11 ms·
Airport Simulator
- kbcool 2mo agoI'm kind of disappointed that this isn't a simulator for managing what happens inside the airport rather than ATC. I'm also unsure why I feel that way as it sounds like a nightmare
- mattimatti 2mo agoFun to play, I like it puts a close by airport on the high-score board.
- TechSquidTV 2mo agoBoth me and my friend have been racing eachother to create airport simulators. Wildly on-topic for me.
- leetrout 2mo agoHow do you plan to release them? Free? Mobile? And are you using AI to help deliver?
- TechSquidTV 2mo agoOh we aren't really planning to. This was purely a vibe coding thing for fun. I mentioned I wanted an airport simulator similar to another game we both play. He started vibe coding one. So I started vibe coding one lol. His was in straight up dotnetcore, mine in unity. We got interestingly far but both kind of slowly let it go, they weren't high quality.
- leetrout 2mo agoAh I wanted to play it. I am vibing a helicopter side scroller.
- pir8life4me 2mo agoFun. But the ATC has a different UI I think?
- cebert 2mo agoWhen I was growing up, there were two airport simulator games that were pretty fun to play. One of them I remember playing on my Sega Genesis.
- tantalor 2mo agoNice homage to Flight Control (2009)
- heresalexandria 2mo agoThis is super fun! Could be neat to add keyboard controls for auto routing (i.e. select plane number n and auto route it to strip x or have it fly a go-around to wait). Would also be sick if you added models of real world airports to play. That said I love this as is and will definitely be playing & sharing it.
- gus_massa 2mo agoNice and fun, but I'd like that the fame enforces a minimal turning radius.
- bakies 2mo agoThink it needs just a little zoom out on my phone but had a fun time. Both my games ended off screen
- rustyhancock 2mo agoAndroid makes this a chore with all its gestures too! But I'm not sure it could (or that I'd want) it to supress gestures like back and close application
- sarreph 2mo agoI was only thinking about Flight Control[0] the other day and how I wish there were more modern takes on it! There was Mini Metro[1], but that was released over a decade ago. -- [0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_Control https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_Control [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_Metro_(video_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini_Metro_(video_game)
- leetrout 2mo agoOptiFlight is similar to mini metro for planes https://www.krishsuchdev.com/OptiFlight https://www.krishsuchdev.com/OptiFlight
- rwmj 2mo agoHeathrow ATC (for the ZX Spectrum) was one that I played extensively back in the day: https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/entry/10530 https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/entry/10530 I wonder if there are earlier examples of popular ATC games? They're simpler than flight simulators so you'd think there would be more of them. Edit: playable version - https://archive.org/details/zx_Heathrow_International_Air_Traffic_Control_1985_Hewson_Consultants https://archive.org/details/zx_Heathrow_International_Air_Tr...
- s-macke 2mo agoKennedy Approach was published around the same time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Approach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Approach
- rwmj 2mo agoWikipedia search turns up this game from 1982: https://www.mobygames.com/game/52384/controller/ https://www.mobygames.com/game/52384/controller/ Quite graphically advanced for the time.
- s-macke 2mo agoThe BSD Games collection has an ATC Simulator as well from around 1985: https://github.com/vattam/BSDGames/tree/master/atc https://github.com/vattam/BSDGames/tree/master/atc
- Aardwolf 2mo ago4 successful landings before disaster struck, not a bad first day as ATC
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- exDM69 2mo agoAbsolutely delightful, just played a few rounds. I really love ATC games and the "draw it by hand" aspect makes this kinda funny. Maybe I need to try with a real mouse, kinda slow on a trackpad. For a more serious entrant in this genre (with speeds, altitudes and radio navigation), check out Endless ATC on Steam. I landed some 40 flights and made it near the top of the leaderboard. The scoreboard is taking too much screen space and occluding the planes, would be better to have scores at the top or bottom.
- wjdp 2mo agoTook me far too long to work how to get a plane to land, was drawing lines along the runway rather than dropping them on the coloured spot at the end and they were overflying. Was thinking the paths weren't straight enough, once I figured it out was quite funny to find the planes can do 180° turns mid air to land.
- paxys 2mo agoYeah to be more realistic they should be able to land from either end of the runway. Mayve depending on wind.
