I'm frustrated and I just want these textures :'(
OK so I'm going completely mad trying to get the SC4 Tool to work. I made a bunch of cool base and overlay textures in Photoshop, to use creating a set of park lots so I can build large sprawling parks in a style that suits my taste. Then I made some other textures for my waterfront beautification project. So I got them all set up, and then installed SC4Tool and opened up the texture program. Got my .dat file ready and selected my texture. Made sure I had all the sizes in place. Even got myself a IID range from BSC. Everything was set until I clicked 'save'.
The program said it couldn't. At this point Google is usually my friend and I poked around the various forums for a fix. Tried running it on my old XP PC. No dice. Tried to run as administrator. Nix. Tried looking for that DLL fix. That didn't work either. I am at my wit's end, and all I wanted to do was make a few textures.
Anyway, I was wondering if any of you would like to mash them into a .dat for me, since I am not able to? I guess your reward would be that you get to use the textures however you like. These are the textures in question:
(https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg198.imageshack.us%2Fimg198%2F6149%2Fwaterfronttexturessands.jpg&hash=ec5aa1f09f224f72a39801e27faeb18bd461cca6) and: (https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg821.imageshack.us%2Fimg821%2F6586%2Fparkforumexample.jpg&hash=c2d0a8a6d05c10aaa1266171cb46900c880e4f0d)
If anyone would be so kind as to put these into a .dat for me that would be super. I put all the 128x128 .png files in a .zip to be found here: http://www.mediafire.com/?whvk84ge612g1nf (http://www.mediafire.com/?whvk84ge612g1nf)
Oh, I guess the paths are overlays and the waterfront ones are base.
Thanks in advance, whoever you are! ;)
SC4tool is kinda outdated when it comes to creating textures anyway. Instead use Null45's PNG2FSHBatch (http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=2255) and follow this tutorial (http://sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=13944.msg401978#msg401978). Hope your textures will be ready for LE in no time. ;)
Thanks for your reply, vortext. I followed Null45's tutorial, and got a little further. I got the textures into the .dat file, iLive Reader can find them, however Lot Editor still can't find them. I did everything the tutorial told me to, including making sure the groupID was 0986135e and the IID range was specified as my own.
Gah! Why does this have to be so complicated? I just wanna make some nice textures :'(
Ohwell... will be tinkering away some more and I'll be sure to share them with the community when they're done, if there's any demand for them.
Thanks
@Doctor Soul: Before you are able to finish, while I am no expert, just out of curiosity, do you think you want to try uploading your work at present to this thread or something, so someone else can see if your textures appear or not for them? I have seen weird behavior with lot editor before, it is not exactly easy to work with.
Hi j-dub
I'm glad I'm not the only one who doesn't find Lot Editor exactly easy to work with.
I've uploaded a new .zip file with in it the waterfront textures (4 of them), the paths (18) and the .dat files I mashed them into (2 files) http://www.mediafire.com/?bsy41qg9dn8x1iz (http://www.mediafire.com/?bsy41qg9dn8x1iz)
Feel free to take a look at them and see if you can get them to show up.
-DS
I had a look at your textures, only the closest zoom was created. You have to check the box "automatically process mips", but other than that I think everything should work out. :thumbsup:
OK, so I got them in. Somehow all of them are in the overlay texture section. Must have something to do with the group ID or whatever. Too tired to figure it out now. Made a bunch of puzzle piece lots. Will make some custom icons for them tomorrow. After that I'll upload the whole package here for your pleasure.
Pics, 'cause who doesn't love pics? ;)
(https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg801.imageshack.us%2Fimg801%2F7007%2Fsewnitydec1823133299754.png&hash=c7a908cf0f9855cfeb9d34910a4e51dbc9fde3d2)
(https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg96.imageshack.us%2Fimg96%2F5964%2Fsewnityjan1924133299775.png&hash=c5d3c66cf27812ff2c5c3f2fed5b9bb86791f796)
Quote from: Doctor Soul on March 28, 2012, 11:18:31 PMSomehow all of them are in the overlay texture section. Must have something to do with the group ID or whatever.
Group ID is the same for all textures. More likely the base textures still contain transparency, i.e. layers or something. Don't know which graphics software you use but in photoshop base textures should be 'background' only.
And if you're not to keen on the Maxis LE, which is totally understandable btw, use the SC4PIM (http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=2260) instead. Makes lot editing a whole lot easier. ;)
The base textures are 32-bit pngs instead of 24-bit which would cause Png to Fsh Batch to assume that they are overlay textures with transparency and save them as DXT3 instead of DXT1.
Thanks for the responses, it helped me a lot!
I made this:
(https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg525.imageshack.us%2Fimg525%2F9958%2Fyupq.jpg&hash=9cf60ae58ff676ac0a96355e799f006a80d0a917)
Get it here http://www.mediafire.com/?upbhhf1300lt7a3 (http://www.mediafire.com/?upbhhf1300lt7a3)
There's also some open paved area lots but I haven't gave them the right properties and custom icons yet.
When this is done next thing I wanna do is teach myself how to gmax & BAT so I can make some stuff to add to the variation of parks, like a bandstand or a fountain or stuff like that.
So, I guess everything is in order, keep up the good work!
It is. Thank you all for your help. Now I need to figure out how to get some sort of preview before plopping, so you can align them properly when building. Otherwise it's just such a hassle. At a later date I want to try to make them available as paths for pedestrians to take a shortcut through the park.