A World Lit By Fire (Color tweaks to the Radiance Lighting Mod for Pre-Electric Games)

[hat_plays_sims]

It is with our passions as it is with fire and water, they are good servants, but bad masters.
Aesop

Let me first and foremost say two things:

1. You need this mod for the mod you're looking at right now to work. I am not capable of making my own lighting mod on the Radiance scale. (And hit the thanks button! Forty thousand downloads and thirty-five hundred thanks? Dude. That is not right.)

2. If you are not comfortable installing the Radiance mod manually, this is probably not the download for you. It requires you to go muck around in the Program Files.

There, now that that's said...

It has always frustrated me when custom lamps that look like they should cast candlelight cast electric light instead. I mean it really bugs the crap out of me, I can't even tell you. When I found out there was a way to adjust the color each individual custom light casts, I was overjoyed... until I found out it didn't work for me. It took me some thinking, but eventually I realized it might have something to do with the fact that I use dDefinder's update of Gunmod's Radiance Lighting Hack. As it turns out, the way the Radiance mod deals with custom lights is to inextricably link them to the Maxis light they were cloned from-- which means the extracted Castaway Stories lights will forever emit bright electric light, even the ones that have obvious fire leaping up from their coals.

I was very sad.

Then I said to myself, "Wait, some of the Maxis lights are all flame-colored-y, maybe it's possible to mod the mod and get the lighting I want!"

It turns out it totally is.

None of these pics have been retouched in Photoshop except to crop them (and once, to combine two photos taken from the same angle to eliminate speech balloons).


Candle-lit dining hall, although a small hall. Brunette in the foreground is wearing one of Pooklet's freckled skins, the alien teen in the background is wearing Ivory Tattoo by Chakaru, and my wicked witch is wearing Phaenoh's lighter overlay. The guy's hair glows like that under any light but sunlight, I haven't figured it out (but I'm only keeping that hair until I steal its alpha anyway).

What This Tweak Does

So I gathered to me all of the base-game floor, ceiling, wall, table, and outdoor lamps that don't emit a special-effects kind of light (because you never know when you're going to need blue or green or red light, or whatever, for a set or scene) and set them to emit a light called 'candleflame.' To see an in-game example of candleflame light, check out the Torcher Luminescence Sconce.

Practically, what this means is that any custom light cloned from the thirty-seven base-game lights I fiddled with will now glow warmly with fire's warming glow.

What This Tweak Does Not Do

Unlike my hiders, you cannot cherry-pick which lights you want fiery. It isn't exactly whole hog or none-- more on that later-- but you can't decide you only want one of the base game floor lamps to be candlelight and plop that file in your game. I'm sorry, but making the Radiance mod read each lamp as an individual file instead of in the EP-specific lumps it was designed for is well outside my ability as a modder. It is entirely possible to change each light to the light color of your choosing (within available options), but it's not something I could feasibly offer up for download.

What This Tweak Is Good For

Non-electric themed games, mostly. I play Medieval, but I could see this look being of use to folk who play anything before the electric light, which ranges from Discovery Of Fire to Gaslamps Are Everywhere. Medieval, Regency (or Victorian, but I see a lot of Regency games), Fantasy, and even Post-Apocalyptic themes could get some use out of this tweak.

Or, you know, if you just like a warm, romantic light, or want to tear my changes apart to make your own, that works, too.

This Tweak is Easy to Screw Up!

Seriously. Seriously. If you are not comfortable mucking around with the Program Files folders, either get comfortable or do not download this. None of the files go in your Downloads folder, this isn't a standalone mod but a tweak to an existing mod, and it will overwrite parts of dDefinder's mod. I do not believe it will break your game-- the Radiance Lighting thread suggests the worst a bad install will do is give you the Red Graphic Death, which is easily fixed by correctly installing backup Maxis lighting-- but it's still pretty easy to try to put this in the wrong spot.


Reading one of my book defaults. I should make an illumination pun. Bedding is off-white, hair is Incendiary. Walls and floor by Sherahbim.

