Screenshot / RMC trains on IBox track
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24-September 15
- Views 10,588
- Fans 3
- Comments 32
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Description
This is as far as I got with yesterday's experiments into rendering new track sprites before I ran into difficulties and had to stop. The trains are unchanged from the last screenshot I posted, but now they're running on the proper track. I never got round to doing proper chain lift sprites, so I just duplicated the gentle slope - that's why the lift appears to have no chain.
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Amazing, The heartline roll looks really good. Is there a way to do vertical drops?
Yes, but I didn't render track sprites for those. I only replaced a small subset of the total track pieces because I ran into difficulties when I tried to do the more complex ones.I assumed that each sprite was split into different tiles, but that's not the case - in some cases the sprite is split into more pieces than the number of tiles it covers. Another consequence of this is that there are numerous glitches.
This screenshot is carefully cropped so as not to show the rest of the layout which is still using the original B&M track sprites. That tunnel over the turnaround is there for the same reason - banked turn sprites, especially the larger ones, just can't be replaced by my code as it stands. If I ever come back to this, about half the code will have to be rewritten to make it work right.
I salute you.
This is amazing! You're doing a great job!
Ooh, that looks cool.
I have uploaded some more screenshots here. I have a GIF as well, but I can't seem to upload it.
I don't give a shit about the crappy scenery, onrealistic station, and terrible foliage in this screen.... It's a damn new coaster for RCT!!! I congratulate you sir, for making these things possible!
So unbelievably incredible! Should be possible to have wooden track 1 unit below this to get the supports consistent but damn...you're doing things for this game that will keep it going for a long time to come
The problem with the supports is that the supports that correspond to a given track piece are hardcoded. I wanted an hearline twist and that meant twister track would be the target for my new sprites - but that meant steel supports. I've tried to hide that by building supports below it. It might have been better with custom scenery but I never did get the hang of using it. It should be noted that this was a failed experiment and does not actually make custom track styles possible, at least not unless you're prepared to lose the twister track. One day, I might make another attempt at doing this but as I said in the other thread, doing this properly is going to involve major changes to the game... quite possibly on a similar scale to removing the object limit. I am doubtful that it can be done while OpenRCT2 still depends on the original game.
However, what I haven't tried (and intend to try in future) is using scenery pieces instead of actual track. I expect this to be slightly more glitchy, but hopefully not intolerably so, and it would work with the existing game without modification. However, it would use up a lot of object slots.
Also, sorry about the crap scenery... I mostly just spammed the tree tool around the area, because I don't like blank areas in my screenshots.
Oh cool. I didn't even know it was possible to make and add new track sprites.
What is the scope with that? Are you just able to create pieces that already exist as track in some form or is it possible to create new elements like a larger corskrew or something?
I think some of you think I've accomplished more than I have ... this is not a new track style, it's a replacement track style. All I did was overwrite some of the B&M track sprites with new ones. Unless you really hate B&M rides, I doubt anyone would want to make this permanent.
I can't add new elements. I can't even really add new tracks.
In terms of what could be done in the future (not what I've already done or already know how to do), it should eventually be possible to add the missing elements to the Arrow and Intamin tracks. I don't know if OpenRCT2 is developed enough to do this yet, but it shouldn't be as hard as true custom track styles (still very hard though).
In terms of adding new elements not already in the game, the main limitation is that existing coasters don't have sprites for them. Larger versions of existing elements should work fine, as woould non-inverting elements, but anything else would require a complete rerender of all the game's ride types, and a change to the DAT file format (the existing one has no room for new sprite groups).
All of this is quite far in the future - it's stuff that OpenRCT2 should make possible, but I really have no idea where to even start with something like this right now. Not that I don't intend to try, of course, but don't expect me to release this ride on this custom track because nobody is going to want to replace their twister track sprites, and that's really all this screenshot is. It's a first experiment, not a complete solution.
New pieces might be possible with openrct2, but the sprites would have to be drawn perfectly to match the existing ones. I know they're working on adding a steep to flat piece for the junior coaster like LL had, but they've already got an image from LL for that.
I see. And I agree it's still groundbreaking. If sprites were created to fit the existing ones then, it would be possible for example to see a waterslide with curved drops and helixes - replacing one of the less used tracks like the togo stand-up coaster?
Wait... they're adding a steep to flat piece to the junior coaster? If they can do that, that means they're already done most of the stuff that I thought would be really hard. If they successfully manage that, it should be possible to apply the same technique to add the elements that are missing from other track styles as well. Yes, you'd need new sprites, but that's the main reason I'm working on this renderer - as you say, overwriting twister track is not particularly useful.
I have thought about replacing an existing track that nobody cares about permanently. Unfortunately, most of the track pieces that nobody uses have very few pieces, and therefore aren't very useful.
You can't replace togo track with waterslide track. The reason is that waterslide track, because it has tall sides, is split into two halves - the part that renders before the train and the part that renders after. If you did not do that, it would be impossible to have the train appear "in" the trough - it would either be in front of or behind it. The tracks that are split this way in the game at the moment include the dinghy slide, wooden coaster, and bobsled coaster. All I can do right now is replace sprites - I can't change how the game renders them. Therefore I can't add new elements or change a split track to a non split one. Maybe (hopefully) one day this will be possible.
I was just thinking that you could replace existing sprites like the B&M track with something that looked like arrow track, this would allow for what essentially are new elements for an existing track type (assuming the sprites are rendered extremely well and new trains are made that allow for things like banked drops).
Still, the fact that for the first time someone has even been able to do something like this in game is extremely impressive. At the rate you're currently making progress it wouldn't surprise me that within a year or so you could develop completely custom track sprites, assuming progress on OpenRCT2 remains somewhat consistent and they eventually become completely independent from RCT2.
Yes, I could replace the B&M track with arrow track ... but then you lose the B&M track. This isn't like DAT files where each track is a seperate file and you can duplicate them at will ... the same set of track sprites is shared by every park.
There is one element I can add to the Arrow looper... the steep to flat piece. That's because that piece is already in the game but is supressed by a flag in the DAT for some reason. Remove it, and that piece becomes available. But you guys can probably do that with a trainer.
That's interesting, would it be possible to remove all "flags" that exist for all track pieces, assuming all are safe to run in game of course.
You can use the steep to flat piece on corkscrew trains, but it is somewhat tedious and requires annoying merging and some hacking. It would be much easier to just remove the "flag" because currently its quite an annoyance.
There's a steep to flat piece on the corkscrew coaster!? Whoa, that sounds cool. That's actually a thing i may need for my new LL park.