RCT Discussion / Black tiles in LL

Due to the recent revival of LL with old players coming back from the dead and new players popping up, I decided to post some to tutorials for things I think are new in LL. They're just small things I discovered when the need arose, but I hope you guys can make use of them. I will add a couple more tutorials when I have time later this week and if I discover any other new things.

Contents
Page 1
-black tiles: LL version
-saving maze designs (for black tiles)
-other maze types and their uses
-flipped over coaster cars
-open windows

Page 2
-glass awnings by Loopy
-vertical pipes and ladders
-animal being eaten and UFO monorail by Gwazi
-shuttered windows by Loopy
-small path fences by Loopy

Page 3
-colorable bubbly goo

Black Tiles

This is probably the most useful thing I've discovered so far. It's an LL version of Cbass' black tile, an object that changed the face of rct2. It's a great object and if I could've brought one over from rct2 to LL, it would have been this one. Luckily I found out how to do it this way. It's not perfect but is a suitable substitute imo. I haven't used this for any full-scale project yet so I'm not sure how hard it will be to make it look good on a large project. I think it should work ok though.

1. To start, I’ll tell you how I discovered how to make the black tiles. If you look at the screen below you’ll probably notice, as I did, that the top of the maze is the same color as the black space on the edge of maps. I thought since the maze is a ride, you could zero clearance two together to make a solid black square. Put this at the edge of the map and you’d have an extension of the black space into your map. That’s really all you do. The only tricky part about it is getting used to the maze building mode so you can make a black square. (Screens are from Atomkraftwerk.)



2. To make the black tiles in your park, start off by lowering some land at the edge of your bench to the lowest point. Then build a maze like the one shown. This is a really simple shape and is next to useless for a real park besides huge sections of black tiles. To make it look good, you have to create more complex shapes. Good examples of black tiles are in parks like Dyna Tech Labs, Ghost Cell Crisis, and other assorted h2h rct2 minis or contest entries.



3. As you can see from the above screen, the basic idea is to have the maze be a pattern of not filled in, filled in, not filled in, filled in, not filled in, etc. You don’t have to do it this way but I think it makes it easier is the long run for any shapes you need to create. You could do it the opposite way with filled in, not filled in, filled in, etc.

4. For the next step you’ll need the Beast to zero clearances. Sadly, the Codex Trainer’s zero clearances function does not allow you to build through mazes. Then you build another maze over your current maze but in the opposite pattern of the first maze. Putting filled in parts where non filled in parts are and non filled parts where filled parts are. The screens below show the basic idea with smaller mazes and your finished product.





Problems- An obvious problem with this is that at the edge of your map, there will be a floating brick wall from the edge of the maze. You’ll just have to ignore this, as it’s impossible to get rid of it besides building off the edge of the map. That’s possible but only if you are using a small workbench and only on two sides. I’m also not sure if any problems would occur from that in the long run, like glitchy edges. Like I said, this isn’t perfect but probably as good as you’re going to get in LL. I also don’t think there is any way to create a black wall in LL though I’ll keep looking.

Saving Maze Designs

Mantis wondered if you could save maze designs and if that would make it easier for you to make the black tiles. You can and it could save you a lot of trouble but only for large sections of black tile. One problem with this is that you could run into ride trouble if you use too many of the same mazes. You should know how big of a maze you need to save before doing this. Here is a quick list of what to do:

-Open an easy scenario like Forest Frontiers or Arid Heights
-Use a trainer to get all rides if you have to
-Build a maze with a pattern like one of the ones above (filled, unfilled, filled, unfilled, filled, etc.)
-Open the maze and wait for a guest to go in it or sometimes the states just pop up
-Save the ride design
-Build another maze with the opposite pattern (unfilled, filled, unfilled, etc.)
-Save the ride design
-Go to your saved game and build one of the mazes and then zero clearances and build the other on top of the one you just made

The only other problem with doing this is the ride entrance and exit, which you’ll have to build to be able to save the design. To get rid of them, you have to make the maze section they’re on disappear by filling in the unfilled section and making it all solid maze. Then you can rebuild the section and not have the entrances and exits. If you’ve already built both mazes, you can change the maze type of one to something else so you can see what you are doing and know what maze you are deleting.

Other Maze Types

Ge-Ride talked about the ice walls for the maze. There are 3 wall types not including the brick, which I use for the black tiles (see above). Here I will list the other three, show screens, tell possible uses, etc.

1. Ice Walls
Probably the second most useful of the maze types. When you make a solid block of it, the top looks a lot like snow imo and even more so than the ice texture. You could use this as a glacier for scenery and as frozen water or as a layer of snow at the bottom of a valley. You could also build it around water and have ice holes.



2. Wooden Walls
Probably the next most useful maze type. It’s just a wooden wall that can be stacked and used as huts or something. Mix it with ride stations and stuff and you could make some nice trackitecture buildings. The top could also be used as a ground texture.



