WIP Beta released A new *CITY* map - LOS INJURUS 2023-12-20

Part of the new interchange... I've spent ALL [CENSORED] DAY on this thing and it's only 60~70% done!

That's all for right now (Well there is more but it's not even close to done yet, we'll see more over the next few days).

 

You know. As I was driving around West Coast I saw something that is missing from Los Injurus. I am sure that these were planed but I figured I would bring it up anyways. Some electrical and water infrastructure would make a huge difference and add details. Power lines, sub stations, pump houses and water towers. Especially in a desert climate.

 

Worry not, I have models for these things, I just haven't put them in yet. It's on the TO-DO list made out of a seemingly-endless ream of dot-matrix printer paper (do we miss those things?). Since I wasn't using it for anything else...
Actually, I had just placed a concrete retention pond (storage for farm irrigation purposes) and small concrete dam / outflow for it prior to reading this. So; Yes, maybe a little stronger on those mental rays you're blasting at me through the earth...

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Needs a lot of set dressing and a whole-lot of signs.
Developing the new area, and some new miles of roadway! It's always nice when building new roads, and not just re-engineering / re-grading / redoing old roads, as it gives new portions of the map to explore and sometimes even might save some time when mapping later (as often I tend to drive there, if it's too far then maybe it's time for a new spawn spot, but a good way to test).
*fixed the missing 50mph speed limit sign model, must have been lost in the file-shrink thingie. The road above needs it for the passing zone(s), at-least in the straighter portions anyways. If you need it for your map, or any of the other two signs that weren't used and hence dropped from the distribution file, then copy them from ECA map sources under shapes/signs_usa in the ECA map zip in the game.
There's the new concrete retention pond, that'll feed some farm fields near here - though not as many as I'd like to add right here. There will be more farm-land on the other side of the highway interchange from here. The interchange in the first shots is visible in one or two of the later shots. This nearby lake has also been made A LOT less deep.
Two up-close shots show the detail on the road texture, for those interested.
I will likely raise the retention pond a bit so that it's not sea-level anymore, but when I made it the water plane (sea) was disabled so this is where it's at for right now.
The road pictured in majority here has a few straight sections interspersed with winding areas and frequent grade changes both large and small. I tried to keep the grade on this side-route at a max of 10%, so it's still possible to haul things along this route though not nearly as favorable as the max-7%-grade highway.
You can easily do grade by setting a concrete texture such as concrete_plain for the MESH road surface you use to carve it and use a texture tiling of 100 meters, lay out your general route layout, and then put each node at the texture seam where it tiles. Then just set your nodes to 10 meters z-level difference for a grade of 10%, or 7 meters for 7% grade (if it's a highway, 6% is preferred max but can be up to 7%, unless grandfathered 8% max grades where it's not reasonable or economical to fix, side-roads can be up to 10~12% though I don't know if over 10% is permitted anymore). This way you only have to add or subtract as a whole number and if you use the snap to grid setting of one or one-half meter (or whatever that allows you to get each whole number) you can quickly lay out proper road grades AND avoid mesh-road bending inconsistencies which cause issues when carving.
Now we don't drive on MESH roads or use them as roads at all - since it's not 2016 anymore - but they're super-handy-dandy carving tools and, in-fact, the best method to get a good immersive road using only editor tools. Of-course carving them in a terrain tool with that capability or using Blender is always best... but not always realistic nor desirable to have to re-import your terrain all the time.
Just so folks know that, yes, of-course the map is always being worked on whenever I am capable.
Attached shots at the bottom show some of the pieces I got with the building generator kit I paid 40$ for. No surprise I had to fix 3 of the 6 commercial building (kit 6) pieces to fix gaps in the objects, make a new one for said kit since it didn't have a door (what!?), fix 3 pieces with botched texturing... and spend hours and hours making variations for the brick apartment kit since it only came with a top, middle, and bottom piece with either a corner, a wall, or 3 windows (or a choice of one door, now there is 3 and a stoop is added). From the original 8 brick pieces* to 26, over a 3x increase!
These units all tile perfectly (now!) and let me make buildings quickly. UV's shared whenever possible.
I couldn't get the building generator to even generate a @#$%ing building, so at-least the pieces will come in handy.
Building that IS made doesn't have a roof, roof/facade decorations, basement, collision or LOD, but that stuff shouldn't take too long all things considered. Good that it'll save time, as Maya crashed A LOT over the past few days working with these. Save and save often, folks. Then backup those saves as I do frequently.
*Due to license restriction, these building pieces won't be available inside the map resources , but the finished buildings will definitely be.
Thankfully, I am learning Blender, slowly but surely...
--That is all for right now.

