Friday Facts #297 - New resource icons

[Jonathan88]

Also question for the Devs: I've got a few people to test the NPE on and I'm waiting until the large rebalances etc. have been done. Is the NPE already mostly finished, or should I hold off for 0.17 stable?

[pavlukivan]

The new icons look glorious, but I'd prefer coal to be darker for more contrast with stone.

[RocketManChronicles]

Hi,
Love the new resources on the belt. Feels much more natural and fun to look at after awhile.

Since you're asking for our help on thoughts..
On the gif, after the turn of the belt, it seems the resource converts to a different random resource after the bend, creating a tear. Could that be smoothed out?

Thank you!

I think that is the "layers" of the icons on the belt changing over. It seems when the icons are moving up, the lower one is in front, then when they turn around the bend, the icon on the side may become the top layer and the icons "switch." This already happens in the current versions of the game.

Maybe there can be a blended transition so that it does not stand out as much, but we can see what is proposed by the devs.

[eruanno321]

I really like how the ore moves on the corners, especially how smooth it looks from the left downwards.

[catma]

Thank you so much for shifting randomness away from inserter behavior and recycling it where it belongs (raw ore look) so it's not wasted!!

I was able to shrink one of my blueprints by half with the inserter reliability not-a-bug fix, but I still suspect there will be more inserter-assymetric-madness in some cases making blueprints not as rotatable as player expect.

P.S.: new launch deserves new merch. The "now or never" for fridge magnets, backpacks, and hammers is soon!!

[bman212121]

Thank you Twinsen! I really appreciate you taking the time to make the inserters even better.

[pleegwat]

P.S.: new launch deserves new merch. The "now or never" for fridge magnets, backpacks, and hammers is soon!!

Wouldn't pickaxes make more sense than hammers?

How about toolbelts?

[Ultros]

I used to do game logic with integers only for a previous job and it was a pain. It's a huge game design limitation that is not worth it.
Avoiding floating point problems is not a big deal.

As a developer (but not game), can you elaborate why that is the case?

I can't see something like the angle of an inserter requiring more than single-degree precision.

[eradicator]

I can't see something like the angle of an inserter requiring more than single-degree precision.

Pure speculation: Smooth animations for arbitrary angles. Example: with single degree precision you couldn't rotate 90° over 60 ticks smoothly.

[Krusnik]

As a developer (but not game), can you elaborate why that is the case?

I can't see something like the angle of an inserter requiring more than single-degree precision.

If you ever have to do any division, you have to round. Rounding is much easier if there is more precision. Otherwise you'd likely have to scale all your values up to add more precision. Integer math make sense for counting.

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Unrelated to above, I wonder if the issue with inserters not picking items up is fixed now!?

[Theikkru]

I predict that someone will ask for a way to detect the appearance variations so they can be sorted back out

[PaszaVonPomiot]

Yeah corners looks a bit weird and uranium would need some polishing. Other than than this resources look awesome. I mean it makes HUGE difference. Fantastic job devs!

[FerMod]

The new resources icons looks very nice! I really like the randomized feel.

[Blacky007]

I get a big headache from the new ICONS
please stop it!!!

[Quarnozian]

- Inserters are now smarter - Twinsen

THANK YOU! That was driving me insane. I actually had to do experiments a few months ago to find out what was causing that problem. The method I was using worked in every instance except if the belt was moving West, and the inserter grabbing the items was on the north side of the belt. All 7 other combinations worked perfectly 100% of the time. It was just that one arrangement that would miss one item 100% of the time.

- New resource icons - v453000

The randomized resource icons look fantastic. Having perfect duplicates for the raw resources was always something I had just accepted despite looking silly. There's so many more important things for you guys to work on. While it may not be "necessary" for the game, I definitely appreciate this change.

[Align]

The new resources look delicious. Especially copper looks like crunchy caramel. Can I get a belt of that, straight into my mouth?

[bobingabout]

assuming the random icon generation could be used by modders?
would love to see random icons like that for all of bob's and angels' ores

I'd do it.
I'd do it now, but the question is, does the game engine support this yet? if so, how do I use it?

[HalfPastZulu]

As always... Awe3some job on the bug squashing !

The new ore icons moving on the belt look so much more amazing! I can't wait to see it in game.


Thank You Devs

[AsherMaximum]

Hi,
Love the new resources on the belt. Feels much more natural and fun to look at after awhile.

Since you're asking for our help on thoughts..
On the gif, after the turn of the belt, it seems the resource converts to a different random resource after the bend, creating a tear. Could that be smoothed out?

Thank you!

I think that is the "layers" of the icons on the belt changing over. It seems when the icons are moving up, the lower one is in front, then when they turn around the bend, the icon on the side may become the top layer and the icons "switch." This already happens in the current versions of the game.

Maybe there can be a blended transition so that it does not stand out as much, but we can see what is proposed by the devs.

It looks to me like only the North>East and E>N turns have the problem. The S>E and E>S turns look fine. There's no W belts in the graphic though, so they may have the problem too.

[pleegwat]

It looks to me like only the North>East and E>N turns have the problem. The S>E and E>S turns look fine. There's no W belts in the graphic though, so they may have the problem too.

Southward belts will have the lead item on top. Northward belts will have the follower item on top. Depending on what east-west belts do, you will have a layer switch where the two switch which is on top either on south-to-east, east-to-south, north-to-west, and west-to-north, or on east-to-north, north-to-east, west-to-south, and south-to-west.