#animated clouds

Better World Select brings a complete overhaul with a brand-new UI, giving you full control to customize the World Selection screen exactly to your liking.

This update also brings quality of life improvements to the Better World Select mod:

Custom world order is now saved per save, allowing you to create a perfect setup for each individual gameplay.

The Preset Manager allows you to save and load your customized combinations for quicker setup in new and existing saves.

Our famous brand new skybox mesh.  The first cross-mapped, semi-transparent skybox.  The first large sky, compatible with SimNopke’s SkyFix 2.1 and Criquette’s Horizons. The first two-layered skybox with animated moving clouds for The Sims 2.

There are two SFS folders of recolors for both versions. You can distinguish them by thumbs and title.

RECOLORS:

LOT VERSION:

There was a lot of fixies for lot skybox, but now it’s perfect. All of the changes will be described in a separate post.  Several important news: Now the lot-skybox is compatible with ALL GAME VERSIONS (I hope for BG too, TESTER WANTED). The controller mesh (small transparent hemisphere) no longer gives an error when switching from mode to mode. There are no more errors with dissapearing default textures. Now you can choose the right texture directly in the catalog window.

You can find it in Misc. -> Misc. Costs 1 simolean. 

Put the controller sphere on your lot. It disappearing in Live Mode - so you don’t need to hire it. You’ll see only the sky! And you will have no troubles with recoloring and bringing the objects - the "bounding mesh” is only the small sphere, not skybox at all. 

There are 2 recolorable layers with different meshes\UV: - outer cross-mapped sky dome (it’s my «know how» to use this shape in TS2) - inner linear sky-sphere, that can be animated for clouds or static for classic skybox textures (such as skyomg and other).

You can use one or both layers at the same time. If you want to hide one of the skies – just use the invisible recolor. If you want to combine the linear sky with clouds – you can use two (!) sky-objects on the same lot. REMEMBER that cross-sky and linear static sky are not compatible, because it has the same stdMatLayer values (-6). Clouds use -5 layer.

All files are compressed!

It is strongly recommended to delete all previous versions of totalitarian lot-skybox. 

Dawnload the FULL ARCHIVE of lot sky

Lowedeus_TotalitarianSky.package - THE MESH FILE with alfsi-1 tex for cloud-sphere and invisible rec for cross-sky as defaults

There are three classic colors: Rise of Communism, The Tower and Pray the Gray + invisible rec for cloud-sphere (null). 

IF YOU WANT TO RECOLOR THE OUTER SKY LAYER - use any recolor for it in ObjectWorkshop, not mesh-package, because the default tex is invisible and has no texture and mat.params.

The other recolors for outer sky are placed in Sub-folder: REC - cross sky The other recolors for inner sphere are placed in Sub-folder: REC - clouds sphere

DAWNLOADS DIRECTORY for LOT SKY

N’HOOD VERSION

You can find it in Effects section. Look for unique custom preview and title.

Just put the controller cube at the corner of the map. Fully compatible with any horizon – you should place it in the same corner.

The controller cube is invisible in other modes.

There is no problem with bringing the sky, with other transparent materials and seasons (the sky isn’t covering by snow). The sky doesn’t conflict with lot sky, if you follow the logic of the layers (see more info in special posts).

All files are compressed!

It is strongly recommended to use my fx-cube default replacement.

Dawnload the FULL ARCHIVE of hood skies

DAWNLOADS DIRECTORY for HOOD SKY

PINK SOUP ALERT:

Please note that the skybox textures are in High Quality, and the resolutions sometimes are quiet huge:

- 2048x2048 px for Gray, Rise, Latte, and Tower - 2048x512 px for ACII, Wind, Star, and Alfsi  - 4096x1024 px (!) for Day, Night and Pink

If the such a large texture sizes are unacceptable for your game (lead to the pink flashing for example) I recomend to delete the most heavy files, and/or use the optimised ones (with reduced texture sizes) by @polygonbeach​ (thank you for this!)

At this moment (07/11/2023) only optimazed NH skies are avalible for download, but I’ll upload the optimized lot skybox recolors ASAP.

CREDITS:

You Are Empty, Assassin’s Creed, @alf-si-cc and Google for textures!

Thanks to the sims-community for thousands of downloads and followings, as well as for getting to know the coolest simmers! Together we revealed the true power of this old game!

@criquette-was-here for your enthusiasm, ingenuity and support. You're cool!

@simnopke​ for the responsiveness and the great SkyFix. Without it, the city-building in the Sims 2 wouldn’t have a future.

@greatcheesecakepersona​ for patience, diligence and magnificent horizons.

@grilledcheese-aspiration for the space sky - the first recolor of Totalitarian Sky for NHood!

@zena-dew-drop for advice and a temporary fix of my sky (because I don’t know how to work quickly)

@plumbobbled for slower versions of my early clouds (you can download it too!)

@dramallamadingdang for pretty recolors of my sky meshes for nhood! (looks! Cross-sky and clouds!!!)

@polygonbeach​ for the optimised NH sky textures (1024 max)

Спасибо ФАНАТАМ за то, что вы есть.

@jogaila-zollern, люби меня

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