What You Get

The Zip file includes reference photos, a list of exactly which lights have been altered, installation instructions, instructions for tweaking your own lights, and one text file each for altered Base Game floor lamps, hanging lamps, outdoor lamps, table lamps, and wall lamps, Family Fun Stuff lights, Bon Voyage lights, Celebration Stuff lights, Mansion and Garden lights, Pets lights, Seasons lights, and Teen Stuff lights. You should not install lighting files for expansions you don't have; also, changing expansion lighting is completely optional-- if you want all your base game lights to be flamey but everything else to be as dDefinder intended, more power to you. Unfortunately, cherry-picking by expansion is the only cherry-picking you can do for this mod.

Also included are updated versions of the Sims 2 Store Castle Stuff lights, the Beacon of Brightness floor lamp and Fleur de Luce chandelier. Originally, these cast a bright white light, but their internal .nlo files have been updated to give them fire. You can use these two lights (if you have Apartment Life, Mansion and Garden, Sims 2 Store Edition, or one of the newer bundle packs) even if you don't install the rest of the mod.

You will also get a backup of dDefinder's original files for the files I altered, but I will not provide a Maxis lighting backup or a full copy of the Radiance lighting mod itself.

These files are not compressorized, because they don't need to be.

How To Use It

Okay, first (assuming you are the administrator on your Windows account; Mac users, you're on your own), go download and install Gunmod's Radiance Light System 2.4 Updated by dDefinder following dDefinder's directions, if you haven't already. If you're a newcomer to Radiance lighting, you might want to delete your cache files and start your game to revel in the pretty, and to be sure you installed the mod correctly.

In my zip, you will find a folder labeled Hat's Lights and a folder labeled Original Radiance Lights. Original Radiance Lights is your backup, don't lose it. The Hat's Lights folder contains the modded files, which you will select and copy to your C:/Program Files/EA Games/The Sims 2/TSData/Res/Lights folder. Let them overwrite dDefinder's files. (If you're on Vista, your game may be installed to Program Files (x86). Don't get lost.)

Delete your cache files.

Start your game.

You may have to re-buy lights to make the changes show up, but that hasn't been my experience.


Lights and temple from Castaway Stories, outside at night, so that the shrine is backlit. These lights put out a cold white light before, despite containing actual fire.

Before we get to the download, I have two comparison shots and a list of what lights have been altered for you. Yes, I forgot to switch out the Sims 2 Store lights for their unmodded versions, but I always manage to screw up something. Pics of the C-C-C-Chandelower, Helier's Streetlamp, and Tri-Luminlight Streetlamp are linked from their names, because they're super-awkward to photograph the same way I shot all the other lights. No matter what I did, I couldn't get the Helier's Streetlamp to behave properly; I'd suggest placing it far enough away from second-story walls that the splot of white light doesn't show up. Yes, the C-C-C-Chandelower is a mess as far as lighting goes; it lights the second-story walls but not the second-story floor or anything on the first story. This is how Maxis designed it to work, and dDefinder couldn't fix it.


BEFORE-- Radiance Lighting As Intended


AFTER-- A World Lit By Fire

BASE GAME LIGHTS:

1. Thrice As Nice Floor Lamp
2. Burnished Blaze Torchiere
3. Light Orbiter Floor Lamp
4. Social Climbing Ivy Floor Lamp
5. Tornado Torch Floor Lamp
6. Tulip Light from Luxiary

7. Basically Bare Bulb
8. Wall Flowers Sconce
9. Almost Deco Wall Sconce
10. Antique Metal Sconce (unchanged)
11. Illuminating Angles by Newt Vo
12. Lunatech "GaulleVanizer"
13. Torcher Luminescence Sconce (unchanged)
14. Torcher Clamshell Wall Sconce

