Files TERRAIN - European Air War Help Site

FILES TERRAIN 9-23-2024

Researched, Written and Edited By: MarkEAW

CONTENTS

TERRAIN INTRODUCTION

There's a lot to choose from! Terrain Add-Ons are great, especially for a seasonal effect which really add to the immersion effect. You want to take a tour of duty in the Mediterranean. A swing through the desert. Snowy Winter terrains. That can be arranged also! You can watch the colors change--the dark Summer terrain is replaced as Autumn rolls around, then snows cover Western Europe in Winter, and finally Spring arrives. (P.S. EAW community member JPI, who is from Lyon, France, says that the new "Spring" terrain is perfect when combined with Major Lee's Mediterranean airfield tiles and Geo's red-roofed Med buildings for France in 1940!) And if you're using the Pacific skins, then "Pacific Terrains" are a must. One community member named, Serb took Paul Wilson's terrains and added High Res Lr*.ter files to them to make custom new Terrain Sets.

AUTUMN TERRAIN

Related Download Links:
-terrain-summer

Hi-Res Summer EAW Terrain: (sum_hr.zip 3.2MB)
by Max188.
the cleaned-up and enhanced default version Hi-Res Summer EAW Terrain. This is a hi-res summer terrain based on the original EAW terrain. The tiles have been reworked to clean up the original terrain, adding texturing and improving color and detail. Snow has also been added to the mountain areas. This is still the "classic" EAW look, but you will be surprised at how much better it looks.

Summer EAW Airfields: (sum_field.zip 471kb)
by Max188.
This is a set of high detail summer airfields for EAW. It includes grass, concrete, and asphalt runways. The airfield colors and textures include more detail and color variation than the default airfields. These were created with the original terrain in mind, but can be used with any terrain set.

Hi-Res European Terrain and Airfields: (eurosum.zip 3.6MB)
by Max188.
This is a new hi-res summer European terrain. It is very detailed and uses photo-realistic tiles, some of which are based on CFS2, FS2K2, and EAW textures. Also includes a matching airfield set. This is a very nice summer change from the original terrain. If your video card does not work with Hi-Res Terrains, download this Normal Resolution European Terrain Patch. (eurosum_lr.zip) You must first install the Hi-Res European Terrain before using this fix.

CFS Terrain: (cfster.zip 4,166kb or CFSterrain.zip 4.06MB or jaysterr.zip)
Converted by JayP.
The most incredible of these is a set of terrain tiles from Microsoft's Combat Flight Simulator textures for European Air War. The colors are rich, the seaming is minimal, and the cities are much improved. Either way you should really check it out for yourself, it is a favorite terrain. A nice change of pace when you are ready to look at something a bit more detailed that provides you with almost photo-realistic landscape graphics especially at high altitude.

CFS terrain sure is pretty at high altitude...but its ugly down low!, but so is the default terrain. It has areas of unrealistic scale and other oddities but after using it for quite a while, you may not want to go back to the original default terrain. The old stuff just looks a little too "painted. However, "The enhanced "darker, richer" of the EAW stock version may seem to make more sense to you. The roads and houses are in the right place, 3d trees are in the right places....You can use the darker version for Spring and standard for Summer, just for an idea.

JayP (10-31-1999)It was actually very simple to do. I have next to no skills with computer graphics, but I do know how to cut and paste, which was all that was really required. The CFS textures are 256x256x256 bitmaps just like the EAW ones. All you have to do is find one you like and edit it to fit in with the EAW textures. Once you work out how EAW fits its terrain together, this is a simple, but time-consuming, process.

It's helpful to turn your desktop down to 256 colors when you're doing this, or get a program that converts color depth without screwing up the image.

There are two main differences between the EAW textures and the CFS ones. One is that the EAW textures are considerably less detailed. The other is that the EAW ones have to tile onto each other on each side. EAW flips its textures through 90, 180 and 270 degrees, so each side has to be able to tile onto any side of any texture in its group, including itself.

