TUTORIAL: Using altered INI files to create a world with custom water colors, sky colors, etc!

[Claeric]

Staff notice: Please note that this thread is unsupported, and although it contains some valid information is now slightly outdated. Current research into Sea/ Sky/ Weather parameters is being conducted in this thread (http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=459198). Please post any questions there. :!:

Go to ProgramFiles/ElectronicArts/TheSims3/Gamedata/Shared/Nonpackaged/Ini

In this folder are various "Sky" ini files. These can b ealtered to change things in ALL your worlds, but this is how you can change them and apply these changes to ONE and ONLY one world! For reference, I'll be using the SEA files.

1. Copy each and every ini ending in SEA. Sky_ClearSea, Sky_CustomSea, Sky_OvercastSea, Sky_PartlyCloudySea, and Sky_StormySea. Paste them into a new folder.

http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/6248/step1bj.jpg

2. Open your copied file for Sky_ClearSea. Note that there are various sections with R, G, and B, followed bya number. THese are the color values for the water, for that type of sky, at that time of day. It's a tough process to keep these colors changing consistently, so for testing purposes, I simply made each and every one of these the same values(such as 0, 0, 20, instead of trying to do variations.)

http://img188.imageshack.us/img188/3526/step2cn.jpg

3. Change these values for each and every file. Doing this PROPERLY would involve, like I said, making specific changes for each time of day. But simply to test, I did not bother.

Now you're going to learn how to add these custom water colors to ONE and ONLY one world!

1. Open the world file in S3PE (Documents/ElectronicArts/TheSims3/InstalledWorlds, if already installed)
2. Resource -> Import from File.
3. You will import each custom ini one by one.

Use the following for the instances:
Sky_ClearSea: 0xDAA2DD455D055F37
Sky_CustomSea: 0x577758BD99619673
Sky_OvercastSea: 0x14BCC166ED42C621
Sky_PartlyCloudSea: 0x3119E691AE6018C1
Sky_StormySea: 0x03091256E1A31960

If you used any other INI files, you need to press "Tools-FNV HASH" and type in the EXACT name of that ini file(such as Sky_Common). Copy the number next to FNV64 and use that for the instance when importing that INI.

And for the "type" of each, put in 0x1F886EAD (though with S3PE at current, this has to be done AFTER importing, by right-clicking and choosing "Details..." and changing it again.

4. Load the freaking world and marvel at your new, one-world-only water colors!

You can also change the sun diameter, moon diameter, shadows, sky color, anything in these inis, and apply them to one and only one world, by following all these steps. This has been confirmed and tested and works flawlessly, even if the world is already installed and in-use. :D

If anyone thinks they can help clean these instructions up or make them clearer, please tell me. I don't know if I described it all properly.

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The following is just how this topic got started.
I think this is pretty badass.

If you go look at the SEA ini, it has an option for water murkiness. at hwat level does the water start getting murky? When does it become COMPLETELY murky? It mentions that it's got something to do with the water color, altered in the "weather" files.

Each sky type has a file ending in "Sea". Clear sky sea. Custom sky sea.

So I went in and there's a RGB level for each one, for each time of day the sky changes. I set each and every one to 0, 0, 20.

Before:
http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x294/ClaericBryant/Screenshot-103-1.jpg
After:
http://i181.photobucket.com/albums/x294/ClaericBryant/Screenshot-102-1.jpg

I will definitely be playing with this. It would be default replacements every time, unfortunately, but it's still pretty awesome.

[chann]

Neat trick. Seeing it immediately made me think of making green or purple seas for alien worlds. :) Come to think of it, the Sky INIs could also be modded to get far-out colors.

[Inge Jones]

We need to find a way to edit this in worlds before sharing.

[Claeric]

We need to find a way to edit this in worlds before sharing.

That's what I was thinking. Perhaps there's a way to tell the...well, I dont know what I'm talking about. I was thinking perhaps there was a way to tell a world which inis to load but htat sounds unlikely.

[HystericalParoxysm]

That's lovely. And by the way, you don't have to actually replace the sky INIs (which becomes a real pain in the ass to track down when you next need to patch) - you can distribute your mod as a package using this method:

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=359702

[Claeric]

haha, I saw that post before I saw this post. I'm talking about it in that topic as if you dont know, but you saw this before even bumping that topic. ;-;

It's very good to know there's a way to do it. Hopefully this gets people started on custom water colors :D

[Inge Jones]

Though, can you make it specific per world? I mean muddy green water for the nile is one thing, but you probably don't want it in your pacific island.

[HystericalParoxysm]

How many times do you really play more than one neighborhood per play session though? Even if it's not possible to change per neighborhood, I'd still be fine with putting in my "Muddy Green Water" file to play one 'hood, and switching it out to another to play a different 'hood.

Do the vacation destinations have differently coloured water?

[Claeric]

How many times do you really play more than one neighborhood per play session though? Even if it's not possible to change per neighborhood, I'd still be fine with putting in my "Muddy Green Water" file to play one 'hood, and switching it out to another to play a different 'hood.

Do the vacation destinations have differently coloured water?

I am 90% sure they do but could not find ini files relating to that, or their skies(I was really hoping to get the chinese rainy sky usable in the base hood). Like, I think china has a much lower murkiness level, and it gets cloudy at really low levels of water, and the water is kinda gray(but that may be in part from the sky).