15. 4 by 4 Designer Chandelier
16. Chinese Riddle Lantern
17. Dangling Daylight Ceiling Lamp
18. Floral Fancy Hanging Lamp
19. Lamp on the Half Shell
20. Legno's Modern Chandelier
21. Light Effects Ceiling Lamp
22. Lunatech "Lighten Up" Lighting Fixture
23. Lunatech Amber Ceiling Lamp
24. Paper Moon Ceiling Light
25. Qadim Bubble Lamp

26. Founding Fathers Electric Lamp
27. Whodunnit? Table Lamp
28. Absolutely Nothing Special
29. Dynasty Enlightenment Lamp
30. GentleGlow Table Lamp
31. Ilistara Lamp
32. Lunatech BCT/6 (unchanged)
33. Pix-Arm Drafting Lamp
34. Shoji Table Lantern (unchanged)
35. Social Climbing Ivy Table Lamp
36. The Inner Light
37. The Watt Is It Table Lamp

38. Blazin' Buckaroos Lantern
39. Little House Lantern
40. Secure Sentinel Post Lamp

--. PreventTek Tri-Luminlight Streetlamp

EXPANSION LIGHTS (that are nevertheless in base game files)

a. Orbs of Connectedness (Uni)
b. Belle Epoque Tiffany Lamp (Nightlife)
c. Circle of Friendship Floor Lamp (Uni)

FAMILY FUN LIGHTS:

A. Dreams Alight by Guildsmen

PETS LIGHTS:

B. Asayake MZ-30: Soothing Sun Device

TEEN LIGHTS:

C. Luminosity Candle Holder by Darkness
D. Nova Table Lamp by Vintage Victorian
E. Wall Flare lamp by Vintage Victorian
F. Four Star Ceiling Lamp by Vintage Victorian

(I thought I'd just done the candle. Apparently I got carried away.)

SEASONS LIGHTS:

G. The Swinging Light

H. Volcano Table Torch

(So the Swinging Light is pretty much the only Maxis-made chandelier that looks like it has candles besides the M&G Chandelower. I use it a lot, and have always been sad that it has a halogen light.)

BON VOYAGE LIGHTS:

I. Imperial Mane Ceiling Lamp
J. Softwind Ceiling Lamp
K. Survival of the Fittest Fixture

L. Wild Wilderness Floor Lamp

M. Lodging Lamp by Economical Effects
N. So Bright It Almost Smells
O. Mountain Man's Lighter

P. SaunaSoothe Wall Light
Q. Stylish Wall Sconce

(Admittedly, some of these don't make too much sense as flame-lit light fixtures, like the Mountain table and floor lamps, but the candle light seems to work better for the general mood of the lights themselves.)

MANSION AND GARDEN LIGHTS:

--. C-C-C-Chandelower

--. Helier's Streetlamp

SIMS 2 STORE CASTLE SET LIGHTS
(requires AL, M&G, Store Edition, or recent bundle pack like Best of Business)

i. Fleur de Luce Chandelier
ii. Beacon of Brightness Floor Lamp


Admittedly the floor lamp tiki torches were always fire, but I'm showing off examples of the lighting anyway and I really love this shot.

Wow, I'm glad you've stuck with me this far. Okay, so you know that this is a tweak to an existing mod, not a stand-alone mod. You know what it does and what it doesn't do. Allow me to give credit where credit is due...

Gunmod, for the original Radiance Lighting System, which is awesome...
dDefinder, for the updated Radiance Lighting System, which is expansions full of awesome...
Plasticbox, for releasing a bunch of individual lighting fixes that, while not compatible with Radiance lighting, started me figuring out what to do...
and our own Eva, for saying DO IT or nearly so (more like SHARE IT) at a key moment.

Show you one more picture...


A surprisingly mean Good Witch, with fair skin, Volatile hair, and a lovely cream dress by Sherahbim, sitting in a white-and-gray throne against a gray stone wall. Photo taken after dark in a very, very well-lit room.

And now, please feel free to

DOWNLOAD on Mediafire | DOWNLOAD on Sims File Share

Also feel free to hit me with questions, I shall do my best to answer them.