For the fields, and most of the other textures, you have to do two things. The first is to make sure that the little roads that cross the fields all lead off the texture such as to link up with each other. Secondly, you have to make sure that each space between the roads on the side of the texture is filled with something that matches up with what will be on the side of the opposing texture.

The way I did it was to find a few CFS field textures that looked suitable and then add some EAW style little roads in the right places. Then I erased the spaces between the roads and filled them with matching textures (this is where the cutting and pasting comes in). Finally, add a few pixels here and there to make it blend a little (this is where my lack of graphics skills shows through) and you're ready to run PICPAC on the sucker!

The roads and rivers in my textures are just the EAW roads and rivers pasted over the top of already converted CFS textures. Similarly with the coastlines. The cities, forests and grass are a bit different as they don't have the little roads, but the principle is the same. I found the cities by far the hardest to convert.

Down low the CFS graphics get horriable, no depth perception.....the CFS terrain is best appreciated at altitude. It looks about the same until you get below 10K ft, it still looks OK to me until you're below 3K, then it gets blurry and looks very flat. I still think it looks better than the stock EAW terrain, though.

Many thanks to all those who have tried the imported terrain.

You may have experienced problems with the low-res coastal city texture (lrcostct.pcx). Thanks to some helpful feedback, this problem has been fixed. It turned out that in coast.bat, picpac's output on lrcostct.pcx was being written over the original file rather than as a new .ter file. This meant that you didn't see the new texture in the game and that lrcostct.pcx was now blank.

To fix this, either resize bncostct.pcx to 128x128 and save as lrcostct.pcx, or get a new copy of lrcostct.pcx....

If you want to make your own coastline textures using coast.bat, you should edit the line that processes lrcostct.pcx to prevent the problem from recurring.

In response to popular demand (well, 1 person actually but it's a good idea), I have now posted the TER files for the CFS import, in order to save people the trouble of having to use PICPAC.

CFS Terrain Patch 1: (terfix1.zip 484kb or terfix.zip)
by Migge.
adds alternate water graphics, for JayP's CFS terrain, changes the water to a darker blue.

CFS Terrain Patch 2: (terfix2.zip 64kb)
by Migge.
adds a missing river mouth coastline tile.

CFS Terrain Patch 3: (coasts.zip 823kb)
by Claude Lumpkin.
adds new coastline artwork and water graphics.

Gaz's Summer Terrain: (Gaz Summer Terrain.zip 4661kb)
by Gaz and AxA.
This terrain is based on tiles that AxA has used for an earlier terrain replacement for Rowan's "Battle of Britain". One of the nice features of its terrain tiles is that there is more vegetation (parks) in the bigger cities. The colors are very rich (especially the water) - give it a try...

Enhanced Summer Terrain: (Enhanced 2A v1.zip , Enhanced 2B v1.zip , Enhanced 2C v1.zip , Enhanced 2D v1.zip , Enhanced 2E v1.zip)
by Sagginb and GAZ.
...

Enhanced Original European Terrain Textures: (enhanced.zip or terrain2.zip or DefaultHRDark.zip 4441kb)
by stererik aka Stone.
This Dark Terrain modification of the original terrain provides you with nice darker colors and richer shading, making the landscape look somewhat more real. For those of you who dislike the CFS terrain because of its poor detail at low altitudes, this may be the right choice for your new standard. Unzip terrain2.zip into the main EAW folder. The 136 terrain files ( *.ter ) should be in the EAW folder, not in a subfolder.

Falcon 4.0 Terrain Conversion: (F4TerrainSet.zip 3792kb or F4toEAW.zip 3.7MB 3,792kb)
by Paul Wilson.
This is a conversion of the terrain graphics of Falcon 4.0 for use in European Air War. The landscape texture ported from the jet game. A distinctive green system reminiscent of bamboo, pale color usage is impressive. The visibility of enemy aircraft etc. is pretty good, and it emerges as clear in the background.

