ProMods 2.50 Previews: Ukraine and Moldova

Posted on | by Stummer | 16 Comments on ProMods 2.50 Previews: Ukraine and Moldova

Welcome back once again. This week’s preview focuses on one of the most expanded countries in ProMods 2.50, Ukraine, as well as the first taste of brand new content in Moldova.

Ukraine

Ukraine is not only the second largest country in Europe, but also very important for international traffic. Its main roads connect central Europe with Russia, the Caucasus and even central Asia. So, no surprise that sooner or later we had to include this country in the ProMods map. There have been multiple approaches in the past: Ukraine was originally added with version 2.0 (two cities: Uzhhorod and Mukachevo). This work aged noticeably, so both cities got a complete rebuild with version 2.41. Meanwhile, development was started on the city of Kovel, but it was never finished and has become outdated over the last few years as well. But now we finally have a developer working on Ukraine again, PapierSUHD, and so there is lots of new content to add in 2.50. So, what can you expect from Ukraine in this update?

Five new cities have been added, spread over two oblasts (provinces) and linked by over 700 km of new roads. You will be able to see a great variety of landscapes from north to south:

Starting in the very north, you are driving through dense forests surrounding Kovel.

On the way south, passing Lutsk and Lviv, the landscape turns into vast fields.

And following the M-06 from Lviv further south, you reach Stryi and the Carpathians open up to you. These mountains are really a contrast to the rest of Ukraine in terms of landscape.

Of course, there are some small scenery villages as well.

But to make Ukraine look like Ukraine it’s not only important to represent the landscape and road network correctly, but also to fill it with accurate details. Let’s start with the UI map. Ukraine has switched from blue road number backgrounds to red some time ago, so we updated all road overlays on the map. The navigation signs have received special attention to detail. There is no generic system, so they all had to be created individually. Even if you drive with a navigation system, it is still worth taking a look at the signs. While there are not as many of them as signs, they are also important for the feeling of being in Ukraine: unique city monuments. Maybe you will discover some of them on your next trip? Finally, we hope you’ll notice that the new cities have received 100% real and custom companies. Each loading and unloading point is different from the others. At some of them you even have to have your documents checked before entering.

PapierSUHD doesn’t like to give too much away, so he selected his favourite spots for the screenshots in this post while leaving much, much more for you to discover. Are you ready to experience Ukraine in ProMods?

Moldova

Moldova was also originally added back in ProMods 2.0, along with Romania. However, the difference in age and quality between old Moldova and the new Romania from SCS’ Road to the Black Sea DLC was so great that we felt it couldn’t be included in that state. Therefore, Moldova was removed in 2.45 and our lead developer MandelSoft has been working hard at making the country from scratch.

The first stage of this was completed in time for inclusion in ProMods 2.50: the city of Balti and the connection to Romania are making a return.

That’s all for this preview. We hope you’re getting excited for ProMods 2.50, and as always, thanks for reading and we’ll see you next time.

ProMods 2.50 Previews: Baltics

Posted on | by Stummer | 4 Comments on ProMods 2.50 Previews: Baltics

Welcome to this week’s preview, which focuses on the Baltics. ProMods 2.50 sees the return of more pre-Baltic DLC areas that have been upgraded or even completely rebuilt, as well as changes to reflect road upgrades only recently carried out in the real world.

Estonia

Returning to Estonia is the island of Saaremaa and the connections to the existing road network on the mainland. Our Estonian developer martinusK is working hard to rebuild old ProMods areas in Estonia to today’s standards, so that they integrate well with the Baltic DLC content. He has this to say about the area:

“Estonia’s always stood firm by its naval heritage and what better example of it than the Western Estonian archipelago. Saaremaa, once home to our very own Vikings (Oeselians), has always had a distinct, although still strongly Estonian identity. Its people are tough and as history has shown, quite rebellious, surely being hardened by the Kaali meteorite strike in 1500BC. Saaremaa will have a total of six scenery or functional ports, and several companies are also navally oriented. The island will also have some of the smallest roads in Estonia, surrounded by typical thick pine forests – not that the Saaremaa-native reigning World Rally Champion would’ve been slowed down by that.
Personally: although I’ve lived my whole life on the mainland, Saaremaa will always be a special place for me. After all, I even get funny looks by my mates for speaking the dialect!”

Lithuania

Now on to Lithuania, where developer Horizon has been busy. Panevėžys, locally known as the capital of Aukštaitija, has recently upgraded the A17 highway, which acts as an international freight and travel corridor through the Baltic States as part of the E67 route between Prague and Helsinki. A majority of the work by SCS has been replaced to provide a more true-to-life rendition of the highway in the world of ETS2. As in the real world, configurations of 2+1 lanes were added (commonly seen in Sweden), as well as turbo roundabouts, of which there are only a few examples in the ProMods map. Lastly, the addition of three new companies to the city will enhance the game economy.

Also making a return is the Curonian Spit. Horizon provides the following details:

“The Curonian Spit: Lithuania’s most attractive tourist hotspot due to its nature, beaches and UNESCO World Heritage Site of fascinating sand-dunes that stretch across the thin landmass. In the world of ETS2, you will be able to drive across from the city of Klaipėda to traverse this piece of land and the coastal village of Juodkrantė.”