Wanna help me feed my cats?

In case you feel like dropping me a buck or two, should you have a buck or two to spare. Donors get two things at the moment: a) a link to the Super Secret Cat Gallery, full of pictures of the cats you'll be feeding, updated sporadically when the cats do something photogenic and I'm fast enough on the trigger to catch it, and b) a link to the list of content I have done-but-not-screencapped, nearly done, partly done, or in the planning stages, and the option to suggest what ought to be in the next batch of things I focus on.

Comments

[morgaine2005.wordpress.com]

I've only just managed to get Radiance to work properly. I'm still in awe over the sunrises & sunsets. And now you come and give all the lights a warm fiery glow ...

Holy cow!! Thank you so much, Hat!! *does happy dance, mashes thanks button*

Just want to toss something out there, though -- people who already have the Beacon of Brightness or Fleur de Luce lamp might want to remove the original packages from their downloads folder. Apparently with TS Store stuff, if you have two copies of an object in your game, it will disappear entirely -- both from the Buy menu and in your Sims' houses. Naturally, I found this out the hard way. ;)

But again, THANK YOU!!! Hat! :D

[hat_plays_sims]

... Huh. That's never happened with me with the Store stuff-- weird. But good to know, because if it happens in one person's game, it could happen in others.

I'm glad you like the lights, though! I admit I thought once or twice "I bet Morgaine could get some use out of this one" as I was banging on things and trying to make them work. I remembered reading somewhere you'd said you got Radiance working, but I'll be damned if I can remember where.

[eefje00704]

Ah, the pretty ... it's going to be hard now for me not to start up my game to try this out. Must. Study. (I bet by tonight, I'll have tried it out already :P)

But really, Hat, I can't thank you enough for this. You always have the best ideas, and manage to make them happen too.

[hat_plays_sims]

Yay, I have Eva's approval! Finish studying, then play games. It always works out better that way.

You are totally welcome, thank you for encouraging me to share (even if it turned out to be easy once I knew what I was doing). Now if only my aging mod gave me some low-end elder lifespans. *frowns at old ladies* Most of my handy dandy testerhouse is going to kick it around 72. Which is average, but it's not much variety.

Maybe in a house where I let them sleep and work, it'd be more varied...

[eefje00704]

Yes, but I don't 'finish studying' until the end of the month. That's a long time to wait. Plus I won't play, just put down some lamps and look at the pretty :D

72 is pretty old for the Middle Ages, isn't it? Although, maybe it isn't when you consider that all of your elders have already survived childhood (obviously). (I really wish babies and toddlers could die in TS2, it's so unrealistic that they all live.)

[hat_plays_sims]

Dang, that is in fact a long time-- two weeks! I'd go nuts, if only because I always go nuts when I say I can't X for Y time. Even if I've gone Y time without X plenty of times before, making it a rule gives me cravings for X.

72 is about human average, actually. Medieval average was lower for several reasons-- if you made it out of early childhood alive, you could easily make it to fifty or better... if your lord didn't grab you out of your fields to come fight in a battle you weren't at all prepared for. If you were a man. If you were a woman, every pregnancy was taking your life into your own hands-- but if you survived until menopause, you could be old for a long time.

And I do wish infant mortality were possible for Sims-- apparently there's a hidden toddler death-by-electrocution animation somewhere, but nothing for babies. The only way I know of to kill an infant is the babbyroaster, and while part of me wants to make an invisible recolor so I can set up some kind of sacrificial altar, a) none of my in-game cultures really have room for a Moloch and b) that is so far from death by whooping cough that it isn't even funny.

[eefje00704]

Couldn't help myself, I just had a quick look in game. It does look beautiful, the lamps give everything such a warm glow.

Yes, that's what I thought. Once you made it to being 'old' you could probably get quite a lot older. The problem was getting to the 'being old' stage.

