CiDy 2.7 Procedural City Designer

Great, thank you!

 

I think I was in this thread long ago. Was looking at that city generator that was about to go on sale. Decided to see if there was any different generators on the store nowadays. Came back across this. Decided to watch your Cidy2.0 tutorial video and I'm sold. I'll be buying this instead some day.

Edit: 2017. Long time no see haha~

 

Hello. This asset is exactly what I've been needing in my project. So it seems. I've been trying to make environments with hills and buildings. It takes far too long to do by hand though. And with my other assets to make cities with they are just flat. Glad I found this. I'll be buying it in a few days.

 

Hello. I bought this asset and I sent you an email with a copy of my invoice from my hotmail. Thanks.

 

You should have confirmation email from me soon.

Thank you for your support,

Steven M.
Reckless Games Studio

 

Well... It seems I can't use this. The prefabs I wanted to use are modular and... Well... Let's just say I'm disappointed.

 

We are sorry to hear that but we understand that not Every project will be a perfect match for CiDy design.

The current CiDy 2 does require your buildings to be in an assembled prefab state.

What do you mean that your buildings are "Modular", as in actual facade pieces or something else?

If you would simply like a refund of your purchase, please private message me @ recklessGames@gmail.com

As I already have your Invoice number on file, all you need to do is PM me that you would like a refund.

Thank you for your support,
Steven M.
Reckless Games Studio

 

Well the prefabs are made from modular pieces. I'm assuming it has something to do with the colliders. Because each piece has its own collider. I don't know how to use this asset in my project. The obj exporter I have exports with no material and I kinda need to export with no submeshes in order to get it working. But when I export with no submeshes I can't reassign my materials that way. So my solution is to export with no submeshes,Then use that mesh on a mesh collider for my prefabs. Tried that... It didn't work. Possibly because I never deleted all the other colliders. I'll try that next.

 

If you send me a Sample Building of the Source File I can see what we are working with and if there is a viable workaround.

 

Give me one with SubMeshes and Without for Testing, if it ends up being because of submeshes, I may be able to patch the system to account for them. Is this for the Zombie Game your working on? Its looking very good from what I've seen. Big Thumbs Up bud. I had a similar project back in the day.

Yours is better looking than mine.

Playable Demo in the Youtube Description Link

 

Yeah it's for my zombie game. I'm afraid I don't think I can send this because it's an asset I purchased. Anyway It's from the Modular Houses asset. I bought CiDy because it was very time consuming to put in all my houses and stuff and make the terrain conform to them by painting it. I'd like to keep the asset though because even if I can't get my modular houses working I can still use it to make cities. I noted that my Combined Houses from the Suburban Neighborhood House pack work but they are on their side.

 

Your legally allowed to send me the files for Service purposes. I am the one who is not allowed to use them in any commercial capacity outside of fixing your specific problem. up to you either way.

And as for buildings spawning 90 degrees rotated. a Quick fix is to Nest them into an Empty Transform with its proper orientiation matching global axis. Y up Z forward and X Right, etc

Some of the Default buildings that come with CiDy are nested this way as well.

 

Oh. I see. Well in that case. I'll email you them.

Email sent.

 

okie dokie.

I will take a look.

I'm leaving work in 40 mins. It may take me a few hours before I have a solution.

I'll continue our conversation through Private Email.

Thank you,
Steven M.

 

Hi, I'm very interested to buy this nice Asset. It looks very promising. What is a current Spline Based Rewrite status of CiDy? Best regards, Primoz

 

Primus,

Thank you for your interest in CiDy for your Design Project.

The Spline Based is still in Alpha due to the slow down caused by Covid-19, and its release is still TBD at this time.

I'm hoping to have some dev log content to post here soon.

Thanks,
Steven M.
Reckless Games Studio

 

This is a cool looking asset, and I wanted to ask about the possibility of the future versions supporting buildings on the "outside" of cells - in such a way that buildings are built on the exterior of the "cells" and optionally along single roads.

