SMACivilization

[Unorthodox]

wait wait wait wait. 

Why are we not using the popular concept of an egyptian pyramid, and going with this tiered....THING? 

In fact, a little color swap and I like their stuff better for Aztec than the Aztec art. 

That Aztec art looks more Mayan to me.  In fact it looks like a really good representation of the temple at Tikal specifically.

Tikal, Mayan Temple



Aztec really do feel more like your Egypt style here (Tenochtitlan):   

[Unorthodox]

If you do mayans bonus points for doing snake kings but perhaps way too obscure for most to understand the reference. 

[Buster's Uncle]

Blame Alex for all that - he seemed to think I was his art robot.

A different, more pyramiddy, base could well happen.


ISTR that the Astral Jaguar logo was indeed something Mayan I changed the blue to green -got that much right- but we wanted to use Montezuma, and the II civ is Aztek...

[Unorthodox]

Itzcoatl doesn't get nearly enough love.

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm pretty sure console2_A.pcx is the one the game uses for the bottom-screen status display.




I did this with it:



...And when I have a blanked copy, here's the difference:



-Every extra pixel you can see of the map while playing is good. 

[Geo]

Ah, here are the comments.


I feel all the city art should be like the last one you posted: more buildings in the city plot the bigger it grows.
And do you have plans to adjust the 'perimeter defense' art? Walls do have more appeal then beams of light.


A thought. Since in Smac you can kinda regulate at which point a city crosses a population threshold with the construction of a hab complex (Public Baths?) and habitation dome (Sewers?), you might use this feature to let a city look more modern over time. Or uses the city with a Headquarters in it automatically the largest graphic? Kinda mood point in that case (just checked, and it is the third city graphic in the row that is used as HQ base graphic in the early game).
Kinda possible too to have a city only look modern once a 'Tachyon Field' is constructed.
Something can be done with the sensor array graphic too to depict a fortress of sort in the country side, or a quick wall graphic for a fledging settlement if a new graphic occupies enough of the plot it is build in.

[Geo]

I found a blankpcx.pcx file in an archive. I "think" it is from SMACX, not SMAC, if the background color is something to go for.

[Buster's Uncle]

That's the faction blank Maniac posted an eternity ago, probably the version I cleaned up back when one of my Photoshop versions worked - if the blue lines and labels were gone, I could probably use that for any interface stuff that needed it.  May or may not work for terrain, which uses a slightly different palette, and probably for what 2D units there are - but the blue's gotta go, and I can't do it with GIMP.

[Buster's Uncle]

I feel all the city art should be like the last one you posted: more buildings in the city plot the bigger it grows.

I get that a lot as a custom faction modder - it's a suspension of disbelief for an arcology structure like that to expand instead of build additions, yes, but it's Firaxis' suspension, right there in the original.

And do you have plans to adjust the 'perimeter defense' art? Walls do have more appeal then beams of light.

I didn't have plans, but I had noticed, looking at the art now, that Alexander had me use the alien shields, and you're probably right.  I think I am planning on walls now, once the bases are sorted.

A thought. Since in Smac you can kinda regulate at which point a city crosses a population threshold with the construction of a hab complex (Public Baths?) and habitation dome (Sewers?), you might use this feature to let a city look more modern over time. Or uses the city with a Headquarters in it automatically the largest graphic? Kinda mood point in that case (just checked, and it is the third city graphic in the row that is used as HQ base graphic in the early game).

Kinda possible too to have a city only look modern once a 'Tachyon Field' is constructed.

I wouldn't know how to do the larger headquarters, and the rest sounds like complicating things enormously for the artist...  I dunno, man...

Something can be done with the sensor array graphic too to depict a fortress of sort in the country side, or a quick wall graphic for a fledging settlement if a new graphic occupies enough of the plot it is build in.

THIS, I had noticed the coincidental Deadlock elements in the Egyptian base screeny on page one, and been thinking that since sensor arrays have no equivalent in II, that laser turret I was using for it there was right for here.

[Geo]

Into the Ts now.



-And I don't think the game actually uses this one, but-
Before: 


After: 

Its used for the report popups.

[Buster's Uncle]

Good thing I got all three, then.

[Buster's Uncle]

Protip: if you think I should change a base, supplying an image to work with makes it more likely to happen.  A helicopter shot at about 45 degrees, sunlit from the right, no trees obscuring the bottom is ideal, but I might can work with ground-level, erase trees and draw bottom, and flip lit-left.  -I have before.

Uno, I expect Alex reasoned that pyramids were tombs nobody lived in - but I could draw a smooth white -as the originals originally were- w/ a small golden sun-sphere on top.  It would at least fit the Egyptian theme and look good...

[Buster's Uncle]

See, this here would make a nice Persian base, w/ background cut out, flipped L-R, and the perspective corrected.  Tedious work, the cutting out, but all doable...

[Blake00]

Great to see you decided to bring this project back to life again and have done some cool work on it mate, love the screenshots!!! The old giant thread with you & Alex came to a bit of a sad end and I didn't hear back from you when you were telling me about bringing the project back to life so I was worried it was all retired again, so this is great news!

As previously discussed I've got no idea about SMAC modding but I know my Civ2 so hopefully I can help with Feedback on things every now and then and not be totally useless lol.

You should chuck a sister thread over on the CFC SMAC forum, or a 'junior thread' with some general info pics, and a link to your thread here. Then I can show it to The_J and see if he's willing to do a main news post about it. If so we can then share it around all the CFC social media pages as we've noticed SMAC is quite popular topic on them which is good to see! Will hopefully get you some more support and helpers!

EDIT: Oh and I also catalog 'crossover' Civ projects where clever modders make one Civ game look like another so I'll have to stick your cool project in the list next time I do a big update!

[Unorthodox]

Thebes would maybe look too Greek?