We should totally have some sort of mod that gives you a dialogue at birth like with the trips and quads hack, except it should say 'Let mother survive, let mother die, or random.' Same for the baby. And one for when babies age up to toddlers 'Age, die, or random.' That is, of course, if it were at all possible to mod the game so that babies could die. Maybe I should make a request at Simbology some time, even if it's just to find out for sure if it could be done or not.

[hat_plays_sims]

They DO, don't they? I took a buttload of pictures and hardly used any... firelight on either side, but moonlight from the front.

Exactly. There were kind of a lot of things that could kill you.

And that sounds like a great idea for a mod, even if all you get for the infant death is a tombstone, not a death animation, since you're not supposed to screw around with the Reaper. (Although even if he just came, picked up the baby, and went away, leaving a tombstone...)

[eefje00704]

Well, there are still a lot of things that can kill you, just new things. Cars, motorcycles, airplanes, busses, trains, allergies, cancer, AIDS, falling from the top floor of apartment buildings, guns, bombings, chemical weapons, ... it's actually kind of surprising we live for so long when you think about it.

I'm going to make that request as soon as I've finished my exams. I can't do it now, because I think when you make a request, you should at least be able to test it yourself. Going 'oh you gave the mod I requested a try, that's great! I'll get back to you on how it works in two weeks' would be a bit ridiculous :P

[hat_plays_sims]

Well, we DO win a lot of Darwin Awards... But we also keep making things safer.

That's entirely reasonable. I'm just trying to think how it would work... Maybe four choices on one card so you don't have to have two extra pop-ups per birth?

"Childbirth is serious business! There are no guarantees that everybody will make it through the experience.
|Mother Survives (roll dice for Baby)| |Baby Survives (roll dice for Mother)| |Roll Dice for Both| |Ignore (both survive)|"

Granted, it wouldn't make it easy to kill babies off for storyline purposes, but that's easily solved the same way you solve needing a boy or a girl for storyline purposes can be solved-- save before the birth, then exit without saving until you get the result you want. *does quick research* Looks like death by birth or complications from birth is generally accepted at around 20% at the highest for mothers... Infant mortality is guesstimated at 30-50%, but that's for the first year of life, not the first few minutes.

[nervous_sims.livejournal.com]

Great. I didn't think it was possible from all your previous medieval-ish uploads (I'm a sucker for hair, okay? ):) and your defaults, but.. You have now just made me wish I had a medieval-style game even more. ;_;

I hope you're happy. :P

Enough of my whinging, I think you've done a fantastic job with this.
The lights just look so much more, warm now.

Keep up the good work.

[hat_plays_sims]

Medieval is a really, really REALLY easy theme to give into, because there's so much great content out there. And I'm a terrible enabler, I know it. *grins*

Thank you so much, and hold on for a hair dump one of these days-- I've got a couple hairs I want to finish and a whole mess of swatches to make. Swatches take more time than you'd expect.

[curiousb]

Oh oh, oh, I really want to find a reason why I need this for my modern game! Is 'just because it's pretty' a good enough one? :D

Anyway, splendid stuff, Hat - your ingenuity never ceases to amaze and impress me!

[hat_plays_sims]

Well, I think it is! I like a nice warm light, even if it doesn't give the same true colors a white light does.

Thank you so much!

[(Anonymous)]

Hat, this is amazing!

[hat_plays_sims]

Thank you!

[(Anonymous)]

Awesome! I love how warm and glowy the lights look. :) I'm so going to use this in my (sort of) post-apocalyptic neighborhood!

[hat_plays_sims]

It makes sense to me! There's no electric company, generators require gas, but you can make candles out of beeswax or tallow or soy, and fire out of anything that will burn...

I'm glad you like it!

[dinuriel]

This looks awesome! I'll have to try playing with it some time soon. Thanks for sharing :)

Quick thing about speech balloons--there is a cheat to get rid of them, but I can't remember what it is because it requires an EP that I don't have (although you probably have it). I think it's "showheadlines off" or something to that effect, but I'm not sure off the top of my head. What I do instead is just use the InSim wardrobe adjuster: if you've got a sim with a speech bubble or a relationship plus/minus or a memory or whatnot floating above their head, just click "Change to Everyday (or whatever the sim is wearing at the time)... [Sim's name]" and any overriding icons will vanish. The corresponding Blender function would probably work too.