“The comeback of the Curonian spit will feature a mix of refurbished and brand-new sections built under new standards, in addition to completely changed ferry locations from past versions. On both sides of the ferry crossing, I have replicated the port as closely as possible to the real-world, for e.g. the current renovations, in addition to changing part of the city and its layout to get sophisticated results.”

Kaliningrad Oblast

Of course, the Curonian Spit is shared between Lithuania and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast. Vladzz-G has upgraded the connection from the border to Kaliningrad, via the town of Zelenogradsk, with assets from the Baltic DLC, restoring another area that was originally released in ProMods 2.10.

As always, thanks for reading and sharing this preview. There is still plenty more to come, so keep your eyes peeled for the next one!

ProMods 2.50 Previews: UK

Posted on | by Stummer | 15 Comments on ProMods 2.50 Previews: UK

Welcome to what is already the fifth ProMods 2.50 preview. This week we are taking a look at the changes coming to the UK, which has seen one of the largest overhauls yet: four cities brand new or rebuilt from the ground up, two dozen cities reskinned, and a large portion of the UK road network upgraded in some way. We’ll start with the southwest of England, specifically the county of Devon, where all content in 2.50 is either new or rebuilt.

Plymouth and Exeter

As we saw in last week’s preview, ProMods is far from a one man job. Plymouth is another great example of that. Back in 2016, IvanGF14 started with the basic layout of this large port city. He planned it ambitiously and was very motivated. Sadly, because of spare time issues, he couldn’t continue his project and so it was put on hold for the time being. Years later, developer Plum decided, together with his Exeter project, to finish Plymouth. Plymouth is a vast city requiring a lot of work, so developer FisherJB decided to help him on the industrial part of the city (once his own project in the Balkans was finished). After Plum finished Exeter, he took over development again from FisherJB and finished his areas and the road to the city’s port, going right through the city centre. But that wasn’t the end. A city without signs doesn’t look realistic or pretty, that is where Mandelsoft, ScuL and Dawid2849 came into action and did a fabulous job. After a lot of time the city is finally completed and you can enjoy the screenshots here, and drive it yourself in the near future.

Plum has some more details:

Plymouth was no easy city to make, it was a challenge. One of the hardest parts was making the road to the port right through the heart of the city. Currently there aren’t a huge number of high quality assets in the game for British city centres, yet with lots of hard work I managed to make something which represents the city centre. Sure, not every building will look identical to its real life counterpart, but there are lots of landmarks which locals will recognise, such as Charles Church in the middle of a roundabout, an anchor made out of flowers near the city centre and much more. The port itself also got a complete rebuild making it as accurate as possible, where you will be able to recognise a lot. By far the hardest challenge though was getting the view from the A38, which cuts right through the city. The fact you can drive deep into Marsh Hills retail park and the industrial estate made it a challenge to optimize too, yet the results are staggering.

Exeter was also a major addition to the South West. The city of 130000 is a centre for business and tourism in Devon, and so was an important addition to include in the UK. In game, Exeter has likely one of the most complex prefabs in the game – namely Junction 29 on the M5 which MandelSoft worked hard on for several weeks to make it highly accurate compared to its real life counterpart. Along with this, Exeter has many recognisable landmarks such as the River Exe, Exeter Airport and more. Below you can see some screenshots of the city.

For those who haven’t seen, some time ago Plum made some cinematics showcasing his work. You can check them out here:

Cambridge and Norwich

We now cross the width of England to the region of East Anglia, where longtime UK developer cashtime2013 has extended the road network and built the region’s largest city, Norwich.

As well as enjoying the view of the cathedral puncturing the city’s skyline, you can look forward to the dirt road to reach a sawmill, which he tried to make both challenging and scenic.

Cashtime has also completely rebuilt the university city of Cambridge. His favourite spot is the view across the river.

Rather than connecting Norwich to the rest of the UK with just one or two roads, a proper representation of the key road network has been created, so you can enjoy an authentic driving experience through rural Norfolk and Suffolk with a choice of route.

UK-wide reskins

There are multiple possible levels of improving an existing part of the map. At one end, the whole area can be deleted and rebuilt from the ground up, as has happened in Exeter, and is effectively brand new content. Sometimes, the basic road layout can be kept, but almost every other aspect is upgraded.

Then, at the softer end, are what we call reskins or refreshes. The goal with these is to get the maximum improvement for the time and effort invested. Swapping out map elements in place can make a remarkable difference: just by replacing ground and road textures, building and vegetation models, interchange and company prefabs, and upgrading the signs, an old area can be made to look ‘nearly new’. Of course, the results are not as impressive as a complete rebuild, but they take a fraction of the time.

This is exactly what cashtime2013 and Plum have done in the UK, making use of the shorter time requirements to refresh a large portion of the country. Shown below are 20 (!) cities which have received this treatment, covering both vanilla cities which were long overdue an upgrade, and older ProMods content which has been brought up to today’s standards.

Large parts of the road network have also been refreshed, with old single-prefab interchanges replaced and landscapes made more realistic. If only we had unlimited developers with unlimited time, we could rebuild everything to the highest possible standards. But in the real world, the reskin/refresh strategy is the best way to improve large areas of the oldest parts of the map at once.

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading, and we’ll be back again next week.