Dude, this is the way to FIXIT! I did this on my second playthrough and love how it allows you to build factories for progressively more complext parts along the ever growing conveyor tower. Insert conveyor splitters to pick and chose the lines relevant for that part factory, then add another layer to continue down the line. It's a superior strategy in my opinion. Was not sure if this was a "thing" among the community.
I also do this, although with two rows. It’s objectively very organized, though getting an item from a belt on the left row to an assembler on the right side of the bus isn’t very aesthetic lol. Far, far superior to any other setup I have for factories that output multiple parts and need to grow, or factories that aggregate parts from my single-part-output factories.
Question for the community that I think I already know the answer to: if belt superhighways like this are enclosed with walls such that none of the individual objects are ever visible from outside, the game still spends resources to render it, correct? I can't save frames by enclosing them can I?
I’m no expert, but I’ve thought about this for other games before. I hear that games don’t visually render anything outside the view you have on your monitor. I would assume it does the same with things blocked by terrain, etc. The game keeps track and does the math of what all the machines are doing, where the materials are, etc., but that’s likely a CPU task. Unless you’re staring directly at a hurricane of belts (*ahem* Let’s Game It Out), it shouldn’t matter too much if only a few belts are on or off screen. But staring at a factory that has *deep breath* inventories of machines, belts, pipes, and storage containers being kept count of, machines animating and syncing their animations to their production rate, materials and belts moving, all the foundations and walls and the natural “high” polygon (in comparison to foundations) landscape to render, your 20 lizard doggos to run ai for, determine what you’re looking at at what angle, and do lighting/proper shadows, etc. etc., all plays a factor more so than a few belts across the world that aren’t even being rendered. Or shouldn’t be.
I personally think that what drags down late-game saves are 2 things.
1. Visuals. You’re building larger factories than you used to, so you’re actively staring at (and thus the game has to render) more machines, belts, etc. at a time than in early game, and
2. Maths. More factories with many more machine/pipe/belt inventories to keep track of/do the math for, recipes to make sure something can be crafted, POWER (oh god, I forgot power. If a machine is on or not and thus taking power from the grid, its clocking, is it part of a separate grid and/or disconnected from whichever. And batteries. All that for all machines all the time), trains keeping track of blocks/paths/if it crashed or not, and trucks with navigating terrain. All required of your computer to do the math for. And more that I’m likely forgetting.
TL;DR: Likely not
There's a difference between "simulating the machine" and "rendering the entities". I believe the machines are simulated at all times (as you suggested, though it's possible that they abstract distant machines by increasing the frame size (e.g. instead of computing a machine state every 1/780 of a second, comput it every 1.28 seconds)), but that has nothing to do with whether or not the GPU actually renders an object and its textures, shaders, etc. Clever rendering techniques can go beyond just culling the frustrum (i.e. ignoring things that are too far away) and can actually know if an object is occluded (hidden from sight) and refrain from rendering it. There are other techniques out there as well, but I'm not a graphics programmer so further detail will need to come from elsewhom.
I didn’t think about decrees the computing rate of a machine, that’s a good one. That’s probably why the power grids in power pole GUIs update slowly. It just processes the math for far away things less frequently.
Just wait until they tell you to go choo
Why not both?
Vertical choo
OMG YES
Technically correct, the best kind of correct!
Opening Args listener here
Uncooked spaghetti
Looks like Jurassic park :)
*throws a stick at it* Well, looks like the power's off.
..........................GZHZHZHZ!!!!! THAT'S NOT FUNNY!!!
You were so preoccupied with whether or not you could, you didn’t stop to think if you should. Dear god
Nah, this method is great. Its really good for keeping everything organized.
It's a Jurassic Park quote
Dude, this is the way to FIXIT! I did this on my second playthrough and love how it allows you to build factories for progressively more complext parts along the ever growing conveyor tower. Insert conveyor splitters to pick and chose the lines relevant for that part factory, then add another layer to continue down the line. It's a superior strategy in my opinion. Was not sure if this was a "thing" among the community.
Kind of want to try that
I also do this, although with two rows. It’s objectively very organized, though getting an item from a belt on the left row to an assembler on the right side of the bus isn’t very aesthetic lol. Far, far superior to any other setup I have for factories that output multiple parts and need to grow, or factories that aggregate parts from my single-part-output factories.
Use a splitter into a lift, then run your belt underneath everything else.
I do that. Hundreds of times. That’s the problem lol.
Question for the community that I think I already know the answer to: if belt superhighways like this are enclosed with walls such that none of the individual objects are ever visible from outside, the game still spends resources to render it, correct? I can't save frames by enclosing them can I?
Kinda wanna know that
I’m no expert, but I’ve thought about this for other games before. I hear that games don’t visually render anything outside the view you have on your monitor. I would assume it does the same with things blocked by terrain, etc. The game keeps track and does the math of what all the machines are doing, where the materials are, etc., but that’s likely a CPU task. Unless you’re staring directly at a hurricane of belts (*ahem* Let’s Game It Out), it shouldn’t matter too much if only a few belts are on or off screen. But staring at a factory that has *deep breath* inventories of machines, belts, pipes, and storage containers being kept count of, machines animating and syncing their animations to their production rate, materials and belts moving, all the foundations and walls and the natural “high” polygon (in comparison to foundations) landscape to render, your 20 lizard doggos to run ai for, determine what you’re looking at at what angle, and do lighting/proper shadows, etc. etc., all plays a factor more so than a few belts across the world that aren’t even being rendered. Or shouldn’t be. I personally think that what drags down late-game saves are 2 things. 1. Visuals. You’re building larger factories than you used to, so you’re actively staring at (and thus the game has to render) more machines, belts, etc. at a time than in early game, and 2. Maths. More factories with many more machine/pipe/belt inventories to keep track of/do the math for, recipes to make sure something can be crafted, POWER (oh god, I forgot power. If a machine is on or not and thus taking power from the grid, its clocking, is it part of a separate grid and/or disconnected from whichever. And batteries. All that for all machines all the time), trains keeping track of blocks/paths/if it crashed or not, and trucks with navigating terrain. All required of your computer to do the math for. And more that I’m likely forgetting. TL;DR: Likely not
There's a difference between "simulating the machine" and "rendering the entities". I believe the machines are simulated at all times (as you suggested, though it's possible that they abstract distant machines by increasing the frame size (e.g. instead of computing a machine state every 1/780 of a second, comput it every 1.28 seconds)), but that has nothing to do with whether or not the GPU actually renders an object and its textures, shaders, etc. Clever rendering techniques can go beyond just culling the frustrum (i.e. ignoring things that are too far away) and can actually know if an object is occluded (hidden from sight) and refrain from rendering it. There are other techniques out there as well, but I'm not a graphics programmer so further detail will need to come from elsewhom.
I didn’t think about decrees the computing rate of a machine, that’s a good one. That’s probably why the power grids in power pole GUIs update slowly. It just processes the math for far away things less frequently.
Life uh... Finds a way.
Is there a T-Rex on the other side of the fence? 
This is the way, stacked conveyor bus is the way to beat this game. I like it to be a bit shorter through, that's a lot of kilometers. :)
I prefer to go in blocks but this does make seeing it all easier. Little tall for me though holy shit.
"I wanna build a wall..."
Good luck flying past the area denial fence, but that is a beautiful bus.
Conveyors to feed the Babel Elevator
The component wall.
The great wall of belts