[hat_plays_sims]

Thank you so much! I'm glad you like it, and I hope you like how it looks in-game.

I do know about the cheat, but I was already in camera man mode and I liked my angle-- it was easier just to take two pictures at different moments and erase the bits that spoiled my first shot leaving the nice tidy un-ballooned bits from my second shot than remembering how to save my angle, doing that, entering a cheat, and taking pictures all over again.

[(Anonymous)]

Is your mod dependent on GunMod's original lighting system, or do you think it would work with Aaron's Ambiance mod?

[hat_plays_sims]

I've never seen Aaron's Ambiance mod, so I'd say it's safe to say it wouldn't work with it. The files in my mod are just files straight out of dDefinder's edit of Gunmod's mod-- it's not a standalone mod, just a tweak to an existing one.

[kalynn06.livejournal.com]

This is lovely. It has inspired me to set up Ancient Highway's themed games batch file and update my downloads, so I can play my 18th Century Village again, which I haven't touched since the end of October. One of the reasons I ditched radiance lighting for my period game was so I could have plasticbox's fix for that Seasons swinging light which I absolutely love and abuse. I can have both again. Thank you :)

[hat_plays_sims]

I swear my files are worth downloading just for the Seasons file. I'm so glad you like them, and that you're getting your period game going again!

[(Anonymous)]

Hat... thank you!

I am a period player, have been since the start of Sims1, Medivael being my theme of first choice. All of your defaults and mods are fantastic. They are loaded into my game and work wonderfully. I am particularily happy about the lighting.

Thank you!

One question - where may I acquire the "temple" setting? It would be perfect for the storyline that is in progress, along with harvestable coconut trees, but I'm not holding my breath on those. ;-)

Again, thank you for all your wonderful hard work on the Medivael mods/defaults. Including the Lighting!

[hat_plays_sims]

It's from Castaway Stories! There's a ton of Castaway crap on MATY, but the ruins are from this post specifically-- scroll down a bit, they're in there. (However, the first post? Has some coconut trees for you. Somewhere on InSim there's a mod to make the harvestable trees harvestable for edible fruit instead of just cash or food points, but I haven't tested it enough to recommend it.) I kind of completely love Castaway crap.

[(Anonymous)]

Fantastic! I have Castaway for the PSP, though I don't own one. My kids do. When we're out and they aren't using their machines, I scarph one up. *chuckling* yupyup. Thank you! I shall check out those links.

[(Anonymous)]

Your witch wouldn't be the only mean Good Witch; Phoebe Adams has three niceness points, and I believe she has three points in activity, outgoing and playfulness, but zero in neatness. I'd love to mess with her personality file and give her ten activity points, and maybe only two outgoing points - give her a Nervous Subject type personality - and change her aspiration to Family. I've even made a former Cow mascot into a good Warlock, and he seems to be okay with it.

Scriptorium?

[celticlass]

Hat, before I try to install this, I was wondering if it works if you have used the Scriptorium method to automatically install the radiance lighting mod? Thanks!

Re: Scriptorium?

[hat_plays_sims]

I'll be honest; I have absolutely no idea because I've never used Scriptorium. If all Scriptorium does is put the files into the correct places, then there shouldn't be any problems, but I can't know for sure because I installed everything by hand.

Re: Scriptorium?

[celticlass]

Ok. Thanks. The instructions say that's what it does. I'll give it a try and post the results here.

I gave it a try. All of the files were right where you said. I LOVE this mod! Thank you for adding so much realism to my sim's medieval world. It's amazing what a difference lighting makes!

Re: Scriptorium?

[hat_plays_sims]

I'm glad it worked! Thanks for letting me know.