 

i know you've got a [CENSORED] heap of stuff to get done for this but you don't happen to have plans for an asphalt track cuz that would make this map PEAK

good luck with your to do list...

 

This is a free mod, so no need to comply. Just sayin'

 

Yes, more than one asphalt track is planned. I also enjoy these, so I'll make sure it's fun!
My to-do list is quite long, but this is the way I wanted it - because I got myself into this mess.
Guess who gets to get me out of this mess... Slowly but surely it goes, let's put it that way.
I'll work on this map until it's either COMPLETE or my arms/hands stop functioning (or until I blow up the computer again, and then I'll be back after a week or two, or however long it takes me to procure repair parts OR re-instate my old Haswell-i7 PC from 2014 - as for now it's collecting dust as a spare, just in-case I should need it).
THANKFULLY it's getting cooler outside, so now I'm not turning this room with the PC into a human BBQ every-time I get neck deep in an editing session. Considering using one of the spare bedrooms in my house to put the editing PC in and leave the old one in here... I've just not got that far yet.

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Managed to avoid getting DMCA'ed thus far, not begging for a bashing of the ban-hammer over here. A fun map would not be fun if no one could get it! That said, it's not a seriously expensive kit regardless. If the guy decides not to maintain the kit, or I can work something out to let people build buildings (like in Fallout 4's settlement thing) with the pieces in here while not violating the license, I will distribute the pieces. I don't mind throwing a little money at it if needed, if there's demand.
To that end, for now I will just be putting the completed buildings in here for now.

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My back went south again, I think I fixed it, but still in pain. It's very borderline right now. Hopefully I can get by for the weekend. Love how it only goes out at the end of the week, and only when you least suspect it to do so. Grrrr!
That said, work on the map continues!
Finally got the road texture I was looking for, too. It's a multi-layer but looks good and not repetitive.

These are heavily WiP shots, so yeah it's very unfinished right now. Please pardon our mess.
--Cheers!

 

nice so when this updates ima need a whole new pc because using my automation cars along driving in this map currently fries my pc

 

For those reading along each post I make, I did manage to straighten out my back finally, with a big loud pop after some bed-rest and a LOT of subsequent twisting/stretching.

The requirements won't go up sharply, though they will slightly and slowly increase with most new versions. Occasionally sometimes requirements go down slightly but don't count on this - this is due to optimizations I make constantly to little things here or there (usually to my older models), but this often gets countered by added detail in the area or new things in the map.
To the best of your knowledge, what is your PC configuration hardware-wise (do not be ashamed even if it's old, mine's four years old now...) ?
Absolutely NO reason to get a new PC over this mod, just use medium graphics, which is fine for most. High detail textures are only available to those of us who have larger than 8gb GPU's at 1080p and above. 4gb and 6gb graphics cards can run the map fine on Medium, and the rest of those using 2gb~3gb cards might be able to run on low/lowest, but it'll look pretty hideous at that rate (however, it IS playable even on a 1st gen i7 from 2009!).
Just for note, DO keep OBJECT DETAIL or MESH DETAIL up to max, the map is designed to be run on MAX model detail and the difference in FPS is negligible on 98% of systems - only TEXTURE DETAIL and AI vehicle amount matters for most folks.
Only memory on the graphics card AND 'draw calls' (amount of different surfaces in the scene) is our enemy here. That said, I *DO* keep a *VERY* watchful eye on my draw calls, and this project is not to require over 16gb memory on a GPU in it's finished state on highest texture & model details. If draw calls get too high due to bad models or not making the scene right then not even the best processor and GPU will hit 60fps... so that's why I spend SO much time doing models. Put it this way, I've yet to buy models that put as much effort into UV sewing as I do, to date (UV = texture surfaces on a model, 'sewing' = joining said surfaces so they render at once not individually, thus keeping draw calls down!).
I will (in time) put my models up for sale to help generate revenue for the map project in the future.
This will totally run fine on an OLD computer provided you have enough video memory on a dedicated GPU, or enough memory on an integrated GPU, and don't go overboard with texture detail or AI vehicles.
RECENT AM4 RYZEN processors with ingrated graphics, or laptop equivalent processors with integrated graphics, you can go into the Ryzen (master?) tool / application in Windows and/or system BIOS and increase the memory portioned to the GPU/APU up to 2gb for most of the better models. That's very likely enough to get this map going on low/lowest texture detail.
12gb~16gb total system memory STRONGLY recommended.
Wheel or analog joystick recommended, but I get by just fine with a keyboard *CRUNCH*
A Monitor IS required, for some reason or another...
--I better get out of here!
*hubcap rolls into scene*

