NE Olympics '16 / June 16th: Cross-Country Engineering

Besides the fact that almost none of the built structures would actually stand up, all of the entries were decent for the first round. Kingdom of Ni takes it in a landslide, the rest were about average. 

 

I was expecting a bit more quality, but I guess my grounds for talking are gone since my team didn't submit an entry

I really liked Parkmenistan's entry. It did a lot of unique things and was the most fun to look through and explore for me. Jaguar did a great job with our team's entry. The suspension bridge was obviously the highlight. The inclusion of traffic and the little details like the car accident and naming of the trackitecture helped it feel really finished and polished. Coaster Rica's entry was very clean and well built but lacked a defining feature to catch the attention. I really liked the bridge idea in Aesthetica's entry but it just didn't quite match the quality of the top two entries for me. I liked the Doninican republics entry but it didn't offer a lot besides the roads. Overall it was a solid first round considering the limited options.

I was expecting a bit more quality, but I guess my grounds for talking are gone since my team didn't submit an entry

 

Nice to see all the other slacker teams didn't submit one for this discipline. I think Sulakke built half a damn on the map we were working on submitting

I think it's pretty clear who won but I'm very happy with my Supreme Leader's work in this event. The massive scale of the bridge in Nork River Basin makes it a great centerpiece and the offroad trail is super fun, but Crimson Way Bridge was an easy choice for first even though they stole our dam placement

Some really nice entries.

 

Kingdom of Ni honestly blew me away, which I was not expecting.  Especially when looking at the builders (no offense), you guys really provided a great piece of RCT.   Only thing I wish would have been different would be the diagonal roads, you could have merged some diagonal track and it would have looked a lot cleaner.  Other than that it was great stuff.

 

Second place was really tough for me.  Aesthetica ended up getting my vote because it felt the most constant and fit the objective a bit better than Parkmenistan.  The dirt roads felt like a bit of a cop-out and could have been done a lot better.  The draw bridge (not sure if that's the correct name) could have been a bit better as well, the green color really felt out of place and compared to the main bridge and ramp system, the rest of the map was bit underwhelming.  I have to admit your tunnel idea using the black walls was clever and was something the other maps could have benefited from.

 

Rest of the maps were solid but didn't do enough to distinguish themselves.  All ended up a bit sloppy and could of used some more refinement and detail work.

Decided to vote on this from an engineering perspective. This includes roadwork! All the bridges are well done though. 

 

My thinking process is this:

 

Aesthetica has two roads, the bridge serving to connect the two. It's simple, doesn't crowd the map. There are no extreme grades on the roads. 

 

Coaster Rica is a mess of roads. Literally one road serves no purpose other than to reconnect with the road it splits away from. 

 

Kingdom of Nin is a square. There are two ways to get across right next to each other. Definitely the best bridge though. Also, the slope leading down from the damn into a turn on a bridge into a tunnel is not a good engineering decision. Brake check anyone? Also, there's a footpath on the bridge, but no area for people to even park and walk onto the bridge. 

 

Doninican Republic didn't stand out visually, in fact, it dropped the ball by creating an intersection in the middle of the map. However, they used the terrain well for the road system, and they nailed using tunnels! 

 

Parkmenistan has a straightforward design! Big ol' centerpiece of a bridge. Well done on that. Then you come to this little draw bridge... What large boat would ever need to come into that lake? Those are not navigable waters for large boats. It's a waste of a bridge design. 

calatravas

really nice entry. good details, lovely bridge (I especially like the old railway bridge) and the dam was excellent too. We had a similar dam idea I think but didn't end up working much on this round at all, and anyways you guys did it really well.

 

coaster rica

your roads felt a bit more awkward and layed out a lot less sensibly- hard to imagine why they would add so many bridges for roads that essentially just go in circles. the bridges themselves were OK but maybe a bit squarey/underdetailed

 

crimson way

I'm reviewing this in order as I open them up and this is my favorite so far. fantastic, giant bridge to really steal the spotlight but a lot of awesome details all around. car crashes, tunnels, realistic touches all over. loved the moving traffic. great work!

 

doninican republic

this one is also quite underwhelming. a sort of uninspired road layout, with pretty bare bridges. a bit awkward in a lot of spots IMO.

 

parkmenistan

awesome bridge and awesome road layout. tons of cool details, like the drawbridge, offroad track, etc. also pretty outstanding work

 

I think what may decide it for me between parkmenistan and crimson way is the moving traffic. really added a whole new level of movement and atmosphere that the others were lacking. good round all round though, looking forward to more!

I went with Aesthetica's entry for my no.1 vote. I found it to be the best looking one (appropriately), with a simple but striking modern suspension bridge. It fitted the landscape well too, which is something I didn't think was the case with Crimson Way's golden gate inspired bridge. I also really liked the winding elevated roads and the green bridge. Crimson Way was very strong though, mostly because of the charm and livelyness that traffic brought to it. Very good job there, it really made it fun to look over. In the end however, I didn't see this as being AS relevant to the criteria as the quality and originality of the bridge's and other engineering elements, and I think our team also accomplished this better than Kingdom of Ni.

very nice entries. I am thrilled, that our work is liked by so many of you guys.

 

I will post a full review of the others later today. Obviously, I will not vote. But just to clear that up: could I vote this discipline? I mean not only my team, but I personally worked on one of the entries !?