Europe Summer Terrain: (EuropeSummerV3.zip 3793kb)
by Paul Wilson aka Shatterer of Worlds.
This is a new Summer season terrain set...with both Bn*.ter and Lr*.ter files. Old Versions: EuropeSummer.zip 3.6MB , EuropeSummerv2.zip 320kb patch.

(5-18-2000) Why create another summer terrain? I wanted to create something that looked just about as good as the CFS terrain set but also look great down low. I am achieving this by using more square\rectangular fields as opposed to the chaotic jumble from the CFS tiles. This allows more field edge lines to rune north\south and east\west so that tile lines do not get pixelly. In addition, I am using darker edge lines and that makes for a more subdued texture down low.

I don't know if this terrain looks better at high altitude than the CFS set but it does look much better than the default terrain IMHO. The default terrain is too cartoony looking. My fields are built by hand from scratch but the field textures are coming directly from the photographic looking CFS tiles.

Basically this set will be a cross between CFS and default EAW although I believe it will end up looking a lot more like the CFS tile set when finished

I also like the square\rectangular field look since I believe it better duplicates the look of wartime Europe fields as seen in photos from the time.

Russian Steppe Summer Terrain: (Russian_Summer.zip 4.01MB)
by Stephen O'Leary aka Prune.
...contains also forest. Other File Names: Russian_summer_1.zip Russian_summer_2.zip Russian_summer_3.zip Russian_summer_4.zip.

"Sea to forest" set for Russian Steppe Terrain: (Russian_summer_forest_1_2.zip)
by Stephen O'Leary aka Prune.
Changes sea and coastal tiles into forest...Old Versions: Russian_summer_forest.zip

European Summer Terrain v4:
by vonOben.
This is an update of Paul Wilson European summer v3 with the following changes:
· Cities: Resized the cities, no more airfields over the city houses.
· Forests: Removed the small roads along the forests to get a more natural look.
· Coast: Changed the coastline using textures from max188's Summer terrain. Added new small coastal city with a harbor.
· Mountains: Mountains covered with forests.
· Roads: Slightly darker roads with softer edges. Changed one road back to EAW default style. Changed the fields around the roads, so they fit better with the roads and look more natural.
· Rivers: Remade the rivers using EAW default water textures and the riverbanks from max188 high-res terrain. Removed the small roads along the river forests to get a more natural look.
· General: Changed certain corner fields to get a more varied look. Improved seams. Added small roads where they were missing, no more dead end roads. Added a few houses to make the roads more natural. Moved textures and small roads so they will fit better with the 3D ground objects.
...he has also released a fitting eaw_ttd.dat that places all ground objects where they can be seen in the terrain. It adds lots of immersion.

Summer Trees:
by Von Oben.
...

Euro-Seasons "Summer" v1.0: (EuroSummerV1.zip 3.55MB)
by sagginb.
...Other File Names: EuroSummerreadme.zip , EUROSUMMER0.zip through EUROSUMMER3.zip

Russian Summer Terrain With Forest v1.2: (Russian_Summer.zip 4.01MB)
by Stephen O'Leary aka Pilot Officer Prune.
...Other File Names: Russiansummer1.zip through Russiansummer4.zip, Russiansummerforest.zip

TROPICAL TERRAIN

Related Download Links:
-terrain-tropical

Hi-Res Pacific CFS Terrain: (cfspac.zip 583kb)
by Jay aka JayP
By replacing all other textures besides forests, cities and airfields with a water tile, you'll get an impression of the Pacific Islands landscape. However, be sure to decrease ground detail level so that you will not encounter trans-oceanic railroads or ocean trees. Older: pacter.zip 600k

I made a Pacific version of the imported CFS textures. Everything except the cities, forests and mountains is overwritten with water textures. The cities are overwritten with forest, and the forests are edited to fit with the water. The result is something that looks a little like a bunch of islands covered with jungle. It's not great, but it looks a lot more like the pacific than the standard texture set!