I have no idea if it's possible to restrict it to worlds. But like HP said, I wouldnt take issue with it. I never ever swap to another world in one play session.

[Inge Jones]

Does this thread give any clue about how to make a world-specific ini for this? http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=386817

[Claeric]

Does this thread give any clue about how to make a world-specific ini for this? http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=386817

i can try that later. From that it looks like all he did was import an ini file into the world. I'll make the water super red and try importing it into a test world file to see if it changes anything.

If so, hooray! The discovery of custom water colors for worlds.

If you want, go ahead and try yourself, it's an easy enough process. But I'm going to bed :p

If you try, just copy and paste this

red = 25
green = 0
blue = 0

over the RGB of each time it appears for the sea in each SKY ini ending in "sea"(I think there are 4). Then import each one into the world as per the instructions in the thread you linked to. If it works, you will have red water in that world and no others!

I hope it works. I feel like I discovered something and was a part of applying it to the game :D

[Inge Jones]

We just need to come up with a standard way of sharing "played" status worlds with each other. Then they can come populated and so on.

[Ascarrott]

I am 90% sure they do but could not find ini files relating to that, or their skies(I was really hoping to get the chinese rainy sky usable in the base hood). Like, I think china has a much lower murkiness level, and it gets cloudy at really low levels of water, and the water is kinda gray(but that may be in part from the sky).

You should be able to, I've looked in the world file for china and their are files for the sky and i think water, these can be extracted and possibly imported into the .world file in the same way as the Egyptian heatwave can be done as in my post about it.

Of course I will have a go at checking this out and test it and maybe upload them to my post:Here (http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=386817&goto=newpost)

EDIT: Looks like it's not possible, I tried importing all the .ini files from china into a world, no clouds showed up nor did the water colour change, but the shadows where darker.

[Inge Jones]

Well I know something apart from heatwave is possible, because if you choose to base your world on a desert area, the daylight hours are longer!

[Claeric]

You should be able to, I've looked in the world file for china and their are files for the sky and i think water, these can be extracted and possibly imported into the .world file in the same way as the Egyptian heatwave can be done as in my post about it.

Of course I will have a go at checking this out and test it and maybe upload them to my post:Here (http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=386817&goto=newpost)

EDIT: Looks like it's not possible, I tried importing all the .ini files from china into a world, no clouds showed up nor did the water colour change, but the shadows where darker.

Uh oh, that makes hope for importable water not so good. I haven't even tried doing this world import stuff, if I upload the inis would you be willing to test them for me?

[Rez Delnava]

There is probably an element control file somewhere within the .world package, that acts similarly to how CASP and TONE files work.

If it is found, then the TGI list could be hex edited to include different .ini mods than the default ones.

Of course, I have no idea if such a control file exists at this moment; but it's something to think about, and another item added to my to-do list.

[Claeric]

Well, I'm going to go make some completely red water ini files, and try importing htem into a dummy world. Let's cross our fingers!

[Claeric]

IT WORKED IT WORKED IT WORKED IT WORKED

How to add CUSTOM WATER COLORS(and also sky, and sun, any ini settings for weather) TO EXISTING WORLDS!

1. Open the world file in S3PE
2. Import from File.
3. You will import each custom ini one by one.

Use the following for the instances:
Sky_ClearSea: 0xDAA2DD455D055F37
Sky_CustomSea: 0x577758BD99619673
Sky_OvercastSea: 0x14BCC166ED42C621
Sky_PartlyCloudSea: 0x3119E691AE6018C1
Sky_StormySea: 0x03091256E1A31960

And for the "type" of each, put in 0x1F886EAD (though with S3PE at current, this has to be done AFTER importing, by right-clicking and choosing "Details..." and changing it again.

4. Load the freaking world and marvel at your new, one-world-only water colors!

:DDDDDDDD

I added a tutorial to the first post, tell me if I can make it clearer. This is so awesome, you guys.

Now,w hat I still dont understand is applying this to YET INSTALLED worlds. Can you just place a world file into "installed worlds"? If so, I imagine that's how people would have to install these custom worlds, because I dont think we can apply it to a sims3pack installer for a world.

That said, assuming you can simply drag and drop worlds, here is a really terrible one I used for testing some concepts, with a custom water color applied.

[Ascarrott]

Good to see you got it working!!
Anyway Inge you can set the times for the sunrise and sunset times inside the SkyCommon.ini found in the game files, it's near the bottom:
SunriseTime = 6
SunsetTime = 18
If you change it to i.e
SunriseTime = 6.40
SunsetTime = 20.30
The sun in game will rise at 6.40am and set at 8.30 pm making the days longer but nights shorter

[HystericalParoxysm]

Well done! Great to see it working! I'll have to try this when I get back to tinkering with my custom world. :)

[Claeric]

Yeah, I put the tutorial in the CAW forum, too.

This will allow all world creators to customize the sky, sunrise, sunset, sun size, moon size, reflection size, everything. It's like adding an entire new tab to CAW :p

[Misty_2004]

Way to go, everyone! this is absolutely brilliant!! :D

[ovelix]

HI!!
Probably i am making a silly question, so sorry in advance...
can i use this tutorial for sunset valley or not?

[gerryiscool]

Awesome I'm going to make (or try to) an apocalyptic world bwah haha I will have an awesome blood red sea (hmm I've been watching the Neon Genesis Evangelion series too much haha)
:gjob: