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Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#1 Old 31st Jan 2019 at 7:21 PM
Default Even more lots -- How to use them (NOT a tutorial, an experiment)
So, I've been experimenting with things.

Lots that can be rezoned (and some that can not, it seems) have entries in the UserData folder's LotZoning.iff file. You can edit this and the game sees the changes.

Now, I accidentally got the game to try and load lot 1023. It actually did attempt to load it and create and error... but more importantly it created a House1023.iff and saved my changes to the lot. Using a hacked object I made I was able to load it up again.

So I had a thought. The game must be able to use more than 99 lots. There must be a way to use some of the unused lot numbers.

There is.

Firstly I want to say This is not a tutorial, this is a list of instructions. This is also 100% safe as everything you need to edit is in the UserData folder which the game can re-generate if something goes awry. Also you can safely back this folder up and plop your copy back in.

Now, as for how to do this...
(1) In the UserData folder you should see LotZoning.iff. Open it in IFF pencil (or Codex). It's just some strings. These are lot number and zoning pairs. Simply add any lots you want the game to see in. I suggest you add them as community lots. Although you can safely make them residential and move sims in through a convoluted method... let's just keep this simple for now. Anyway add new entires as 11, community or 100, community. Anything you like.

(2) The Houses folder contains all the lots. I like to copy lot 71, but you can copy any working old town community lot you have handy. Rename it to House###.iff where ### is the number you added to LotZoning.iff. (If you did want to make this a liveable house you could copy any working residential lot).

(3) Download and plop in the object into your downloads folder. It's a garden gnome that will let you load up arbitrary (and not so arbitrary) lot numbers. You can visit any "defined" lot number (some are unused as well) which matches a block in any of the global checks for lot types. But more importantly you can set an arbitrary lot number by adding (or subtracting) ten or one to the number then clicking to visit. Using this you can load up any arbitrary lot number that you have a House###.iff for.

(4) Now your sim should arrive as normal as if they visited an Old Town lot from the shuttle. They should be able to return home with the payphone / phonebooth.
Attached files:
File Type: zip  dd_visitgnome.zip (737.2 KB, 24 downloads) - View custom content
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Lab Assistant
#2 Old 1st Feb 2019 at 2:37 PM
Ohh I love this! That is pretty interesting, since you could create a set of 'out-of-town' community lots, even giving them a different aestethic (I'm talking more about storytelling opportunities, though some excellent hackers like you see here en MTS could definitely make something pretty fantastic). I'll try it! Thanks a lot!
Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#3 Old 2nd Feb 2019 at 5:59 PM
Cool! Let me know how things work out for you! I have them working in my game but I'm interested to make sure it works for others, too!
Lab Assistant
#4 Old 20th Feb 2019 at 7:25 PM Last edited by ed95 : 20th Feb 2019 at 8:35 PM.
Hi! I finally got the opportunity to test out your little experiment, and seems to work fine to me! Here below there's attached (I don't have any image posting site account), a picture of my sim in Lot 100 that is, as you recommended, a copy of Lot 71.

Right now, searching a buy/build mode enabler to be able to edit the lot!

EDIT: Just done that, I found them on the old Simslice via Wayback Machine; let's see what happens when I edit the lot.
EEDIT2: It works like a charm! I deleted the original Old Town buildings and build something else; bad thing is, I accidentally deleted also the phone booth! Good think I have workarounds! I'll post images when I have the time!
Screenshots
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