TUTORIAL: Neighborhood Terrain Surgery

[Li'l Brudder]

Is there any way this can work with the Downtown neighbourhood?  I put a house on that turned out to be unplayable, so I bulldozed it.  Unfortunately, the house caused the road to rise upwards and it didn't go back down when I removed the house.  I tried putting a larger house on to hopefully level it down, instead it made the road split in half and veer to the side, exposing blue stuff underneath.  It not only looks hideous, now I can't put a house there at all.  I would have thought it would have gone back as it was, but it hasn't.

Will I have to completely replace the main neighbourhood to get the Downtown one back as it should be, or can I do Downtown on its own?  I don't have many Sims living there so it would be no big deal to move them out and back in if I can somehow replace the terrain with the one in the main EA File, which I would have thought was possible but doesn't seem to be.

Sorry to laugh at this post Ancient Sim, but I thought that was so funny.  The road turns into nowhere are reveals the blue stuff underneath.  Sounds like my neighborhood...

[Mizz Rose Bud]

Okay ... this looks like something that even I can do 
But you say don´t move the houses to the bin. Why ? ... I mean, it it b/c of the families loosing their relationships or has it something to do with changing the hood ...
I have grown really tired of my hood and houses but not of my sims, so if I move out the sims into the bin and delete the houses ... would that cause any problems ?

Thanks for putting up the tutorial

Rose

Edit ... hmmm ... it didn´t work ... or I did actually edit the terrain, but the old neighborhood decor was still there and the old roads was there too, but the new roads was missing. I think it´s b/c I only had 2 UNK to replace and 4 was mentioned ... or maybe it was someting else 

[Leeahna]

Im having the same problem, running simpe 0.58, i've replaced a neighborhood before and that was working fine. But now i only have 2 UNK's to replace (0xCC2A6A34 and 0xEC44BDDC). The new terrain shows up with the rivers and stuff but the old roads remain and no new roads show up. I've also tried deleting the remaining UNK that i couldnt replace but that didnt help anything. Please help, would really like to replace my old hood.



Edit: Found it, extracting and replacing Neighborhood Terrain did the trick..who would have thought a thing with that name would solve it.

[Mizz Rose Bud]

Found it, extracting and replacing Neighborhood Terrain did the trick..who would have thought a thing with that name would solve it

Please explain ... pleeease 

Rose

[Leeahna]

Ok, heres for hoping my explaination will be somewhat understandable, its not my strong point.

Follow all the steps explained by JM but instead of extracting (from the new hood) the UNK's (0x2C310F46) and UNK (0xABD0DC63), you extract Neighborhood Terrain to a new folder. Then after jumping back to the neighborhood you wanted changed you replace that neighborhood terrain with the one you saved.

In total the things i extracted and replaced were: 2d array, tatt, neighborhood terrain, Unk (0xCC2A6A34) and Unk (0xEC44BDDC).

Hope this helps .

[pseudonymph]

i was wondering if this could be done. sounds good. i'll give it a go later. thx.

[t r a c y]

this worked perfectly for me, thanks J.M & Leeahna ! 

is it possible to change the menu neighborhood video/animation for pleasantview so it shows the new terrain ? i poked around all my game folders but can't find anything that seems related that i could fiddle with... 

[J. M. Pescado]

The neighborhood "flyby" is not actually a part of your neighborhood file, but is some kind of "reia" file. It is actually static and pre-filmed, so unless  you have some idea what the hell a reia is and how to film a flyover, it ain't happening.

[Mizz Rose Bud]

It is actually static and pre-filmed

Are you sure about that ... don´t it show new buildings and other changes  ... I´m not sure, but I think it does ... haven´t played Pleasantview in ages

Someone, somewhere, wrote that it was a code for different cameraangles ... or something like that ... but it only works with the Maxis hoods ... have already tested it 

Rose

[J. M. Pescado]

Not that I know about. It's definitely a static flyby, though, because you can transplant the REIA into another neighborhood, and it will still display the original flyby.