 

no i mean since 0.29 i struggle to get playable FPS with playable graphics and this map being how big it is doesnt help im not sayings it a bad map tho.
(i really should start looking at some serious upgrades)
btw most of what i said in my previous post was a (joke-ish)

 

Well then it may mean it's time to upgrade your computer, or build / buy a new one if your existing machine is 4~5 years old or more. That said, even a 5 year old computer can run this map, provided you have a 2gb GPU and 12~16gb of system memory (and not a whole lot of stuff going on in the background).
Text doesn't have much capability in regard for emotion, sadly.

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A wild building appears!
This one's just about done, including low/high detail meshes, UV optimization, and collision mesh is finished.
This shot is from inside the modeling software, and is 8-bit due to being 1/4th the size and not affecting the preview much. So for the nostalgic folks, enjoy some dithering (only in the preview, the building itself is not) with 256-color mode.
21,300 triangles on full detail, 3800 triangles on low detail (still a lot), and 450 triangle collision mesh.
This building has been designed with draw calls in mind, thus draw calls are very low for what detail is here. This keeps the CPU free to load in and issue render commands for other models, and keeps the map lighter-weight and loading faster (still takes just as long as last time). If when you drive around in Los Injurus, building detail seems at all lacking (it sometimes is a bit too obvious, other times is much less noticeable), this is to keep FPS up and allow more detail for roads while keeping the FPS budget as open as possible, for more props and in the end a larger variety to the map. The simpler the buildings, the less space they take up in VRAM, too.
Triangle count is an approximation and nowhere near exact. This can mean +/- 5%, or a little more/less than that.
Buildings models and textures may be subject to change. This is a preview and not a completed in-map shot, among other obvious things.
--That is all!
P.S. For those who missed it a week ago: the map has survived the update with only odd mountain graphics right now, which will be fixed any day now on the game-engine side of things (this is not a map-related bug).
If anyone has any OTHER issues with the recent update causing problems for them, please give a holler so I can have that nicked before the next Los Injurus update. Thank-you.

 

I don't think I've ever left a message on this forum thread, so I just want to state my love for this map. Even now in its unfinished state, it's the one I always jump on by default. The miles of freeways, roads, and streets it contains is something that no other map made for this game can really compare to. I also admire your dedication to the development of the map. Keep up the great work!

 

Why thank you! Much appreciated.
Even if I get discouraged for a day - or even a few days - I still come back to it. It's pretty much the #1 thing I do (well a tie between that and reading since I can't always map / model things). Without it, I am not sure what I'd do on here. Playing games is not nearly as fun as making them. So to those who like playing Simcity and similar games (Cities Skylines, or even building houses in Fallout settlements), consider mapping or modeling. Even if you don't make super fancy things... you can certainly make something you will enjoy, if you put even the slightest bit of effort into it - even if it's not released and is just something you make for yourself. You don't have to however, you can always enjoy the plentiful mods made by others - and even this one.
I guess it helps that I can't really get into these super-complicated newer games due to the PTSD symptoms (one of which has recently made my memory go from bad to much, much worse, and also completely screwed up my sense of time passing... e.g. many days will go by and it will feel like one day or two days). I don't fret that one bit, and I can spend that money on better things (after-all, I'm not buying games with project money, I use that for models, textures, software packages, and up-keep or upgrades for the computer - but ONLY upgrade when it's absolutely needed, as I have otherwise zero desire to alter the computer in any way unless the thing goes belly-up). Things like buying drives to store project backups or project resources I purchase or download (sometimes I can legally do so for free if licenses permit, people DO make free models). Don't have the best hardware over here, after-all, a Ryzen 3000-class processor isn't top-dog three or four years post-purchase; but I'll sure be happy to keep this thing going as long as I possibly can (I kept the last machine going for 5 years!). Even if I bought a 7950x or 7950x3D CPU right now and the rest of the parts needed for it (like RAM and a motherboard for an upgrade situation), the only speed increase that would matter would be single-core speed (and memory speed too) under many-core loading, which as we know isn't as good as single-core speed under lightly-threaded loading. Hopefully advances in the Vulkan renderer will allow us the ability to work-around the DirectX 11 single-core rendering limitations (draw call feeding from CPU to GPU as render commands, 10,000's of times per frame, many times per second) which hold this simulation back, especially for high-FPS monitors and/or heavy AI-use.
Some people let PTSD take over, I keep a good lid on it as best as possible (easy enough to say most times at home, not so easy out in public, especially crowded places), and I continue doing whatever I CAN do, when I can do it and not fret over what I cannot. Plus, the best part is that making this map (and the models within it) keeps my mind busy - and that's currently the best thing I can do.
However, even if you've never posted before; just writing in to say thanks and how you enjoy the map (especially as you've listed things you like which helps me get feedback) is great encouragement.

