Hiker, software engineer (primarily C++, Java, and Python), Minecraft modder, hunter (of the Hunt Showdown variety), biker, adoptive Akronite, and general doer of assorted things.

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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: August 10th, 2023

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  • “Unused road” is ridiculous except in extremes. Unless people merge well over a mile back, 1 lane of traffic will make no difference. The only way “unused road” matters is for the people that haven’t entered the traffic jam yet who are getting off before they reach it.

    Very few people (from what I’ve seen) merge more than 30 car lengths out. 30 cars is not going to make a difference.

    What does make a difference is the fact that we can’t do a merge at speed because some people want to “zipper late.” It’s the zipper behavior that matters, the “at the very end” part never should’ve been added to that recommendation.

    Looking at an actual research paper about this, the zipper merge demonstrated is not at the last possible point. A merge point forms ahead of that point and that’s what should be used. The pictures from their study show the zipper occurring over a wide area with many of the zipped cars driving in the middle.

    https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/35694

    I don’t know how studies like this have become the recommendations we have. They seem to me to miss critical bits.

    Edit: based on my quick read, it’s worth noting the study finds only minimal support for the zipper merge and only in contexts not involving trucks largely based on visual analysis from their video feed as the quantitative data was not statistically significant. We need better transparency on recommendations like this frankly and the research supporting them. We should be able to have an honest debate on the merits of the papers.



  • The problem with zipper merges as this person describes them is a zipper merge is SUPPOSED TO get traffic back up to speed. However, when your take on the zipper merge is “up there where the wreck is at the last possible spot I can merge” there’s no time for a human to safely merge at speed. So everything has to continue at a crawl.

    So the people jumping out of their lane and “zipper merging” at the last second instead of 50 feet out or so end up making things worse for everyone.

    The zipper does not and should not be at the point of the physical problem on the road. Just like you should not just drive to the end of the on ramp and at the last possible second merge into the lane on your left without paying attention.


  • I really can’t more strongly disagree with this take.

    Zipper merging is to interleave two lanes of traffic when there’s one lane of traffic available ahead.

    It DOES NOT matter if it’s done with 3 feet to merge or 300 feet to merge. There’s no efficiency gain.

    What does matter is some assholes trying to merge at speed at the last possible second.

    The zipper point should not be the point where there’s NO ROOM to merge SAFELY without EVERYONE going 3 miles per hour.

    The handful of times I’ve seen a zipper merge actually start to work, someone rushes down to the end of the line where the problem is, nearly causes a second accident trying to get over, and then everything starts moving at a crawl again.

    You don’t need to zipper merge at the “physical barrier” causing the zipper merge to be necessary.











  • I’d argue you’re the one that’s committed the nirvana fallacy if anyone.

    You want them to take a useful stance but you quit supporting them because it wasn’t enough of a useful stance.

    I’m just saying, don’t moralize companies … they’ll let you down every time. It’s not about doing what’s right, it’s about fitting in. Companies are like the virtue signalers in high school, they’ll only do it if it’s cool.

    Maybe that’s useful to your cause, maybe it isn’t, maybe you support them maybe you don’t, but I wouldn’t expect a company to do things from a place of morals.





  • Yeah for me, it’s the variety of tales that you author. Every game feels a bit like a new adventure, after a while similar to ones you’ve been on before, but still new.

    ARC has those elements, but something feels off so far for me…

    Also typically the progression is in terms of variety (Roguelike) instead of straight power (Roguelite). That keeps things fair because even a new player, if they trade the aim, can pose a real threat to a seasoned player of similar FPS skill. ARC seems like it’s decided to go for a sort of Roguelite experience and that seems risky.


  • I haven’t played Marathon, but I did get into the ARC test. This will mostly be some ramblings…

    I’m still waiting to play ARC with some friends. I only did some solo stuff.

    I’m coming from this as a big Hunt Showdown player (1,200+ hours) and someone that’s played a bit of Forever Winter (~20). I still like Hunt better; I think it’s the only extraction shooter that didn’t take a ton of influence from Tarkov.

    I wasn’t crazy about the marathon art style, but I’m not ready to pass judgement on it until I’ve been in the world.

    ARC’s art style I found beautiful but also perhaps too sparse. There were so many wide open spaces … I just don’t see that being a good thing for an extraction shooter. The world felt vast and empty … I prefer Hunt’s more cluttered and dense design.

    ARC does seem to have a lot of potential in like how it’s designed its AI, Hunt’s is very primitive in a lot of ways and kind of secondary. I think the AI is going to be a bigger deal in ARC.

    Third person also feels worse to me than first person. I hope they add a first person mode to ARC, but I kind of doubt they will.

    I definitely agree that ARC felt like it was being set up to tell a story and felt very cinematic at times.

    The UI also felt like the best extraction shooter UI I’ve ever encountered.

    I’m concerned about the long term health of ARC. The progression system seems like it will certainly lead to established players dominating newer players. The lack of a primary objective that’s shared by all the teams on the map … I’m not sure how I feel about that. On the one hand, it may lead to a more relaxed experience, on the other hand, it doesn’t curate players towards each other like Hunt does; it seems looting and crafting are the primary motivators instead.

    The fights that I did get into, they lacked the complex environment and buildings in Hunt so I didn’t find them nearly as engaging, they were much more straight forward gunfights than leveraging the map to use it to my advantage. I think that aspect will ultimately hurt the game as it makes it feel like a bit of a generic shooter.

    Overall ARC felt very middle of the road from what I’ve played of it so far. I had a similar feeling about The Finals. Embark seems like a talented studio and I wish them the best as they go up against Bungie and Crytek.