I see one particular reviewer repeatedly critique the use of prefab elements and the lack of terraforming and I was wondering how the rest of the people here feel about such things.
I like using buster's corks and such because they are easily scaled to fit whatever track I'm working on, and at the same time, they don't require a ton of riding/editing/riding/editing etc. to get the pumps and bumps out as they are about as perfect as elements can be made. when making a complex coaster, they not only save time, they improve the overall quality of the ride, so when I see criticism that they are being used, I have to wonder what is more important here.
As for terraforming, I don't add points for it unless it is particularly well done, something very few people achieve. Most of the time, it just helps kill the framerate rather than improve the realism of the ride. Killing the framerate is an important factor to me, my comp isn't that fast and I really hate to ride a coaster that is being compromised by a 3 fps view of it. Those who know how to use the terraformer properly, usually chose the lowest detail setting and apply lots of filtering to smooth the features out, and they also know how to optimize the polygons...everyone else just adds terrain like it was an afterthought and it tends to detract more than add to a ride.
Just thought I'd throw these questions out there.