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Dev Diary - Renewed Cities by Brum
March 6, 2026by Cities: Skylines Official
Hello everyone!Welcome to my Developer Diary about the Content Creator Pack: Renewed Cities for Cities: Skylines.
First of all, let me introduce myself: I’m Brum, a Brazilian architect and designer passionate about architecture, urbanism, and a big fan of Cities: Skylines. Living in a tropical country, I’ve always loved assets that represent my place and culture. But, there weren’t as many of them on the Workshop as I’d like. That’s why, at the end of 2022, I started learning 3D modeling and began creating Brazilian historical buildings and contemporary assets from tropical countries.[p align="center"]
RESEARCH & CONCEPT
To define which assets would be created and what their style would be, my research was guided by two key aspects: Function and Form.Function
Urban planners are always looking for ways to attract major companies and new residents to revitalize downtown areas. In addition, cultural, educational, sports, leisure, innovation, and creative economy spaces, along with social housing and parks, are key components of such renewal projects.Contemporary urbanism, which aims to bring all these functions close together to create vibrant, livable cities, inspired my decision to design a CCP featuring a wide range of functions: office buildings, residential buildings, unique buildings, service buildings, and parks.Form
After defining my list of assets, I conducted extensive research on architectural styles. I compiled a panel with around 800 visual references from across the world that I might want to add to my pack.
MODELING
Basic Volumes
Based on the moodboard, I built a simple volumetric model for each asset, studying their scale within the city, approximate footprint, and height. After placing them together, I adjusted some proportions to bring greater impact and diversity to the overall set.
Final Modeling
With the basic volumes and moodboards defined, I began the detailed modeling of each asset. The main challenge from this point on was to produce a significant number of assets and landmarks within a limited timeframe. In the case of Renewed Cities, each asset was essentially two - one historic and one contemporary - fused together. The first step, therefore, was to systematize the workflow.
Tris count
In modeling, the triangle count is crucial to ensure good in-game performance. Basically, you need to decide which volumes will be physically modeled and which will be represented through textures only. If a good number of volumes can be made by textures, then you achieve a reasonable tris optimization. In Renewed Cities, almost all assets range between 15K and 20K tris.[p align="center"]
TEXTURING
When creating building assets, I consider texturing to be the longest and most challenging stage - it requires patience and close attention to detail.Renewed Cities features a wide variety of architectural styles, which translates into a large number of textures. The historical architecture includes four distinct styles with many façade details. The contemporary part, in turn, showcases a multitude of materials and construction techniques that give each landmark its own character.The assets in this CCP are not replicas, so there was plenty of room for texture experimentation. One of the initial concepts was to create buildings where form and materiality reflect their function. For example, the Elementary School was designed like a building-block toy, featuring vibrant colors. The Innovation Hub has a high-tech shape and textures. The Police Headquarters presents an austere architecture that conveys solidity through exposed concrete. And the Lofts Skyscraper, with its sinuous outline and large balconies, clearly represents a sleek, modern luxury condominium.[p align="center"]
Example of the six texture maps for the Police HQ in the picture above. At the top, the diffuse texture (_d) is edited in Photoshop and tested multiple times on the 3D model. Later, it is also tested in the game editor, along with the other texture maps: alpha (_a), color (_c), illumination (_i), normal (_n), and specular (_s).
GAME EDITOR
Importing the mesh and textures into the Cities: Skylines editor allows previewing the asset in-game, across all variations — map types, snow, day, and night. But that doesn’t mean the process is finished. Based on what the editor shows, textures are further refined in Photoshop and re-imported into the game as many times as necessary to achieve a perfect balance of color saturation, reflections, and nighttime lighting.[p align="center"]
LODs
With the assets finished, it’s time to create the LODs. As many players know, an LOD (Level of Detail) is a simplified version of the asset with a reduced tris count and texture size - like a miniature model that replaces the main one when the camera zooms out, helping optimize the game’s performance.The greatest challenge in creating a good LOD is to avoid a noticeable transition during zoom in and zoom out, when the full model switches to the simplified one. Some LODs had to be reworked multiple times to make this transition smooth and almost imperceptible.[p align="center"]
To conclude this Developer Diary, I've included below some screenshots of the Tempered Vanilla Theme at different times of day and night, without using color correction mods.I’d like to express my gratitude for the privilege and creative freedom I was given to bring Renewed Cities to life. I’m excited to see what Cities: Skylines players’ imagination will create with these new assets. Thank you very much!Daniel BrumFollow Brum here
Cities: Skylines 1 Workshop: https://steamcommunity.com/id/DBrum/myworkshopfiles/Cities: Skylines II Paradox Mods: https://mods.paradoxplaza.com/authors/DBrumInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/dbrum23