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Speaking of encouragement, here's some pictures of a building I'm slapping together much like I (we?) did with the houses in Fallout 4's settlement building thing! I sure enjoyed that part of Fallout 4 more than most other parts of it to be honest, and doing it for the map (vs just decorating it and then staring at it for a while in Fallout 4) only seems fitting. Of-course I modded it to the moon.
Who knows, maybe I'll make a 'Nicest building you built in Fallout 4 ... or not!' thread one day.
Nota Bene: pictures shown below are in the modeling software, not in-game.

 

Great map! Only limitations for me are 16gb of ram and huge bottleneck from 8gb video memory... also will you adapt it for Vulcan? Im getting lower fps, whne vulcan gives about 10-40% fps boost

 

I will ask the devs about the 'Do and Do-nots of Vulkan' in the near term (next week, they deserve weekends off after-all). Maybe there's something putting 'the kabosh' on the FPS for Vulkan. I've noticed it being 'weird' on my end and being rather lower FPS here due to using it. I usually use the DX version.
8gb is only a limit if using high textures, use medium textures except leave the model detail maxed (or things get ugly fast).
Medium textures are a very slight trade-off and in-fact until around May I was using it as I had a 2070 Super 8gb card at the time.
Entirely, I did notice FPS was not great on Vulkan, so I will look into this more. I can't promise the next release of the map will have it 'fixed', but I can say it will be looked into, and the following release after the up-coming one, I should have something done about it.
Could be the 'old format' textures in here (they'll be updated sooner or later). That's likely part of it since Vulkan is rather new-ish by comparison.
Who knows. Doesn't hurt to ask! Thank-you for the feedback.

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New stuff in Los Injurus, namely that highway that's eternally under construction (that's immersion for you, I take almost as long as real-life to do them!) that's way out in the middle of nowhere.

Please keep in mind that these pictures are a disaster and show a heavily work-in-progress section of the map. Pardon the mess!
MILES of new roads, and over a mile of newly carved highway (the newly carved part has the green layout grid under it, helps me keep it aligned and on the right part of the banking). To be clear; this is not additional highway mileage but a re-do of the 'new pavement' two-lane per-side highway that was from grandfathered in from So-Cal made in 2016~2017. Needs center barrier yet.
Got the striping done on most of the other part of highway I previously laid out / re-did (last pic) the other week.
Regraded LOTS of terrain and removed a pile of mountain near the shore where a small town* will go. The start of this has some stores and a factory type building (or warehouse, whatever).
*There will be a small town with a spawn-point here, in the 2nd shot between the camera and the warehouse/stores pictured.
Got over a mile of new concrete side-road done. Lots of twists and turns and some occasional cliff danger for the Wile E. Coyote in all of us - I know you're out there.
Almost time to live it up on some new adventure!
--That is all for right now!
***There's a bug I'm seeing on the underwater portion of my shoreline, where the (underwater) beach area connects the terrain to the infinite land-plane at the very edges of the map. I'll try to fix this before the next update, shouldn't be too hard really. It's bright white, can't miss it. This affects the area(s) between and including the island military base and the HUGE civilian airport across one whole side of the map. Oops.
If this is still working for you, tell me so I can see what went missing in the texture indices or files/resources and not waste a ton of time trying to figure it out. Sometimes the in-game material editor forgets to put back some things in the texture indices (unconfirmed).