- skeater15 2mo agoLanding either way is not realistic. Even with no wind airports have a designated runway open. For example a straight North and South "runway" has runway 0 and runway 18, and only one will be open at any given time regardless of windspeed.
- einhard 2mo agoIf an airport is uncontrolled, planes can land in either direction. Whether the pilots choose to do so is a different matter. At airports with towers, the controllers can allow landings in either direction. That they usually don't is more of a function of existing traffic.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- sdh9 2mo agoRunway 36
- Unified-Mentor 2mo ago[dead]
- jsabess24 2mo agoSweet
- thanzex 2mo agoThis was really fun to play with, I have a few suggestions: - As the airspace gets more congested, it becomes difficult to click the airplanes as you can also grab an existing path, messing everything up. - The big stats table on the top left completely obscures a good portion of the map, making it harder than necessary. A togglable or semi-transparent option would be nice. -The possibility of zooming or moving around could be nice
- nativeit 2mo agoSpeaking of congested airspace… Yesterday’s 50-mile line of planes coming to Oshkosh is something to behold: https://youtu.be/9IHbO0tzpMc https://youtu.be/9IHbO0tzpMc
- kronk 2mo agoctrl-shift-<minus> until the stats table is as small as you like
- apunen 2mo agoadded a button to hide the scoreboard on desktop! was originally only available on mobile viewports
- 2mo ago
- tdubey 2mo agoOpen up https://www.liveatc.net/ https://www.liveatc.net/ in another tab and you have a complete experience. Really fun!
- paxys 2mo agoNot enough of you played Flight Control in 2008 and it shows.
- istoleabread 2mo agoI was 3 years old
- totallymike 2mo agoI’m gonna need you to explain yourself. What a strange choice
- moffkalast 2mo agoThey did it to dodge taxes.
- bigbuppo 2mo agoBabby.
- jojobas 2mo agoGet off my lawn!
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- tallanvor 2mo agoJust a green background and some text on Firefox.
- brettermeier 2mo agoNot with mine. Are you blocking your JS?
- AlfredBarnes 2mo agoFun how quickly i developed my own rules. Yellow planes always get rerouted this way. Put red in this circle to stay out of the way. Thank you for sharing and thank you maker for makign!
- opentestudox 2mo agoIs this based on WebAssembly?
- apunen 2mo agosveltekit and pocketbase!
- Wilson2000 2mo ago[dead]
- yangosoft 2mo agoAdd some color blind option, please. I cannot distinguish the two reds/browns/greens or whatever hehe.
- vlovich123 2mo agoThe touch controls, at least on iOS, leave a lot to be desired.
- pjmlp 2mo agoEven if simple, it is quite appealing and fun, spend quite a while playing it.
- mannycalavera 2mo agothis is awesome, thank you for making this. Such a neat little package - I love that there are no instructions. And the graphics are so simple and neat
- koko443 2mo agoThe appeal of ATC-style games is that the entire difficulty curve comes from one mechanic: you're never doing anything hard, you're just doing too many easy things at once. Flight Control nailed that on touch screens. Curious how this one handles the difficulty ramp — more planes, faster planes, or tighter airspace?
- apunen 2mo agothanks for playing! yes, over the first 5min the spawn rate ramps up from ~5s to ~1.5s and the aircraft cap goes from 3 to 12. also wanted to make things more interesting with the takeoff mechanic to add some predictable congestion
- pardon_me 2mo agoFantastic game! I miss the old iOS version. My suggestions: The predictable congestion gets a bit tedious and makes the game impossibly difficult quite quickly. It guarantees needing to keep readjusting almost every plane, otherwise a crash happens while trying to select the correct plane to move. It's a great mechanic earlier on and as a tutorial, because collisions happen rarely, but knowing that so many planes spawning or taking off on a calculated crash path when it's already chaotic seems to actually take skill out of the game as it progresses. Planes that land should turn gray as it's confusing vs. planes taking off (especially consecutive takeoffs). Volume slider rather than just on/off. Drawing paths to the landing area should be more forgiving. If there's a short section of weird path at the end, it messes up timing for the planes landing and causes crashes.
- fransje26 2mo agoGreat little game! Thanks for sharing! Just two little niggles: - I feel like I should be able to fly over a runway without crashing in a landing/taking-off airplane. The vertical separation would allow for that. - It would be nice to have an (optional?) zoom-out level, to have a bit more space for routing. But a lovely little game, thanks again.
