If anyone is interested I've made some edits to the IC2 energy block textures (Batbox, MFE, MFSU, and all 3 transformers). I find I can no longer live without these texture modifications and wonder why the default textures are not as explicit.
It might be overkill, but I've labeled each face of each block with it's name, or an abbreviation thereof. Also there are markings on each face:
- "L" bracket markers indicate the "primary" face (output face for storage blocks, higher voltage face for transformers)
- Diagonal line markers indicate the rear face of the block, opposite the "primary" face
- Straight line markers indicate the other sides. I tried to have unique markings on these sides indicating with arrows which way the "primary" face is in relation to each side, however, in-game, these textures always orient based on cardinal directions, and not relative to the other sides.
I've also removed some of the decorative markings on the MFSU and HV transformer as they made the texture too busy.
- Amber colored markers indicate that the block is in its default mode
- Green colored markers indicate that the block is in its alternate mode
For transformers default mode is normal high-to-low voltage mode (low redstone signal), and alternate mode is the inversed low-to-high voltage mode (high redstone signal).
For storage blocks I believe the correlation between modes and textures changed at some point. I'm pretty sure the normal mode texture used to mean "not fully charged", while the alternate mode texture meant "fully charged". However this doesn't appear to be the case anymore. These days, the only time I ever see storage blocks using the alternate mode texture is when they are set to "Emit if partially charged", and redstone signal seems to not affect the texture mode at all, regardless of the block's redstone configuration. Still, the directional functionality of the added markers is useful.
Attached is the texture PNG file. It's meant for this thread's texture pack. You can add it by opening the texture pack ZIP with
7-zip, navigating to the "ic2/sprites" directory, and dragging the PNG into that directory. Then answer yes when it asks you if you want to add the file to the archive. It should overwrite the original texture PNG file within the archive. Make sure to exit the game before doing this. Also before you insert it intot he archive make sure the image is called block_electric.png or it work overwrite the correct file. Then just load the texture pack in-game as you normally would.
Here is the original file for comparison or if you want to revert without redownloading the entire texture pack. You'll notice that in the original there is absolutely no difference in the textures for the different modes, which in my opinion is ridiculous considering it can mean the difference between a healthy system and a big hole in your base where a bunch of expensive machines used to be.
I've also attached the .XCF file I used to make my edits with GIMP. It's in a ZIP because I can't upload a .XCF apparently.