 

Awesome man, thank you & I look forward to seeing the development of this project continue !!

 

Always trying to improve things, without creating an endless feedback loop of constantly revamping everything (without completing any of it). It will be done one day though, I can promise it won't be tomorrow, and probably not the day after either. However, it is a labor of love, and thus whenever I am able, I work on it. It's usually daily if I'm not in too much pain to concentrate on it or work the mouse/KB. I am glad you are interested in this project and it's nice 'thank-you' 's like you wrote that keep me going. I don't require these at any rate (not any more than the next person), but they're always a nice boost & much appreciated.
The only thing I ask in return (aside of support for those who can afford it, of-course) is that folks enjoy the map and let me know what you/anyone feels it needs most or what it needs more/less of; or even failing that - stuff that it needs less of (things like 'help I got stuck' etc, I try to avoid that at ALL costs!).
Believe it or not, you CAN make a game-map that doesn't make you get stuck all the time that is STILL immersive, realistic, and above-all FUN. That being said I'm sure someone can find SOME way to get stuck somewhere, despite best efforts, etc.

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There are those times I get sick of retrying constantly to get the right curve bend on the Jersey-barrier... SO I SPAWNED ALL THE BIG ONES! Now I can just painstakingly drag this monstrosity along with me as I copy bits that fit for use along this 6-lane highway. I'll likely stuff this somewhere out of the way in a corner of the map somewhere not often driven and hide it underground until I'm done making highways - so if you find it one day, you'll know why.
Don't worry though, it certainly won't be in the middle of the highway when the map update goes out I will be absolutely sure of it (I do heavily test highways!).

Sorry for the unfinished state, but this is the current state of what I've been working on as of the last few days. Just wanted to share what I'm working on. The overpass is roughly 12"~16" inches (1 to one and one-half foot, or 30~44.2cm) higher than the dry goods trailer shown for scale. There wasn't originally an overpass here, but it's been added in the last few days, and these road stubs will connect to a through-road that will service some of the rural/semi-rural area out here. There won't be on/off ramps to this one but another overpass/underpass nearby will have them. For map-flow reasons, I don't usually out-right PREVENT people from driving across the embankments (if you're careful enough) to switch between side routes and the highway if there are no ramps at a grade-separated crossing like this, unless the terrain itself is hostile to such an idea outright (like sheer rock walls/cliffs/outcrops, or needing retaining walls). This is because it is best to encourage - but never force - the player to follow the roadways to keep the vehicle in best condition, but it's not fun if you're forced to drive the long way around if you don't truly want to.
So if you get a little bit of momentum going, you can usually make your own short-cut if you must. But DO know that, as much as possible, I always leave this up to the person playing the map. The less I have to set in stone to force the player to do this, or do that, go this way not that way - the better.
So, TL-DR; Leave it up to the player to decide what they want to do. They know best what they want better than anyone else. Provide fun for a broad spectrum of play styles in a varied amount of terrain types / environments, and thus meet the needs of as many as possible, as often as possible. This keeps the player 'in the zone' and thus immersed, and thus having a good 'ol time in Los Injurus City map. A map made possible by YOU, and YOU, and all the rest of YOU, even if all you do is download and read a few bits of the download page. Over half a million downloads and counting! So, I'm not about to even THINK about stopping production... even if I accidentally blow up this computer (or it commits computer-cide and summons the feared 'magic smoke'), have to grab a backup and dust off the old computer, to do work on it.
--That is all for now. I will be working on this a bit more before I turn in for some shut-eye. Hopefully before the sun comes up.

 

Starting to work on the terrain some here, a bit I've done the other day, but the 1st shot is all today's work.