[t r a c y]

gah.  the difference between the flyby and the actual terrain of my neighborhood will slowly drive me batshitinsane. no mismatched wire hangers dammit !

[J. M. Pescado]

Well, if it were up to me, my neighborhood flyby would involve the camera angle jerking crazily about before nosediving rapidly and plowing straight into the dirt.

[Mizz Rose Bud]

Not that I know about. It's definitely a static flyby, though, because you can transplant the REIA into another neighborhood, and it will still display the original flyby.

Okay ... I haven´t paied much attention to it, so I believe you 

gah.  the difference between the flyby and the actual terrain of my neighborhood will slowly drive me batshitinsane. no mismatched wire hangers dammit !

You can always remove the .reia file from the Nxxx folder.

Rose

[jrd]

Some of the UNKs are now labelled. I think you now need the three Neighborhood resrources, the TATT, and the remaining UNK.

[jrd]

Err, yeah. Didn't mean you should pick that one… should probably have been more clear.

[Kyna]

I just did some terrain surgery using SimPE version 0.60b, and I discovered that the resource formerly known as unk 0xCC2A6A34 is now known as Sim Creation Index.  As Jordi has already mentioned, 2d Array is now known as Neighbourhood Terrain Geometry.

To summarise, the five resources I extracted and replaced were:

- Neighbourhood Terrain Geometry (formerly known as 2d Array)
- Neighbourhood Terrain
- Tatt
- Sim Creation Index (formerly known as 0xCC2A6A34).  Not sure why this was needed, but this is one of the resources originally mentioned by Pescado
- unk 0xEC44BDDC

[J. M. Pescado]

The Sim Creation Index may not need copying, but the tutorial was written before its purpose was identified. It appears to be an unnecessary step.

[Lerf]

Is there any way to avoid this?



The ugly, unremoveable tall bumps are where the houses were when I opened the new neighborhood.  I could live with the ones in the water, but I can't find any way to get rid of the one on the terrain.  I've tried lowering it by putting a lot on it, but even with the 90 degree angle hack in the game won't let me place a lot on it.

[Marhis]

Is there any way to avoid this?

I've solved that problem applying the surgery twice, the second time after house re-placement.

[miros]

"Holes" can be fixed by placing a 1x1 lot at the edges and slowly working in, so I'd assume you could do that with these "spires," too. 

However, I suspect you were trying something like that, since the screen shots seem to show a large lot in the process of being placed.

[J. M. Pescado]

Terrain may be mutilated as a result of the originally highly incompatible mapping. You can reach a more compatible state by, as Marhis stated, repeating the surgery procedure after the houses have been moved to more conformant positions in the new terrain.

[Lerf]

Thanks!

Actually I figured out about re-replacing the terrain about 4AM....

Neighborhood looks MUCH better now.

[J. M. Pescado]

If it's been crossed out, ignore it.

[J. M. Pescado]

It may have been renamed. SimPE has renamed a lot of things.

[Kyna]

Ok, heres for hoping my explaination will be somewhat understandable, its not my strong point.

Follow all the steps explained by JM but instead of extracting (from the new hood) the UNK's (0x2C310F46) and UNK (0xABD0DC63), you extract Neighborhood Terrain to a new folder. Then after jumping back to the neighborhood you wanted changed you replace that neighborhood terrain with the one you saved.

In total the things i extracted and replaced were: 2d array, tatt, neighborhood terrain, Unk (0xCC2A6A34) and Unk (0xEC44BDDC).

Hope this helps .

This post on the previous page refers to 0xABD0DC63.  You will note that Pescado states it is not necessary to update 0xCC2A6A34, so don't bother updating it.

The last time I did terrain surgery, I combed through the entire thread to note what had changed, as SimPE does rename unknowns once it is known what they are.