Help or tutorial / guide wanted for how to add my own maps to the game

[jonathanuk]

I've been reading through what tutorials I can find but none seem to go through the process from start to finish on how to create and then add a map to the existing europe base map. In particular, I'd like to know how to link my map to an existing road on the base map (while also removing the road block and making that road driveable), how to 'overwrite' areas of the base map with my own, e.g. to add a city with industries or maybe just a non-interactive town visible from the road, and how I can make a ferry port take me to a different map (if that is the best way to create an island).

Some guides go so far but they don't answer these questions in a complete sense which I think would surely be fundamental to adding map areas.

Thanks!

[Reinhard]

No tutorial will cover all knowledge a novice map moder wants to know. Forget about that. All this is way to complex. And many tutorials must be kind of wrong, because in all the years the map editor has changed.

You can't link one map to another. The game will only load one map. It is possible to import parts of a different map into the one you work on. But that is a difficult and barely manageable process, if the area to import is big. But some people have allegedly done so. But I guess these people are well-versed, when it comes to the map editor.

Your other questions I can't answer, I have never touched anything in the map which is related to the economy. Last time I read a tutorial for the map editor was more than 10 years ago.

[jonathanuk]

Thank you for your reply. So if I want to add an area to the UK (which is already 'covered' by the europe base map) I have to edit the europe map, compile it back into a zip (with a .scs extension) and place that whole modified europe map in my mod folder?

How do the DLC map areas work then, as that must be a preferred way to add additional map areas to the game? I would be interested to know how the game defines an area as being part of map x, for example if there are no roads in most of Western Scotland would that be ripe to add using the DLC method or would it have to be added to the europe base map because it's in the europe map defined area (if such a thing exists)?

Thanks!

[Reinhard]

A mod doesn't have to be a zip archive, a file/folder structure will do as well. Putting files into a zip, or any other copy operation, for development, isn't necessary anymore, since 1.40. The map editor now saves straight into folder "user_map", in the mod folder. As the editor will load any present mod, you can continue your work with the next editor session. To get the work into the game, you may have to enable it, in the mod manager.

Any DLC will add new sectors to the base map, making it bigger. So if you own a DLC, these additional sectors will be automatically present, in the game, and in the editor.

[jonathanuk]

OK so I've returned to trying to at least create my little island map, I've gone through the mapping guide for adding a custom background to the editor here - https://scsmoddingguide.github.io/mappingguide/ (with one or two adjustments because that guide appears to be out of date) and tried the trouble-shooting steps I found in a post on these forums, however like the original poster from that thread I cannot get the editor to display my custom background. Is there a concrete method / process for doing this? How do others who make maps get their background to appear in the editor? I'd really like to know as at the moment I'm banging my head against a proverbial brick wall with this, and I don't want to have to just guess at distances (I want it to be accurate).

So far I have, in my Documents/Euro Truck Simulator 2 folder:
mod / MyMap

MyMap / def
MyMap / map
MyMap / material

def / editor_data.sii
map / MyMap.mdb
map / MyMap / (five map files - .aux, .base, .data, .desc, .layer)
material / editor / (MyMap.dds, MyMap.mat, MyMap.tobj)

I noticed that the tobj file contains the path /map/material/editor/MyMap.dds which confused me a bit as the material folder and contents were not supposed to be placed in the map folder according to the guide, I copied the material folder to the map folder just in case but it made no difference.

I've tried saving this lot into a zip and renaming it .scs, then in ETS2 enabling it as a mod, no difference.

One odd thing also confuses me - when I go into ETS2 and the mod manager it shows user_map and map as mods, is this how it's supposed to be? I've lost track a bit as to where these came from, I'm assuming the editor created the user_map folder as that's where my test maps have been saved, I may have created the map folder while attempting to follow a tutorial (which was probably out of date).