Another question I had was if its possible to create less dense towns where there are cells which randomly skip certain areas to create a less cluttered look? This might be useful for smaller residential areas that aren't necessarily tied into a larger denser city. I watched a few of the videos but skipped along and may have missed it if this is already an option.

Anyway best of luck on this asset, it already seems very promising and I'll be keeping an eye on it to see how things progress!

 

MD_Reptile,

I would like to take a moment to respond to your questions.

Q1.) Will future versions support buildings on the "outside" of cells and Along Non Cell Roads?

A.) Yes, The new System is being designed to allow you to control what spawns along roads, What variables are used in cells and Exterior Of Cells and Lone Roads separate from cells.

Q2.) Will we be able to Control Cell Building Density?
A.) Currently there is not that specific function, However I see the Value in it and will put it on the To Do list for Cell Logic

I'm still working on the Minimum Cycle Basis Algorithm at the Moment. (This is the Code that Determines what areas are Cells)

After I have that running as Desired, I can move onto Cells and there Building Lot Cutting, Then I can start extruding Buildings from that lot data. (Building Facades, Pieced together from Procedural and Modular Meshes)

(Once I begin the Facade Creation, I will start posting progress images on here, I Don't have anything visual yet of the new System as I'm still working on the Foundation Changes for the New Methods)

Thank you for your Interest in CiDy.
Steven M.

 

Just bought the asset; i'm pretty amazed by how quickly i can build organic looking cities. I see there's a billion commented out sections in code (baaad practice!); however the result is nice.

One thing i don't understand is why in the docs there's a 'stop' line at end of the roads and there isn't in the current release.

I've tried making my road texture with stop line but of course it repeats along the way. Any idea why ?

 

A few more annoying bugs ... Unity 2019.3.10f1 (Mac)
Sometimes the editor window becomes empty .


Trying to rebuild all materials :

Code (CSharp):

1. NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
2. CiDyNode.ReplaceMaterials () (at Assets/CiDy/CiDyAssets/CiDyScripts/CiDyNode.cs:241)
3. CiDyGraph+<UpdateAllMaterials>d__114.MoveNext () (at Assets/CiDy/CiDyAssets/CiDyScripts/CiDyGraph.cs:2344)
4. Swing.Editor.EditorCoroutine.Update () (at Assets/CiDy/CiDyAssets/Editor/EditorCoroutine.cs:44)
5. System.Reflection.MonoMethod.Invoke (System.Object obj, System.Reflection.BindingFlags invokeAttr, System.Reflection.Binder binder, System.Object[] parameters, System.Globalization.CultureInfo culture) (at <437ba245d8404784b9fbab9b439ac908>:0)
6. Rethrow as TargetInvocationException: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation.
7. System.Reflection.MonoMethod.Invoke (System.Object obj, System.Reflection.Binding

 

onefoxstudio,

I'm sorry you experienced a Reference Null Bug.

I will Take a Look at this bug you encountered when Rebuilding Materials and see if I can re-create it.

Thank you very much for your Support of CiDy Development.

As for the Texture Stop Line. That Code was removed. It was using a Basic Method of Catching the First and Last Sections of the Road Polygons and Clamping the UVS to 0.25f and 0.75f in the Texture.

This creates a stretching effect in the uvs. So I replaced it with Proper Distanced Based Repeating UVS to keep everything consistent in the UVS.

I am working towards a solution to the CrossWalk and Stop Line Areas mesh problem in my re-write.

Most likely I will be adding a special mesh to those sections where we can better control the visuals of cross walk areas with there Own Material and Textures.

Thanks,
Steven M.

 

Thanks Steven ! PM Sent.
If you need a sample project let me know.

 

When I enter playmode it dissapears ...

 

Having some Fun with the Free KitBash3D Sample Sets on Unity Asset Store.

Here are the Three Programs used to put this Scene Together.