- JKCalhoun 2mo agoCool. But, yeah, no, too stressful. Give me a relaxing game. (I'm getting old.)
- yunnpp 2mo agoHave you tried getting younger?
- JKCalhoun 2mo agoYeah. Also tried not aging. But, seriously, I know I am an ass throwing any shade on a very cool game—I suppose I'm more or less putting the idea out there that, hey, as everyone around here gets older, do you find these "stress games" less fun than you used to? (I suppose even Nethack might seem like a chore these days, but I haven't fired up an old game in some time now.)
- dssagar93 2mo agoThis is addictive. Enjoyed it thoroughly
- mrkpdl 2mo agoI still miss flight control, seems wrong that such an important early iPhone OS game is just… gone.
- jmkni 2mo agoFun little game However I notice people have realized they can set their own score with an HTTP request (I mean, it's Hacker News), maybe put in some sort of mitigation?
- naet 2mo agoIn my experience there is little you can do to "mitigate" that kind of thing outside of running the game completely server-side, which usually makes a tiny project into a much larger undertaking.
- pardon_me 2mo agoRecording the game start and end time server-side to perform a plausibility check of submitted score vs. time played would help, but this would require tracking individual users games, and still doesn't solve the problem entirely.
- ErenayDev 2mo agothe graphics reminded me OpenTTD
- mrcwinn 2mo agoNice work!
- Rotundo 2mo agoLooks like Kennedy Approach from mumble years ago! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hgi2fuSL9tk&t=28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hgi2fuSL9tk&t=28s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Approach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Approach
- rob74 2mo agoNice! But whatever happened to "Show HN"? I see more and more people posting their own projects here (which is completely ok!) but avoiding (or unaware of?) the "Show" option. About the game (sorry, sim) itself: it was really fun once I realized that I have to drag the airplanes to the runway threshold matching their color. You can draw a straight line from the plane to the runway, and it will land even if it has to do an instant ~360° turn directly before touching down, which is a liiiitle bit unrealistic :) Also, while landing the planes just float with constant speed right until the end of the runway and then taxi away. A nicer animation would be if they would touch down somewhere in the middle of the runway and then decelerate gradually before taxiing away. Same in reverse for take-offs.
- jmkni 2mo agoMaybe it's by design, but Show HN posts seem to just get completely buried, whereas posting stuff directly is more successful I've spoke to other people who've had the same experience, maybe just a coincidence but could be why people avoid it?
- cure_42 2mo agoShow hn was overrun by ai slop for a while so I and presumably many others filtered it out of our feeds. That would have resulted in show hn getting much less interaction and potentially led to people not wanting to use the feature.
- tantalor 2mo agoLosing because some collision off screen seems a bit unfair.
- V__ 2mo agoWhen playing for the first time, a simple pop up tutorial would be nice, explaining what to do. Figuring out how to land and how to drag the planes takes a second, but it is fine. However, I still haven't figured out what to do with starting planes? I can't change their route, so how do I prevent two starting planes from crashing? Edit: I would also add some “crash margin” around the border of the screen. A plane coming from the top right corner and crashing into a plane leaving just to the right of the top right corner is frustrating.
- tenacious_tuna 2mo agoyeah, not being able to vector departing planes is also a pain. Kinda makes sense I guess, but still annoying
- nicechianti 2mo ago[dead]
- grwthckrmstr 2mo agoBrought back fun memories! Thank you
- danfunk 2mo agoPerfect kind of intuitive. It was a joy to figure it out, and just "learn by doing".
- WhyComboNadir 2mo agoIt's surprisingly fun! You've inspired me to finish something aviation related I'm working on and post it soon. Cheers.
- murzynalbinos 2mo agoThis is nice. And yeah, I've crashed after 33 sec ;)
- haunter 2mo agoIf you like this I highly recommend the Air Traffic Controller series https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Traffic_Controller_(series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Traffic_Controller_(series... https://www.sonicpowered.co.jp/world/nsw/rjgg/ https://www.sonicpowered.co.jp/world/nsw/rjgg/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1348390/I_am_an_Air_Traffic_Controller_4/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1348390/I_am_an_Air_Traff...