Just a quick post here, please ignore unfinished bits and floating barriers but DO enjoy the nicer-looking terrain (entirely not done yet, but the more satisfying areas have been worked over better, obviously, you be the judge). The cliff face against the ocean is entirely unfinished, and there are solutions for that but not implemented yet. There will NOT be beach along the long straight face of highway that faces the ocean (cliff wall here), but if there's beach already made (you can see some near to where the bridge is, where the calmer sheltered bay waters are) that part of the beach will obviously stay. There will be sections of rock placed to help randomly fling you into the ocean periodically if you mess up while driving fast, so you will want to use care here. Not forgetting the main (primary) mission objective here, this is a car crash simulator; so I won't stop until I've crammed almost every car-launching opportunity into the map, in almost every logical / realistic or even semi-realistic place, to fling you into oblivion while simultaneously obliterating the car as much as possible. We're here to have FUN right? FUN is the objective, so best not to forget this.
Sometimes you're trying really hard not to crash, or maybe just trying to see if you can keep the vehicle together long enough to run out of gas. It sucks when you inevitably push your luck and eat a barrier. So at-least if you end up flying off a cliff or 'ramp of rocks and dirt disguised as the top of some cliffs' and go absolutely flying / spiraling and end up landing (mulching the vehicle in the process) in some other spot far away, at-least you have sense of still having achieved something (and that it was worth doing / watching).
Failing a corner and losing control doesn't always have to suck, or not suck as badly. Do mind that some of these corners are rather tight / sharp, so they will catch you off-guard if you're zoning out at all. I built more variety in along with the realism, though to be honest the old highway did have it's share of corners. SHARP CORNERS WILL BE MARKED clearly, so do mind the signs that will go in over the next few days / week.
I've done a few miles of road (maybe 2.5+ miles? could be way off here) over the last 5~7 days, so once I get another mile or so of road done, I should be closing in on release. Keep in mind I still have to tie into the two roads I've built nearby* so they're not dead-ends, as they will have on/off ramps in one or both directions. I also need to add in some small docks/sea-wall, stripe a few miles of road at-least in a basic manner, and also clean up some more terrain and remove/hide temporary objects before release. There's AI work to be done as always and this gets well tested. If I can get this done in 10 days I will be very happy but sometimes real life gets in the way as always. With it getting cooler outside, there are some last-minute things to finish up before winter gets here, so as-always things are subject to change. I am really cramming to get a lot of work done though, so surely check back every two days or so and you hopefully won't be disappointed with the progress. New spawn points will make finding this area in the next release easier for those of us that don't know by heart where this is, however. It is several miles of the 26-mile long (IIRC) outer-loop highway, so if you drive it long enough, you'll find it. 5 minutes drive from the island base clockwise along the outer loop (2nd exit at the cloverleaf when leaving the base) will find it. It's a few miles from where the base is but I'm slowly working my way over there. When I finally get over to where it is, the outer-loop will have been completely redone.
*Not the road with only short stubs going off of it with the overpass, but the two roads on either side of the much larger bay - one which is concrete and one which has some passing zones and the warehouses/strip-mall along it.
I've been divvying my time between modeling, fixing broken resources (or missing ones), working on the terrain, doing the highway, and working a bit on perfecting the town a bit here and there, but the main downtown near the default spawn is largely unchanged. So you'll have to see yourself out of the city in the rural areas to find the lion's share of the changes, except on the more run-down side of town.

I've included a very-ugly-but-far-away shot to show the general area in which I've been working. City is top-left and top-center, island base is top-right, and most of the rest is where I've been working. You can tell where the new highway sections have been done as you can make out what they are from the camera position (the old one you could not).
MAN I hope they fix the stupid glitch with the mountain graphics, or at-least I'll swap it out for something less ugly before next release. I have to get on them and ask if that'll get fixed or not (it's a shader bug, ignores 'side projection') in the near-term.
So that issue will 'go away' for the most part next release, which I do promise is coming up soon.
--That's all for right now.
***Our chevy pickup has decided it's 'fuel management' tech designed into the top of the 5.3L V8 engine no-longer wants to work properly at 107,000 miles, and the lard-leveling suspension compressor relay stuck closed and burned out the compressor. We just had the heater repaired (the house was cold but BeamNG kept this room TOASTY warm AND full of cats), and I'm finally almost done fixing the mower. In addition, when hearing of a family member's peril of starvation and being stuck with a drug-dealing partner who was abusive; I quickly drove all the way several states away (after throwing new tires on the car and changing the oil, of-course) and picked up said family member who was eternally grateful. Gratefulness aside, it's one of those 'what would Jesus do?' moments you don't really even have to worry about. I drove there and back and it was roughly 20 hours driving.
Long story short, I figured I'd share, and mention that IF you can support the map PLEASE DO, as it feels like one expense after the next over here. However, the bills are paid and there is food in the fridge, so it's not like we're in dire-straits over here and you shouldn't be either (especially not over me, keep in mind I still have the Corolla, so not a deal-breaker for sure). Just thought I'd throw that out there. Regardless, work on the map continues despite the real-world trying to keep me down (and I'm still a happy person despite all this and my own pain). When life gives you lemons... MAKE PIE!