CiDy 2

KitBash3D Free Models Sample (Free)

GAIA Pro

 

Went through the Free Building Assets on the Unity Store and Found Many were out of the Box compatible with CiDy 2.2

 

CiDy 2.3 Update Out Now! Full GAIA Pro Integration.

CiDy Will now automatically generate the Needed Terrain Masks Textures and Apply them to your GAIA Biome Controller and Automatically Update your GAIA Biome for a Complete Solution of Urban Elemnts Mixed into your GAIA Terrain anytime you Blend your Terrain.

 

GAIA Pro Integration, Speed Run with KitBash3D Free Models.

 

Thank you for the asset,
- Is it possible to use it with CSCAPE to generate building instead of KitBash? If not, are the buildings separated objects that I can change or remove them?

- Can it be used with gaia 2 or only gaia pro?

 

I'm not directly familiar with CScape.
But if the Buildings can be turned into simple Prefabs. Then yes you can set any prefabs you want as your buildings.

The Kitbash showcase was just showing how quickly you can swap out prefab buildings to have CiDy Populate into your cells.

Yes, The Building placement is Prefab based.
You can Put any Prefabs you want into the Pre-Desginated CiDy Folders or Change the Buildings on a Specific Cell and Regenerate that cell.

Yes, CiDy 2.3 is Fully Integrated with GAIA 2 & GAIA Pro. Specifically it is integrated into the Biome Controller of GAIA's System.


Here is a Tutorial Video demonstrating setup and Common Use. The Models showcase in the Tutorial come with the CiDy 2 Package.

 

Made a City Flythrough Video showcasing Free Building Assets from the Asset Store.

Here is a Short Speed Run Video of The Flythrough Scene Being Created in only 30 Minutes!!!

Speed up 8x to condense the session to 4 minutes.

 

Really impressed with this asset so far. Good stuff!

 

Thank you! There is more to come.

 

Had some fun using GAIA Pro and CiDy 2.3 to Create a Test Drive Scene.

Join in on the Fun and Drive a Seat Leon Racing Car around an Island City.


Playable Demo Test Drive PC:
966 Mb download Size, (1.4 Gb Hard Drive Space Needed)
Mega Cloud Link
https://mega.nz/file/MVw0zDCa#KvoshER2YdKKS4qwBwIKNTCdHKKA-xCQo7r-TaBXPVw
Google Drive Cloud Link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PoZ5k0CRkLvZ__GErxF5Q1jKss81Vhbg/view?usp=sharing

WSDA Or Arrow Keys Controls the car.

Enter/Return Turn key will Flip the Car right Side up if you roll it.

Escape Brings up two Buttons in the upper Left Corner.

Quit
&
Restart(If you want to reset the scene after knocking down a bunch of street lights and benches. )

Enjoy the Free Demo Scene From
Reckless Games Studio

 

Hi,
Demo Scene looks cool... I have already test it all over. I'm just curious why is so huge in size ...5GB ? Could there be some optimisations done in the future to reduce the installation file size? What is the size of the map (terrain)?
Best regards,
Primoz

 

Its the Textures. I'm sure if I spent more time on it. I could change some compression settings.

This is all default Unity and Package setups.

I'll take a look and see if i can do anything to change the texture compressions for a better build size.

Map Size is 2048X2048

Build Report
Uncompressed usage by category (Percentages based on user generated assets only):
Textures 3.9 gb 89.6%
Meshes 137.2 mb 3.1%
Animations 0.0 kb 0.0%
Sounds 47.3 mb 1.1%
Shaders 9.4 mb 0.2%
Other Assets 61.6 mb 1.4%
Levels 160.3 mb 3.6%
Scripts 4.6 mb 0.1%
Included DLLs 15.2 mb 0.3%
File headers 29.7 mb 0.7%
Total User Assets 4.4 gb 100.0%
Complete build size 4.4 gb

 

I went through the Textures and Added Crunch Compression and got the total build down.

