Welcome to JADsHome

Home of SCRegion for

Electronic Arts' Official website

Right click and select 'save target as...' to download SCRegion

Please see the 'To-do' section for an important note about config.bmp

I HIGHLY recommend SCTerraformer from Simtropolis if you want REAL region power once you've generated your random region

How do I use it then ?

The toolbar

· - Save the region to your personal folder '(My documents or your Profile directory - depending on your OS)\SimCity 4\Regions\'.
You will be prompted to enter a name for the region. A folder will be created containing config.bmp, output.bmp and region.ini
See 'Importing your region into SimCity 4' section for instructions on getting the map into SimCity 4

· - Generate a new random region. Can also be selected from the File menu or by pressing Ctrl+N

· - Show the 3D map filled in or as a grid

· - If painted (see above) superimpose a grid showing each point (See the 'To-do' section for proposed change)

· - Change the size of the map and set the range for some of the generation algorithms. Can also be selected from the File menu or by pressing Ctrl+C

The configuration window

· MAP SIZE - Self descriptive really. Sets the size of the region. One unit is one small town (red in config.bmp)

· SEED - The map uses two methods to generate. (See 'Faults' for the other). First it 'seeds' each point on the map with a random height between 0 and the number set on this slider.
RANDOM SEED - Sets the Seed to a random value picked by the computer.

· GROWTH - As the map is generated each pass will raise or lower each point by a random value between 0 and this value. The lower the figure is the flatter the map will be.

· FAULTS - The second method the program uses (see 'Seed' for the first) is called Faulting. This draws a line starting at a random point on any one of the sides and raises all points to one side and lowers all points to the other.
This slider sets the amount of times a fault is generated. The more faults - the longer the map will take to generate - but the more varied the result will look. (See the 'To-do' section for a note on this)

· EROSION - After being generated the program 'smoothes' each point on the map to make it an average of each of it's neighbours. This slider sets how many times this smoothing process is run over the map. The lower this is set to the more bumpy the map will look.

· GENERATE NEW MAP ? - If ticked the program will generate a new region map when you select OK. If not a flat map will be generated - handy if you want a different size canvas to start with in SimCity 4.

· DEFAULT - Set the sliders back to their initial settings. This will set Growth to 15, Faults to 50 and Erosion to 6

· OK / CANCEL - Create a new map or leave settings as they were.

Rotating the 3D display

· The 3D display can be rotated using the numeric keypad.

4 , 6 - Rotate the map left or right
2 , 8 - Rotate the map up or down
9 , 3 - Zoom in or out
1 , 7 - Tilt the map left or right
5 - Reset the diaply

See the 'To-do' section for a note on rotation

Importing your region into SimCity 4

· If you don't want just small cities load up and change the config.bmp file and change to the following:
1x1 small cities (bright red) - 1 pixel
2x2 medium cities (bright green) - 2x2 pixels
4x4 large cities (bright blue) - 4x4 pixels

· Open SimCity 4. When you are on the region map press the middle button at the top of the display and select your new region.

· If you have changed the config.bmp file and did it correctly you should see a blank region of the size set in SCRegion configuration with only small cities or if you changed config.bmp in your configuration

· Press the Shift+Ctrl+Alt+R keys together. Locate your My Documents / Personal folder (depends upon your OS) and then the SimCity 4/Regions folder.
Click on 'Output.bmp' and press the load button.

· After a pause (the larger the map and the slower your machine the longer this will take) you should be presented with your new region.
Note that it will not be exactly identical to the 3D map in SCRegion. Due to the smoothing SimCity 4 uses some low islands may have gone under water.

To-do

· CONFIG.BMP

· Still a major bug in the bitmap generation - leaves holes in the map. Be sure to load the file into MSPaint or similar and edit it before use. See the 'Import' section for more info on doing this

· Allow user to set the town sizes by point and click. Currently saves the config.bmp file out with all cities as small (1x1 red) only

· 3D MAP

· Sort out the rather sloppy slow rotation !

· Change the grid overlay to show the configuration of town sizes from config.bmp

· Track down and resolve an OpenGL issue under Windows XP where the water shows as vertical bars instead of flat ! Believe it to be a .NET framework change ! Thanks to David Jackman for finding this one

· Fault with the faulting routine ;-) Currently appears to start from the top corner all the time.

· 3D map currently appears 'back to front' to what appears once imported into SimCity 4.

The program is Freeware but if you like it feel free to make any offers ;o) No viruses or spam though please !!!
Email bug reports, suggestions, critisms or praise about the program here

(Please remember to REMOVE _NOSPAM from the end of the address when you send the mail)

SimCity 4 is a copyrighted name held by Electronic Arts (EA) and Maxis.