- schnebbau 2mo agoThis is cool. What is it built with?
- SamBam 2mo agoVery fun. Got a few minutes in. Is there a strategy for avoiding hitting the planes driving slowly across the runway for takeoff? It seems very hard to also pay attention to them when they have so little lead time.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- DevDesmond 2mo agoHigh Score: 81 Succesful Landings in 6:53! Video here so you can copy my sweet strats: https://youtu.be/7f1WgnAqckk https://youtu.be/7f1WgnAqckk I'd love to watch a professional SC: Brood War player give this a try.
- _zendar_ 2mo agoJust playing right now inside airport waiting for a delayed flight, such an irony
- SamBam 2mo agoShould the leader board be cleared of the folks with 10,000 landings in 1 second? It looks like the true leader right now is 90 landings in 7:29.
- robertlagrant 2mo agoYes, that would be good! I got to 86, and on a macbook trackpad, and those fake scores are making my RSI flare up.
- apunen 2mo agodone!
- arsenkk 2mo agovery sticky game, love it! my record is 18 landings
- przemub 2mo agoI love the airport style, bilingual interface. One of my favourite parts of flying is getting to see different combinations of languages on the signs!
- tonic_note 2mo agothe hitbox on the landing strip is kinda odd, not sure why sometimes my planes don't enter into the landing state when entering the runway
- Khira_Moss 2mo agoThe real simulator feature is discovering how quickly one delayed plane becomes everyone’s problem.
- axelb152 2mo agoI think the landing box could be a bit easier to hit
- Avio223 2mo agoVery satisfying to play! I made airpordle.com a bit ago when the dle craze happened, where the goal is to guess the airport you are controlling and the ATC score you get allows you to buy hints. https://airpordle.com https://airpordle.com
- WillowWithAWand 2mo agoNow I see why ATC is such a stressful job!
- outworlder 2mo agoA bit better in real life since the world isn't 2D.
- ivraatiems 2mo agoPlay this for a few minutes and you start to realize why sequencing and published flight paths are so important! Really fun, thank you!
- bigbuppo 2mo agoAnd traffic patterns.
- harvie 2mo agoImagine modified version of this game having local AI voice recognition and you would have to give instructions to the air traffic over "radio" using callsigns and everything. Just like the real tower.
- consumer451 2mo agoVery fun. My only gripe is that you should be able to overfly taxiing aircraft, without crashing.
- advisedwang 2mo agoThe departures kind of subtract from the "flow state" feeling you get when lining things up. Sure, that's an additional challenge, but it's not that fun.
- westcoast49 2mo agoI got a slight flashback to Blue Max, just because of the graphics.
- keito 2mo agoThis is super fun! Really gets your heart rate going. I tried various tactics borrowed from actual ATC/tower techniques (drawing common approach paths; throwing in some 360 degree turns) but it never seemed to be enough as the traffic picked up :P I'm curious if anyone figured out any good strategies.
- tom2948329494 2mo agoAt some point I started to send incoming planes away like no airport for you!
- cure_42 2mo agoHad a crash happen super far from the airport after I did this, found it funny do to how unlikely it seemed
- 2143 2mo agoLong ago I played this game called Airport Mania. In it you’re an ATC. There’s like 10 stages (airports), with several levels in each stage in increasing difficulty. There are different capabilities to add to the airport (such as de-icing, defogging, upgraded terminals, upgraded fuel pumps, layover spaces, additional runways etc). Different types of planes had different patience levels (for example, Concordes needed quick service) etc. Very sophisticated. It was fun. About 5 years ago a slightly watered down version of it was available on Android. I think it’s gone now. Even as an adult I found it engaging. It may look childish in the screenshots but it’s really fun. It’s the only game I have bought online. They sent me the CD from Portland Oregon to my home on the opposite side of the Earth. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_Mania:_First_Flight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_Mania:_First_Flight
- ignaciovdk 2mo ago[flagged]
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- ignaciovdk 2mo agoVery cool!
- socalgal2 2mo agoReminds me of C64 Kennedy Approach. Of course Kennedy Approach is 10x more stressful as you need to stack the planes at VOR towers and designate their elevation.
- dariush624 2mo agoSuper fun! Gets very complicated with congestion, good work!!