Aesthetica

Logical and simple layout to connect the roads. I like the dam, the white bridge looks very clean. Looks great and very modern. One point I dislike is the tunnels, this could be done better.

 

Coaster Rica

Confusion is the first what comes to mind to describe this. It's a criss cross of roads and that seems very confusing and unnecessary. I do like the white bridge and the tunnels are executed more realistic than Aesthetica's park but aesthetically also not so great. Also a great little dam but I feel this kinda lacks a big eye catcher.

 

Doninican Republic

Very clean, very logical road layout. The diagonal bridge is example for the whole park: clean and very effective. The whole park shines in simplicity and efficiency. Execution of tunnel is getting better the more parks I view.

 

Kingdom of Ni

The first and only park that included moving cars! And I have to say they help a lot. The road layout is the most logical of all submissions. Also here a dam present. The great red bridge is a huge eye catcher and greatly executed. Well done. The execution of tunnels is the best of all submissions, very well done too. The little bridge is also great and the road block a nice detail. 

 

Parkmenistan

Clever move to make an abandoned path from one of the roads. Well firs things first, you can't look around the huge bridge, tuibrug (don't know the English name), which is very fun to ride on. Very clean. You guys had your own idea for the tunnels and it's not bad, though I still like the tunnels of Kingdom of NI more. Kinda funny you also added a typical Dutch bridge on the side of the map, but it feels kinda out of place in this environment. Nonetheless strong submission.

 

 

Congratulations on all the builders to deliver. Was fun to view, but I can only vote on two submissions. I went with 1) Kingdom of Ni and 2)  Parkmenistan. Kingdom of Ni was simply the best but for the second spot it was hard to chose. I went with Parkmenistan but it could also be Doninican Republic or Aesthetica. 

Went with Aesthetica and our entry.

 

Most important for me in this round was a reasonable road design. Obviously the setting is a nice countryside far away from any larger town. So roads here are mainly countryroads. So it makes no sense to have a loop of roads in this kind of setting or to have stop sign or even traffic light crossings. In some entries I had the feeling that the creators never drove with a car through countryside. Moreover, when there was a large bridge it should also be part of a larger road. That was my biggest concern with the Kindgom's entry. They have a in fact very nice bridge, that is also rather huge. But the bridge leads on both ends into a T crossing?! The road design is what made aethetica and my team in the most convincing way.

 

Some comments on the entries:

Aesthetica

Imo the best entry. The bridge was very nice, aswell was the dam. Only criticism would be the trafficlights. This entry was the one with the peeps on the road right? What were they doing there??

 

Coaster Rica

I liked the heaps of earth for the ramps at the canyon area. I did not like the fact that there were two roads with the same direction 30m apart from each other. The bridges were solid, but nothing special. Loop in the road design is a huge downer. The tunnels were very low.

 

Kindgom of Ni

As mentioned above, the bridge is very nice but it does not fit into the road system. Also a loop in the roads. The tunnels were very nice. I did not like the fact that there were sidewalks everywhere (even into a large tunnel). The whole roads felt very city-like but that did not fit into the setting imo. The traffic was a nice idea but poorly pulled off. Diagonals were really ugly and the creeping speed of some cars on parts of the track was also not nice to watch. I liked the car accident in the corner.

 

Doninican Republic

Solid entry with a few flaws. I liked the serpentines down the hill by the lake. The diagonal tunnel was not very good. What killed the entry for me was the T crossing with stop signs. I mean wtf is this a traffic calmed area?

Some comments on the entries:
Aesthetica
Imo the best entry. The bridge was very nice, aswell was the dam. Only criticism would be the trafficlights. This entry was the one with the peeps on the road right? What were they doing there??

 
 
They were mocking me -_-

They were mocking me -_-

Zai made one for himself then I added one for myself and then we just made them for everyone lol

shouldn't the poll be closed by now?

Results

 

The poll has been closed, the votes counted, and these are the results! All teams congrulations on their first points. A score table will be published soon!

 

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1st - Kingdom of Ni
Traffic On Crimson Way Bridge by Jaguar (85%) and thirteen (15%)

19 winner votes (x 2)
6 runner-up votes
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44 votes

The Kingdom of Ni earns ten points

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2nd - Parkmenistan
Nork River Basin by Liampie (70%), Tolsimir (20%) and Faas (10%)

6 winner votes (x 2)
19 runner-up votes
________________
31 votes

Parkmenistan earns 8 points

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3rd - Aesthetica
Calatravas Confluence by Zaiush (80%), Coupon (10%) and spacek531 (10%)

6 winner votes (x 2)
5 runner-up votes
________________
17 votes

Aesthetica earns 6 points

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4th - Doninican Republic
Roads with Bridges by Maverix (90%) and Scoop (10%)

3 winner votes (x 2)
2 runner-up votes
________________
8 votes

The Doninican Republic earns 4 points

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5th - Coaster Rica
Coaster Rica Cross Country Engineering by X7123M3-256 (100%)

1 winner vote (x 2)
2 runner-up votes
________________
4 votes

Coaster Rica earns 2 points

Am i the only one wanting to build a park on that landscape?

Go team! Congrats on gold guys! Really wanted to help with this, but was out of town for a week. I'm back now... and motivated

Congrats Kingdom of Ni!

Congrats to first and second for their amazing entries, congrats to my country for coming out with a decent entry for our first appearance on NE and congrats to everyone who entered the event for scoring some points. I'm having so much fun