Build Report
Uncompressed usage by category (Percentages based on user generated assets only):
Textures 948.6 mb 67.1%
Meshes 137.2 mb 9.7%
Animations 0.0 kb 0.0%
Sounds 47.3 mb 3.3%
Shaders 9.4 mb 0.7%
Other Assets 61.6 mb 4.4%
Levels 160.3 mb 11.3%
Scripts 4.6 mb 0.3%
Included DLLs 15.2 mb 1.1%
File headers 29.7 mb 2.1%
Total User Assets 1.4 gb 100.0%
Complete build size 1.4 gb

966 Mb for download

 

CiDy 2.4 Update Released!

Fully Integrated with GAIA 2 and GAIA Pro as well as Vegetation Studio

New Update Brings New Built-in CiDySpawner System.

Roads can now Generate Sub Splines with Procedural Attributes that automatically change with Road.

New Spawner Types Available:

1.) Road Markings: Double Line, Left Pass Lane, Right Pass Lane, One Way Lane, One Way Lane with White & Yellow Lines

2.) Generate Prefab Along Spline,

3.) Power Lines,

4.) New Procedural Mesh Extrusions Types:
1.) Guard Rail,
2.) SideWalk,
3.) Barrier

Spawner System Also has a Normalized Length Range, Allowing you to be able to Mix and Match Multiple Road Markings and Other Spawner Types along a Road Spline with User Defined Offsets.

New Models and Prefabs Added:

1.) PowerLine Pole and Procedural Power Cables Connecting Between them,
2.) Street Speed Signs:
25mph,40mph,55mph,70mph
3.) Turning Signs:
Slow Speed 25, Slow Speed 45,Double Sided Chevron Turn Arrow

 

From my understanding, this cannot be used for runtime generation. Is that a feature you plan to add in the future?

 

Sorry No, Currently its not in the Road Map. I wanted to Tackle Major Elements of a City first.

(Highways,On/Off Ramps,Bridges, Multi-lane splits, Traffic, Pedestrians etc)

The Main Issue for Runtime is the Blending To Terrain Logic. Currently its so Process intensive that it doesn't lend itself well to Run-time Applications.

To get good blending results, The Process requires iterating over the entire Layout.

Where as in a run-time application you would want blending to happen at the instant the item is created. (With the current Formula that would mean the Entire Layout would have to be re blended)

I Have thought about how I would address this in the past and made attempts at Multi threading etc. But they still require the Entire layout to be blended again for the final result to be good.

As the Blending of the Heights requires the stacking up in a specific element order so to speak of each element to create the final output.

Perhaps in the Future if I can solve the Problem of Blending only Parts at a time without degrading previous blended areas. (then run-time blending would have a future)

 

Thanks for such a thoughtful response. What you're stating definitely makes sense. Although, I would not require an instant generation. I'm willing to have a "Generating level" with status bar screen if need be. Since I don't yet own this (dang, it looks so cool!) can you tell me how long it usually takes to generate at design time?

 

Depends on the Size of the City.

With the Current System, Blending Scales with the Size of the City.

Each Road must be blended.
Each SideWalk Mesh is Blended,
Each Individual Building Lot is Blended. (And Buildings that are hovering get a Procedural Foundation Mesh)

//Then Terrain Vegetation is Blended.
If using unitys built-in terrain veg system.
It iterates through each element again doing a clearing for each Detail Layer on the Terrain.
Then it does similar works with Trees using Radius checks.

So my question would be what is the approximate amount of elements of your levels?

How many Roads?
How Many Cells with Sidewalks and Buildings?
How Many Intersections?

What are you using for Vegetation?
Unity's Builtin?(Slowest Blend Method) Or Third Party ?
Vegetation Studio or GAIA?

Vegetation Studio doesn't require any blending steps as it is GPU instanced and CiDy generates its Vegetaion Mask when a road is created or edited so only terrain blending is needed.

