Why the barriers?

[Griffith500]

It's not so bad on Death Valley, but the other themes have a noticeable "hump" where the track scythes through the terrain. Driving on / over that, between the two components, just isn't going to work, cars will likely get stranded. The collision physics don't help here, and that even applies to "jump tracks", where it's possible to get stuck on peaks in the road!

Not sure what the fix is, aside from reengineering the way the ribbon is integrated into the base terrain, and / or making the ribbon wider at Death Valley, as above (but its bulbous nature would be painfully obvious, more so than on the other themes, in that case).

 

[UnkaD]

I try to keep from the back-and-forth kind of stuff and the snickery comments, but I'll leave this here. Don't like the invisible walls? Slow down and turn. I don't mind them since I never really notice them.
I gave an opinion on why I think there is sense to what we have. I think guardrails would look strange on the location, but what is the point on working to lay out a track if anyone can just cut through the whole thing?

 

[Samus]

I try to keep from the back-and-forth kind of stuff and the snickery comments, but I'll leave this here. Don't like the invisible walls? Slow down and turn. I don't mind them since I never really notice them.
I gave an opinion on why I think there is sense to what we have. I think guardrails would look strange on the location, but what is the point on working to lay out a track if anyone can just cut through the whole thing?

You can't be serious, can you? Not everyone is a perfect robot that never runs wide and that is especially true on a track you've probably never driven before. Seriously, "Don't go wide" is a terrible excuse for this design.

What I don't understand is the other tracks have a grass run off before a barrier, why couldn't the Death Valley have at least some dirt run off before the invisible barrier? Logically makes no sense that the barrier is directly against the road.

 

[Griffith500]

You can't be serious, can you? Not everyone is a perfect robot that never runs wide and that is especially true on a track you've probably never driven before. Seriously, "Don't go wide" is a terrible excuse for this design.

What I don't understand is the other tracks have a grass run off before a barrier, why couldn't the Death Valley have at least some dirt run off before the invisible barrier? Logically makes no sense that the barrier is directly against the road.

Having thought about it a bit more, I think it's to keep the width of the whole track structure to a minimum. This presumably because they took the aesthetic decision to not have any visual obstruction to the view on the background scenery.

For example, look at these shots:

View attachment 468652 View attachment 468654

A larger runoff before a solid barrier would mean a wider "hump" on Death Valley, where it would be visible at all times and spoil the impression that you are driving a road that is part of the terrain. It'd also mean the decoration had to be moved back, too, which is another aesthetic blow.


The answer, in my opinion, is to remove the barriers outright, but navigating that hump would be interesting. It needs to be made so that it better blends into the background, geometrically.

A quick thing they could try is to move the barriers to the very outer edges of the hump, but even then the trackside decoration becomes an issue.

 

[Samus]

Perhaps, it just seems like this was the easiest, and quickest solution. I mean even the old concrete wall like unbreakable tape would be better than completely invisible walls, at least you would have an idea that was the edge of the track.