- verelo 2mo agopretty nice, the click targets are a bit awkward but otherwise really fun!
- lucb1e 2mo agoIf you enjoy this, you may also enjoy the `atc` binary that is shipped alongside tetris and other classics in Debian's bsdgames package. Also exists for Ubuntu (https://packages.ubuntu.com/noble/bsdgames https://packages.ubuntu.com/noble/bsdgames) and probably other Debian derivatives. I enjoy the keyboard controls there, a lot more deterministic than trying to mouse around the screen!
- hexator 2mo agoI love this emerging "3D pixel art" trend. Stylized graphics always age better than realistic. And it definitely has more charm
- BigDataNinja 2mo agoThere was a game for the C64 (or VIC20.. I forget) in which your were an ATC. I remember either the packaging for the game or the credits on screen saying something to the effect of "If you like this game, call us". "Us" being a number to contact the FAA for a potential job.
- projektfu 2mo agoIf you like this game, call us! The President just fired all our controllers.
- cmenge 2mo agoAddictive! Made it to #16 but now got some serious PTSD about flying lol
- micah_chatt 2mo agoSuper fun game! Minor modifications that would be fun: * As you draw a path, at the same rate gradually bold/pulse all other planes' existing drawn paths from their current location forward so I can visually see if two future lines will not just overlap, but overlap at the same time * A slider to control game speed * A clearer arrow over the landing zone. It took me quite a while to realize how to land a plane * A timer over each runway to next takeoff
- DarmokJalad1701 2mo agoThe pilots in this game are complete dum-dums and not following 14 CFR § 91.113 (b): When weather conditions permit, regardless of whether an operation is conducted under instrument flight rules or visual flight rules1, vigilance shall be maintained by each person operating an aircraft so as to see and avoid other aircraft. I had some aircraft pop in from off-screen and just run into another one that just took off.
- jjwiseman 2mo agoA few months ago I built a piloting harness for LLMs[1] in X-Plane. You can give the AI pilot instructions as though you are ATC, and I imagined what it might be like to scale it up and make an ATC game out of it, talking to dozens of AI pilots. The most open-ended ATC sim ever… [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiXcLURL7yo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiXcLURL7yo
- bigbuppo 2mo agoevery single one of those pilots is getting a number to copy.
- Archit3ch 2mo agoI expected a backrooms-style game where you are lost at an infinite airport...
- orangeberrytea 2mo ago[dead]
- omeysalvi 2mo agoFirst line of action was to crash two planes into each other. Mission successful
- mscissors 2mo agoVery fun game. Helps my mind relax
- mscissors 2mo agoCan I ask what programming language you uesd? Good game
- bronco21016 2mo agoFun take on the ATC type genre but for some reason ATC style games have never really hooked me. I'd love to see a modern take on Airport Tycoon where you layout runways and terminals etc. I also fondly remember an airline management simulator while in college. I started playing with IdleFlightManager on iOS but it was just insanely easy so I lost interest quickly. The software I used while in college had you manually set fares and fare pool size in addition to buying aircraft, dealing with maintenance expenses, and choosing routes.
- gfalcao 2mo agoAddictive
- rsendv 2mo agoStrange. Can’t write “e” in the top scorer input box. Anyone else have this problem?
- ssl-3 2mo agoI just noticed that myself. It seems to wiggle the map or something instead of input the letter e.
- rsendv 2mo agoInterestingly a lot of high score names contain e. BR, rsëndv :)
- kirubakaran 2mo agoR-ally? It s--ms to work fin- for m-.
- apunen 2mo agofixed! q/e was being intercepted for world rotation but this was breaking scoreboard functionality
- zsypsilon 2mo ago[dead]
- strzibny 2mo agoI was surprised by the controls, but actually quite interesting.
- DirkH 2mo agoIncredible. But on mobile the menu is in the way and you can't play. Why no button to hide the stats?
- meshaneian 2mo agoWhat about Unmatched Air Traffic Control on Android? 3D POV https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vector3d.uatc https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vector3d.u...
- meshaneian 2mo agoHmm ... Just played after a long hiatus and reinstall, same account but lost all progress and purchases and can't seem to win the first level without in app purchase:(
- treszkai 2mo agoThis is an amazing game that I'm still playing after a week, no request for changes! Thanks a lot.