work there in maxisland.  Nice mix of styles.  As for the odd links, I'm certain I didn't put them in.  It would appear the forums automatically create links to that thread whenever they encounter the words Simp.eg or Pegasu.s (periods added to prevent link creation).  Possibly others as well, very odd though. 

[carkid1998]

Nice! I think it would look better with euro roads (I won't put a link because it will probaly lead to the prop pox thread!)

But.... I am a euro head!!!!!!

[FrankU]

The Euro road textures are not invented by the Flying Horse! They are from SFBT and can be found on the nearest LEX or Simcityplaza.de.

[rooker1]

Wow DarkLoki, you are off to a great first page.
Love the over all layout and the Elrail.  I have been having some fun lately with the Elrail in my MD, especially the over road stuff.  I sometimes wish there were more pieces to work with.
Well see you around and I can't wait for the next update.

Robin 

[Nexis4Jersey]

Ah great , Start DarkLoki ,this MD certainly looks promising 

[DarkLoki]

FrankU - Thank you , to bad there are still some problems with the str  .
Battlecat - Thanks  , glad you like the mix of styles, gives the city more history and character. It's a bit weird to link all those things to a thread about a problem that they are not sure if it is really true and is caused by work of other people to. Seems a bit harsh and exaggarated 
carkid1998 - Someone from england who like Europe?? Just kidding To be honest I do not really like the euro road textures they look a bit like the road in the Netherlands but in some ways they are also very different. So for me they just look weird, the American roads are completely aliën to me and do not really bother me. I hope you understand what i mean 
rooker1 - El-Rail is my favourite network, great you like it to  I never used the over road stuff yet but i'm sure that my new region wil have el-rail to so that would be a good moment to try them out. Still I like the seperated network more, running between the buildings, sometimes crossing the street and then disappering between the buildings again. Specially for you this picture of elrail in a suburban setting:


Nexis4Jersey - Thank you, I hope I will not disappoint your expectations

Well Nexis4Jersey, I will probably do because I still don´t have an update, been working with the str rail but the combination of the sam and the str is not a very good one and to make the rail go trought the city is very frustrating and somehow the rail on the p.e.g. sawmill lot´s has disappeared now  . I hope I´ll be able to get things working soon, I want to work on my city, not spend all my time on making custum content working .

I do have a region image for you:


This is Verzand on the eve of a big boom, a big part of the forest in the vicinity of the village has been removed and exports are slowing down. The future of Verzand did not look very bright. In order to get things going again it was deceided to make some big investments, a new port in deeper waters and a rail line to get logging operations deeper inland.

[carkid1998]

Each to their own!!

By the way where did you get the trails in the first 2 updates?

I like the latest update! Lots of e-rail!! Nice e-rail

[Battlecat]

Nice pictures!

Without seeing the exact problem you're having with the STR I don't have a lot of ideas.  However, the STR textures won't work with existing custom content.  The easiest solution I found was to use the puzzle piece that widens the railway to double track before entering the sawmill.  It actually does a decent job of simulating a siding. 

There is also a patch out of the issues that have been coming up with STR crossing SAM roads here in the 3RR thread.  Good luck, hope you sort out the troubles!