 

I don't know for sure but it feels like with each update my computer is more capable of running this map. I'm not sure if it's being optimized as development goes but it's a welcome surprise to me.

 

Both the game and this map are receiving updates with each download of new code.
EX: The game didn't even support batch-rendering back in 2018 when this project was officially ground-broken until one of the following winter updates; that update nearly doubled FPS. That update was so good on a performance front, that it brought tears to my eyes, literally. Batch rendering means any other model using the same detail-level (which is decided via distance from the player's camera) will render any extra copies 'for free', unless they're using a different detail level.
So there's always little optimizations on my end and on the developers end. I will continue to optimize throughout the development process. Though with that said, the GPU video-memory (VRAM) requirement will slowly go up over time as more textures and models are included. However those with 8gb graphics cards will still get by with medium graphics by the end of it, with a 16gb (currently 10~12gb) card being required for the end-result of this project with max quality textures.
Thanks for writing in!

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More roads and more messing about with the terrain. Large canal is done, though I may decide at some point to raise it up a bit, still not sure as there's currently a good meter of water in there (far too much for the Pessima). It's mostly there to give water a means to flow out of this area, as there's no other way out since it's rather low compared to sea-level and hence would naturally fill with enough rain.

Obligatory ugly overview shots out of the way, at-least you can get your bearings and know what is where, generally. Please keep in mind this is very early, hence things are super-unfinished/ugly/etc. I've really only worked the terrain over enough to complete the next step.
Above three shots show the new flood mitigation outflow to allow water that otherwise would overtake the arable land here a means to escape into the ocean. It's too deep to drive through currently, but a boat would love it.
Do we even HAVE boats yet? I suppose we get some in short order. I can't make them as they'd just sink surely so.
Below two shots show the future area that will have a town infested with tourist traps and nice vacation homes, not solely infested with Jersey-barrier bend/curve objects. This is as far as the highway refurbishment has gotten, but in the distance is the military airbase / island. That's the goal and completion when I get all the way over there (5~6 miles?). You can still drive on the loop and it is easy enough to do so at speed, aside of a small bump sometimes where the old highway hits the newly improved one. There's a small island connected with a bridge where resort condos will be, and a deep shipping channel dredged out beyond it. Expect this long bridge for the highway here to be a nicely sloped model when I get around to making the models, or just swapping them out for something else (notice median barrier goes to one side, this is why, there is a lot of planning ahead in my doings as a mapper). The highway is only 50mph through the S-curves right here until it is out of the 'town' area, though with some intentional (or not) power-sliding, you can easily do 90 through here or more (remember, The Bob drives with a keyboard).

Stuff to do before the next update:
At-least two more interchanges, one is 0% done aside of the highway existing, the other has the roads/highway in but none of the ramps.
Fix stupid ORANGE ROAD bug in two spots in a rural part of the map (you may have never noticed this but if you did you'll know what I mean). That was a nasty surprise, mostly from graphics format changes.
More BUILDING models need to get put in the map to give areas some purpose. I already added a trapezoid-shaped culvert tunnel to facilitate turns, if slightly imperfect, to help make what I made earlier in the week.
AI in areas I worked needs a heavy overhaul and does not even exist in some new spots. Some areas will be much quicker than others, obviously, but this should only take a day or two of the time.
Road out in the middle of nowhere needs connected to the rest of the stuff I've made in the last few days/week (road not shown) as it's missing a good mile of it's alignment yet (I haven't really engineered this in yet so it will take a good chunk of a day).
I will make sure to wall-off road stubs of incomplete roads to keep people on the right track until they're done, unless they're only ~50 foot long, where you can see it is obviously missing, etc.
Make the tunnel entrance needed to complete the connection between the two sections of subway in the map. This could take a day or two.
Other stuff I'm forgetting, obviously.
The Bob hasn't been feeling well and got a lower respiratory infection, and it's a BAD one, holy smokes - so things are a bit slow-going and will be for the next ~week or so.

 

As soon as the new beta gets released I will test it with this monster. https://www.beamng.com/threads/mpv80-multi-purpose-vessel-paid.90597/