Hi-Res South Pacific Terrain "Tarawa": (tarawa.zip 1271kb)
by Claude Lumpkin.
Coral reefs, lots of deep blue water with foaming waves, jungle covered tiny islands - what would a Pacific pilot want more? Lots of enemy targets, I guess... Be sure to set terrain detail level to low to avoid trees and houses in the water.

Hi-Res South Pacific Terrain "Rabaul": (rabual.zip 1117kb)
by -E, Claude Lumpkin and Jay
This Pacific Island Terrain is the "hybrid" Terrain Set named "Rabaul" by -E, that is in fact a combination of Jay's Pacific and Claude Lumpkin's Tarawa. It covers the bigger islands of the "Tarawa" set with the CFS textures that feature in Jay's set.

Pacific Mainland Terrain: (PacMain2.zip 4207kb)
by Paul Wilson aka Shatterer of Worlds.
This provides you with a Pacific Terrain with less water areas. The terrain is primarily forest/jungle but also has areas of farm vegetation (fields of rice, etc.), and cities created from the CFS terrain set. It also features flooded areas including flooded fields (reside where forest use too) to get you the impression of an Asian landscape. This terrain could really represent any large Pacific land area. Make sure you set Terrain Detail to Low in EAW game setup. If you do not strange objects will appear the the wrong places! Like forests of trees appear in the water and all over the place when down low. (I sure wish I could figure out how to change the terrain elevation data.)

Mediterranean Terrain Textures: (eaw-med.zip)
by ?
...

Tarawa South Pacific Terrain: (tarawa.zip)
by C. Lumpkin.
These South Pacific tiles were created from aerial photos of atolls, surf, and islands. It's a stunning sweltering terrain set that will have you reaching for a cool lemonade and squinting under those sunny Tarawa skies. If you have waited for the pacific addon's to mature, wait no more, begin or expand your pacific collection today.

Coasts: (coasts.zip)
by JayP and C Lumpkin.
C. Lumpkin blended aerial photos of coastal cliffs and beaches with JayP's terrain tiles to create more photorealistic coasts. Coast and water included. You must have CFS Terrain for EAW (cfster.zip)

Mediterranean Terrain: (medter.zip 4746kb)
by Snake Macguphie.
Terrain replacement for the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations. The original early artwork by Snake Macguphie has been completely revised to apply missing tiles and some vegetation. Looks great now...

Mediterranean Terrain: (medter2.zip 4193kb)
by Martin "Hoover" Hoefer.
The second Mediterranean Terrain set up for European Air War.

Mediterranean Terrain: (MedTerWilson.zip 3641kb)
by Paul Wilson.
And here comes number three... Yet another fine Terrain Pack for a Mediterranean look. Make sure you set Terrain Detail to Low in EAW game setup. Old Versions: MedTer.zip 3.6MB

Repacked Mediterranean Terrain: (Mediterranean_ter.zip 7.5MB)
by Martin Osranek aka Dolfo.
...June 5 2001...Common Features: High resolution ground tiles, High resolution objects, including all buildings, trees and vehicles (trucks, trains, ships), Seasonal landing strips, buildings, trees and camouflaged vehicles (more hires tanks in winter, autumn, Mediterranean, desert, late war), Ugly 3D forests eliminated, Transparent airfield tiles, White parachutes, Hand-picked aircraft skins best suited for each theatre(Mediterranean_tpc.zip 1.7MB)...

Pacific Blue II: (TERPACIFICBLUEII.zip ??kb or pbfile1.zip through pbfile4.zip)
by Jaeger.
A complete set of files that are required to introduce a new terrain for the Pacific theatre of operations. The original 'Tarawa' terrain set by Claude Lumpkin was used as the base. Ground effects, such as the airfields, were created by Moggy and assistance was also given from Pretzel.

WATER TERRAIN