Friday Facts #269 - Roadmap update & Transport belt perspective

[posila]

So I was just pointing out, that while I still disapprove, it is completely official now, as they made a change that specifically says it is considered intentional now.

Originally, the mechanic emerged from items on one half of the belt colliding with underground belt structure while items on the other half didn't collide and were pushed to the tile with underground belt. There was code specifically to preserve this behavior in 0.12 belt optimization as is in 0.16 belt optimization. That's just to clarify that changes that made it completely intentional mechanic happened years ago.

[Gergely]

So I was just pointing out, that while I still disapprove, it is completely official now, as they made a change that specifically says it is considered intentional now.

Originally, the mechanic emerged from items on one half of the belt colliding with underground belt structure while items on the other half didn't collide and were pushed to the tile with underground belt. There was code specifically to preserve this behavior in 0.12 belt optimization as is in 0.16 belt optimization. That's just to clarify that changes that made it completely intentional mechanic happened years ago.

So it wasn't intended at first! Kinda like the creeper in Minecraft or wall jumping in the Super Mario series.

[5thHorseman]

So it wasn't intended at first! Kinda like the creeper in Minecraft or wall jumping in the Super Mario series.

Correct. And also like those, it's been intentionally programmed in (and therefore is intended) ever since it was found.

[FasterJump]

Yes. It was a glitch, but they turned it into a feature to troll everyone for eternity because it was an useful glitch.

By the way, I think they want to have the 2 different spites (one being the side openned) to preserve the glitch/hidden aspect (glitchs are fun!)

[Artchr]

Thank you for the Roadmap update!!
Also Thank you all for the time you spend to keep us in the loop with Friday Facts.

[eradicator]

Yes. It was a glitch, but they turned it into a feature to troll everyone for eternity because it was an useful glitch.

By the way, I think they want to have the 2 different spites (one being the side openned) to preserve the glitch/hidden aspect (glitchs are fun!)

The full sprite also looks nicer and is what you'll be seeing a lot more. I can totally understand that they don't want to enforcing the cut-out/half-sized sprite on every underground just because one in a hundred is used for lanesplitting. (And i'm actually someone who uses that mechanic extensively.)

[Dr4chm4]

Hi,

thanks for your great work!
I'm really looking forward to the updates.

Just on thing (already mentioned) bothers me:
Circular belts have a second belt underneath for no reason.

[FasterJump]

There's been few posts about underneath circular belts. This request makes sense, but I think it makes more sense to not implement it. IMHO circular belts are ok because:

In-game reason : The player has a process for building belts. He don't bother creating a new recipe that save a fraction of 1 iron ore. And building circular belt like any other belts allow for versatility : if he open the loop, the belt parts continue to work.

Game design reason : it would need to create new spites, more memory used, would add nothing to gameplay.

When you use a keyboard, do you dismantle the keys you don't use ? It's the same for belts, it's in the package.

[yblondinca]

So now we have green circuits mixed on our uranium belt. Great job devs *twitch* lol

gross.jpg (270.94 KiB) Viewed 7715 times

[mexmer]

So now we have green circuits mixed on our uranium belt. Great job devs *twitch* lol

gross.jpg

all green, it's OK

[Calibretto22]

Is the topic from ff#263 (Trains in blueprints) still in the roadmap for 0.17?
or is it postponed for 0.18 / 1.0?


i like the new belt graphics. but until today i considered the backwards moving belt underground. so that the surface of the belt is even with the ground.

[Oktokolo]

So now we have green circuits mixed on our uranium belt. Great job devs *twitch* lol
gross.jpg

all green, it's OK

You never need more than half a lane of green circuits anyway. More efficient to share a lane with another ultra-low quantity item - like an ore.

[<NO_NAME>]

So now we have green circuits mixed on our uranium belt. Great job devs *twitch* lol
gross.jpg

all green, it's OK

You never need more than half a lane of green circuits anyway. More efficient to share a lane with another ultra-low quantity item - like an ore.

I always carry green circuit to assembling machines personally. There's just no point to build a belt for them and carrying them builds character.
(Well, my friend once made a whole green-circuit belt but he'd built a mega factory and have had automated everything. Pretty crazy stuff.)

[emp_zealoth]

I really love everything about new belts...apart from the underground cover redesign. (I do like the little cutout for the side belt) My main gripe is that it makes Factorio cartoonish. Those hard edges and 45 angles made the belts look properly "industrial", while those rounded covers make it look extremely cartoonish to me. Especially that the IRL conveyors usually do work with sharp angle breaks when going up or down.

[Ser_Optimus]

The new belts look awesome! Great work! But as mentioned in the post above, the new round U-belt covers look too soft. I like the style of Factorio because its all rough and with corners and edges.
Fro the holes for Belt splitting maybe the normal texture could have some plate bolted on to cover up the hole when not used. This would be a compromise between "its not always there" and "its a hint to new players"

[Lizzy]

I love all the changes, but I didn't see anyone mentioning the biggest problem I've always had with underneathies, which is that the "in" end looks too similar to tho "out" end. When zoomed out, and in a factory with a two-sided main bus, it can be hard to spot sometimes.

My suggestion would have the direction painting be more predominantly gray for the "out" part and more predominantly yellow/red/blue for the "in" part. Still the same overall design, just thicker lines, so they can be offset for that purpose.

[Twisted_Code]

I'm not sure how I feel about seeing the reverse belt for the entire length of the belt. Sure, it's cool to see that as opposed to the belt "disappearing" into the dirt/concrete/even-harder-material, but this change has a side effect that you see a reverse belt even when there shouldn't be one, such as those circular loops visible above. Perhaps the "wall" lifting the belt off the ground should be solid, so as to remove the contradiction completely? I hate the idea of completely hiding the reverse belt again after you put so much into it, but that's why you would still show it on the end tiles, which only occur in pairs. The point is to avoid this contradiction of having a pointless reverse belt because those ends would only occur when a reverse belt would make sense, and I'm not so sure there's an easier way to do that. The only other idea I have would be to somehow track whether a line of belts has end pieces or not and switch the entire line to a different sprite, but I think that's just asking for trouble in the performance department.
Other than that, looks cool, especially the new rounded look of the underground belt sprites! nice job guys!

[Oktokolo]

The only other idea I have would be to somehow track whether a line of belts has end pieces or not and switch the entire line to a different sprite, but I think that's just asking for trouble in the performance department.

Another option would be to display start and end pieces for the already existing belt optimization segements. It would be another nice little detail as it would visually split long belts into multiple shorter ones. And we could directly see the optimization segements without enabling the debug overlay.

[meganothing]

I'm not sure how I feel about seeing the reverse belt for the entire length of the belt. Sure, it's cool to see that as opposed to the belt "disappearing" into the dirt/concrete/even-harder-material, but this change has a side effect that you see a reverse belt even when there shouldn't be one, such as those circular loops visible above.

At least once in a circular belt there is a nearly invisible cut where the ends of the belt connect to underground. The circular belt is a normal belt with its ends put really close together

Maybe you can see it if you zoom in, maybe not

[FasterJump]

I love all the changes, but I didn't see anyone mentioning the biggest problem I've always had with underneathies, which is that the "in" end looks too similar to tho "out" end. When zoomed out, and in a factory with a two-sided main bus, it can be hard to spot sometimes.

My suggestion would have the direction painting be more predominantly gray for the "out" part and more predominantly yellow/red/blue for the "in" part. Still the same overall design, just thicker lines, so they can be offset for that purpose.

Good point, I'm so used to it that I didn't even imagine it possible.

@meganothing
Most simple explanation so far