If your using GAIA's Biome System, They Use a Texture Mask. This is detected and Generated when Doing Terrain Blending and the Mask is Generated at the same time we are updating the Terrain Heights for Blending.

But it requires CiDy to Perform an extra final step(In place of Vegetation Blending) where GAIA's Biome Spawners are updated with the CiDy Generated Mask Textures and then GAIA's Spawner's are Called to Update Again. (Time scales with Terrain Size)

Sorry I Couldn't be more direct.

If its standard terrain with a standard size of elements 5 mins or less.

But if its a Large Packed City Scene it could take 30 mins. (Unacceptable Run-time, even for a loading screen)

 

Excellent answer. Thank you!

There's a lot for me to consider. This asset does look excellent, BTW.

 

Work in Progress on Highway Structures. (Overpass / Bridges)

 

I bought CIDY 2 last month. Altough i have yet to start working with it, i'm loving what i see in these updates.
I've read mention of a spline based rewrite of CIDY in the works. What kind of features is that going to bring ?

 

The Rewrite is being worked on by myself and a professional 3D Model/Art Designer.

It is still a ways out for its Release.

Currently I Believe we will do a Upgrade Package Setup. It will be released under a New Name but setup as an Upgrade package for those who Have CiDy 2 already and they will be able to Upgrade for a Discounted Price rather than paying the Full Price a New User would be faced with.

The Main thing that the New Version will Bring is a more Decoupled System. (Unlike CiDy 2)

Currently CiDy 2 uses a Planar Graph setup to generate City blocks from User Defined Nodes and Limited 4 Control Point Splines for Roads using an Adjacency List Setup

This is great but I have found over time that its limitation can only be corrected by Decoupling the connection between the Roads and Intersections (Nodes) and doing more Pre-Calculations to Generate the Nodes from the Users Splines and the Subsequent interactions they create from there layout.

The New Product will be a decoupled Version of the current system but with more Features.
Which will allow more flexibility in how the user can design as well as the way they design,
but most importantly the Quality of the Models it generates.

Some of those features are being brought into CiDy in the updates for Testing and application purposes.

The Main thing that the Re-Write will have is What My Partner will be Bringing to the Table.
AAA Quality and Details in its models and textures.

The Main Thing I am Excited for is the Hybrid Procedural-Modular Building Façades and Modular Set Models that will Come Stock with the Asset.

We will also have Later Set Pieces developed that can be used with the Re-Write System or Used on there own like you would any modular model sets. (Themes if you will, Old time, Futuristic, Western etc)

These sets combined with the New Hybrid Procedural-Modular Building Façades System that I am developing to be able to Generate High Quality Building Facades, will allows users to be able to Create a Full, High Detailed City using Modular Building Sets combine with the Spline Based Road Networks and Procedural Tools. (Procedural Meshes and Procedural Prefab Placement)

The Full Road Map is ever changing.

But the Main Things the Re-Write will be targeting is as Follows:

1.) Non-Limited Spline Based Roads with Customizable Road Markings for Mix and Match Materials and Textures
(Only going to be in the new Package)

2.) Procedural City Block Creation, calculated from the Spline Roads and User Defined Settings on Each Road.(road type etc) This will generate a planar Graph with Loops which is a more complicated Graph Layout.
(Only going to be in the new Package)

3.) Detailed Procedural Intersections and Cross Walks (Partially Implemented in CiDy)
4.) Detailed Procedural SideWalks,(Partially Implemented in CiDy)
5.) Detailed Procedural-Modular Hybrid Buildings,
(Only going to be in the new Package)

6.) Detailed Highways with On/Off Ramps(In Progress, and May see a Partial Implementation in CiDy)

7.) Procedural Bridges/Overpasses, (In Progress, and May see a Partial Implementation in CiDy)

8.) Procedural Tunnels,
(Only going to be in the new Package)

9.) Spline Based Procedural Extruded Meshes. (Partially Implemented in CiDy, Three Mesh Types)
(The Full List of Mesh types will only be in the New Package)

10.) Auto Generated Traffic Lane System.
(Only going to be in the new Package)

11.) Auto Generated Pedestrian Lane System.
(Only going to be in the new Package)

I Would also like to Add Railways but this is not currently on the Road Map, Just my personal Wish List.