3. Hedges
I don’t really know what you could use these for besides some kind of garden decoration or something.




Flipped Over Coaster Cars

This is probably the easiest little detail out of all the ones that will be here. All it is is flipped over version of the hack to make cars for custom flats though it’s useful for themes where you have destroyed areas, battles, adventure rides, crashed coasters, etc. I was going to use this in the Mutation design before I decided to release it unfinished. Here is how you do it:

1. First build some track like this. (It doesn’t have to be corkscrew track but it does need to have a corkscrew. You can do it with the half loop but it’s too tall to work well and sometimes the track doesn’t sink very well.)



2. Then, using a trainer (I use DragonsIOA), change the ride mode to Downward Launch Mode and the number of cars to one if you have to. Another thing I do is change the launch speed to zero. I’m not sure if it makes anything different, but I do it anyway.



3. Go back to the game and click the yellow light to test the coaster. Then, close the ride as soon as the car exits the station. The car should go to the end of the track and stop. Now what you have is this.



4. Using either the Beast or Codex Trainer, sink the track of the ride. (I have never had any problems sinking inversions so no error trappers should pop up.) After the track is lowered, raise the land up to the coaster car that remains and bingo; you now have a flipped over vehicle, crashed coaster car, or whatever you want it to be.



Problems- you can’t use cars that don’t go through inversions because they will just disappear so you’re kind of limited with what kind of coaster cars you can use. Also, be careful where you right click because error trappers can occur if you right click the sunken track. You may also need to bury and unbury the land over the ride to be able to raise the land to the car.

Open Windows

I know these aren’t exactly new but decided to post a tutorial for this here. I just released the park where I started to use it and actually discovered how to do it last May. It was an idea I got when watching a ghost train in some park. I tried several different ways and actually discovered this one by accident. I feel it’s a nice little detail you can add to your buildings to give them a little depth.

1. The open windows are really simple to make. All you do is build a ghost train with a station and track that makes a window. It should look something like this.



2. Then use a trainer to change the ride mode to Upward Launch Mode. Go back to rct and change the number of cars to one (DO NOT do it in the trainer or you’ll get an error trapper). Next, test the ride. The car will go on the track and crash out the window but the shutters will stay open.



3. After the car crashes, double click the red light and delete any track you don’t need so all that’s left is the track with the window. What I love about this is that you can do this as many times as you need with the same ride. Just build another station and start again. You can build backwards from the window and it won't mess it up.




Forgot to add that if anybody has seen these in any park or done them yourself, show me so I can give you credit for it.

OLE

Edited by OLE, 22 February 2007 - 09:11 PM.

Good stuff OLE. I hadn't thought of that black tile idea before, and it's a pretty cool one. If you combined that with the off the edge of the map hack, you could do some pretty amazing things in LL that haven't been done before.

^Thanks. That's what I thought too.

Btw, is this in the right forum? I wasn't sure.

great find, ole!

I can't remember if it's possible to save maze layouts, but if so you could just save the corresponding layouts to make it quicker to do.
Nice ideas, OLE.

Oh thanks . I forgot about that. It is possible but I think it would only really be useful for large sections. Where the land meets the black part would have to be more fine tuned. I will try that out and see if I can come up with any good ones to make it easier.

You could have also posted this in Ask the Experts, but I'm not gonna move it unless someone asks me. Great stuff there, OLE! Thanks for the lessons!

^I hate to ask this, but could you pin it? There will be updates and it might be easier to find for me and other members if it doesn't get buried. If not, that's ok. I'll bump it every update if I have to.

Edit-especially if this is moved to the Ask the Experts forum as there are a lot more topics being created there.

Edited by OLE, 25 July 2006 - 02:09 PM.

Big thanks to whoever pinned this.

This is an awesome idea, and what's the off the edge of the map hack?

You're welcome, OLE.

Ge-Ride, on workbenches that are less than full-size, you should be able to own all land and then build off the edge of the two sides of the map that have been removed to make the smaller map.

yup.

Thats a very creative idea man. I would never have thought of that.e

By the way, you can do the exact same thing to make a layer of ice for frozen lakes and glaciers.

Great find OLE. Very useful.
Just in time too...

Thanks for the comment guys. I'm glad you like the idea. Now go use it .

Update
I have now added a tutorial for the open window hack I discovered a while back. I know it's not new but I just added it because this is the topic for stuff I've discovered.

I also hope to update the black tile tutorial some time tomorrow or later this week. It will include what mantis and Ge-Ride talked about. Thanks guys.

Edited by OLE, 26 July 2006 - 11:53 AM.

OK i'd never even thought of that open window hack but it's so good! This topic definitely deserves its pinned status.
Damn I so need a new laptop...

Thanks mantis. I didn't think the open window hack was all that great though.

OK i'd never even thought of that open window hack but it's so good! This topic definitely deserves its pinned status.

It'd make balconies so much more believable though, as well as adding another layer of interest to big buildings. For a hotel, for example, you could have some of the rooms 'occupied' with the windows open, with others closed. It's just a cool detail i'd never even given a thought to before.