Here's my editor_data.sii

Code: Select all

SiiNunit
{
editor_data : .edit_data {

	autosave_interval: 15 #minutes
	autosave_notify_interval: 15 #seconds

	startpos_model: "/model2/editor_start_model.pmd"
	startpos_rotate_speed: 2.0

	stamp_count_warning: 40
	road_length_warning: 330

	sub_mode_types[]: 39 #bezier patch
	sub_mode_types[]: 2  #buildings_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 45 #camera_path_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 23 #camera_point_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 12 #city_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 44 #curve_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 8  #cut_plane_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 46 #cutscene_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 43 #far model
	sub_mode_types[]: 19 #ferry_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 13 #hinge_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 47 #hookup_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 42 #map_area_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 18 #map_overlay_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 5  #model_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 9  #mover_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 11 #no_weather_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 4  #prefab_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 3  #road_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 36 #sign_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 21 #sound_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 1  #terrain_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 38 #traffic_area_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 41 #trajectory
	sub_mode_types[]: 34 #trigger_item
	sub_mode_types[]: 48 #visibility_area_item

	map_import_offset: (-43402, 0, -28089)

	source_name[]: "base"
	source_tag[]: ""

	source_name[]: "north"
	source_tag[]: "no"

	source_name[]: "balkan_e"
	source_tag[]: "blke"

	source_name[]: "iberia"
	source_tag[]: "ibe"

	source_name[]: "russia"
	source_tag[]: "rus"

	bcg_map_name[]: "/map/MyMap.mbd"
	bcg_material[]: "/material/editor/MyMap.mat"
	bcg_size_x[]: 100000
	bcg_size_y[]: 100000
	bcg_offset_x[]: 0
	bcg_offset_y[]: 0

	bcg_map_name[]: "/map/europe_reskin.mbd"
	bcg_material[]: "/material/editor/europe.mat"
	bcg_size_x[]: 207656
	bcg_size_y[]: 174375
	bcg_offset_x[]: 10500
	bcg_offset_y[]: -7090
	
	bcg_map_name[]: "/map/balkan2/balkan2_prototype_zadar.mbd"
	bcg_material[]: "/material/editor/europe.mat"
	bcg_size_x[]: 207656
	bcg_size_y[]: 174375
	bcg_offset_x[]: 10500
	bcg_offset_y[]: -7090
	
        bcg_map_name[]: "/map/balkan2/balkan2_layout_new.mbd"
bcg_material[]: "/material/editor/europe.mat"
bcg_size_x[]: 207656
bcg_size_y[]: 174375
bcg_offset_x[]: 10500
bcg_offset_y[]: -7090



# For INTERNAL members: Please for added custom map use "/mod_internal/base/def/editor_data_custom.sii".
# This one below going to be overriden.

# For MODERS: Custom maps should be added to file below.
@include "editor_data_custom.sui"

}
}

I replaced the first map bit that had 'europe', I presume the others (balkan etc) are something the devs have left there and probably nothing to do with my dlc. I didn't get as far as setting the scale, there seems no point until I can actually see the map image in the editor.

MyMap.mat

Code: Select all

material : "dry.tex"
{
	texture : "MyMap.tobj"
	texture_name : "texture"
}

.dds is a 16MB image file in the format specified (in Paint.Net - Save As .dds file - BC3 (Linear, DXT5)).
.tobj has some incomprehensible garbage then the path I mentioned earlier:

Code: Select all

±p                           ˆ9        /map/material/editor/MyMap.dds

Really really hoping someone can shine a light on this please, I know it must be possible (SCS manage it, for one, as must surely ProMods or anyone who makes serious accurate maps).

[jonathanuk]

Aha! After being generally annoyed I came back to this a couple of hours later and searched the forums deeper, came across a thread that recommended this video by a certain DigitalX - https://youtu.be/z1hIh54l2qg
But for one (probably crucial) error, this video helped me to finally get a background into the editor - in the video it references editor_data.sui but it should be editor_data_custom.sui, according to a note in the file itself and another thread I found on here.

I'm not sure if this also could have been a factor, but I wasn't running the editor as Administrator previously, had a bit of bother understanding how to pass the launch options through a Windows shortcut (has to be AFTER the quotation marks, not within! Not mentioned in the video or elsewhere that I could see).

Now all I need to do is work out the scale, hopefully should just be some simple number crunching.