My Desire is to have a Full Set of City Design Tools that will Allow you to Create a Road and Building Network and all the sub details and then go back and Modify Roads and Sub Details iteratively and have the System retain all your other settings as well as Blend that City to Unity's Terrain and Vegetation System, as well as some third party Systems (GAIA, Vegetation Studio)

Thanks for your interest in CiDy and its Development.
Steven M.

 

@RecklessGames_ That is super interesting and i look forward to see this project expand!

 

Soft Update is Going through Unity Review, Will be Live within 2 Days.

This Update Changes the Folder Structure for District Themes and Allows users to Add New Custom Named Themes and Place Building,Clutter & Street Light Prefabs into these Theme Folders.

The New Theme will be available in the Drop Down Selection.

Two Ways of Creating the Folders Either Using the New Button in the Editor(Recommended)
OR Manually Creating Folders directly in the CiDyResources folder.

But The System Requires you to Prefix the Folders with "CiDyTheme" for it to recognize the New Theme. This way you can Drag and Drop your folders from previous projects etc and CiDy Will Automatically Pull them into your CiDyGraph for use in your CiDyCells.



The Buildings, Clutter and Street Light have there own Folders you must place your Prefabs into.

This way the System can pull and use them in there appropriate locations when you change a District Theme.

Also a Minor Bug Fix: Sometimes when a User would click in the Scene View to Interact with a Cell or Road,
The Event would not be properly Consumed by Unity Editor and the Left Alt Orbit key would not function, This has been fixed.

 

Hi I have recently purchased your asset but I am unable to draw roads and environment I am looking for I mean i could not get started yet, so help me in this regard, i have followed all rules mentioned in the pdf.

 

The Only Thing you have to Do is Setup your Project Tags and Layers.

By Adding "Terrain", "Node" ,"Road" ,"Cell" to Both Layers and Tags.

Then In the Scene. The Terrain or Mesh that you want to Build your city on should be set to Both Layer "Terrain" and Tag "Terrain". (This Tells CiDy 2 what object can be built on through raycast checks, so the object or terrain must have its collider attached and Enabled)

The Object that you have as your terrain must have a Collider for the Editor to Be able to Register Clicks onto with your Mouse in the Scene View for Node Creation.

I See in your image you are using a GAIA Setup. This is a Great Package to Work with for your Terrain as CiDy 2 is integrated with it.

If you have The Top Toggle "UseSceneCamera" set to On. CiDy will not build as you are telling it that you want to use standard Scene View Interaction. Unity requires Editor tools to take control of the Interaction when working in Edit mode and allowing editor to click and interact in the Scene View.

When you are building in the Scene view. Feel Free to use left alt key to orbit and move your camera while creating nodes and editing your city without having to toggle the "UseSceneCamera" button all the time. Whenver you press left alt CiDy acts as if you toggled UseSceneCamera as a convenient short key for quick creation.

Feel free to Join our Discord channel as well for faster interaction and support with questions.
https://discord.gg/5ErF9MU

Thanks for your support!

Layers and Tags Setup starts at 00:51 seconds

 

Hello. I bought your asset again even though you previously refunded me. I figured out that the house models I did want to use were too high poly of models to be viable for my game environment in the way I was trying to use them. So now the plan is to manually place just a few of them rather than a whole bunch and use some low poly house assets I found for the other houses. Now I have a question. You say this asset can't handle a multi-tile terrain setup. What's that mean? Does it mean I can't extend one city/road over to the other tiles but I can still make another city on the other tiles? Or does it mean I can only do a city on a single tile and I can't do more on the other tiles?