AirportSim | Hacker News Reader

AirportSim

airportsim.com

179 pointsskibz87 comments

Ah, yes, this seems to be an excellent example of "someone caring very much about things I don't care about at all"

Still wish everyone involved the best of luck! Licensed vehicle models, upcoming DLC, hope it all works out!

I'm sort of reminded of the VR job simulator. (I can job!)

To someone, all this is job description stuff. But to others this is super fascinating. I've met lots of train people who would do train stuff for free just for fun.

> I've met lots of train people who would do train stuff for free just for fun.

This shouldn’t surprise me –I do a lot of programming for fun– but it still does somehow.

Programming is a creative activity though. What are these?

> Welcoming passengers, offloading baggage, refuelling large aircraft, pushing aircraft back for departure and a further array of exciting tasks await you.

Exciting tasks.

It's just the fulfiling part of the job, without any of the bullshit. It may not be "creative" or "exciting", but it's satisfying.

I think I'll never understand. I see all that stuff as the bullshit I don't want to deal with and flying the plane as the actual exciting task.

Some people just like working down task lists. Some people just like a peek behind the curtain of big operations (like an airport, farm, etc).

Not every game is meant for everyone :)

Euro Truck Simulator was the game that this finally click for me. I think under all different game mechanics -- games like OpenTTD, Factorio, RimWorld, Dwarf Fortress, Farming Simulator, Euro Truck Simulator, Minecraft, Civilization etc -- all scratch the same itch of being able to set uour own goals and work towards them through an evolving but intuitive gameplay loop.

I really like games like this. Can't explain why. You just kind of do little jobs and feel like you're accomplishing something. Farming Simulator is my favorite: there are lots of different tasks you can do, lots of ways you can go about doing them, etc. And I learned quite a bit about agriculture along the way.

This game scratches the same itch, it's given me just a tiny understanding of how hard all the ground crews work to turn planes around at the airport. It does not have as much depth as FS and it's hard to play single player (you can't really parallel process anything) but with the right crew it would be fun co-op.

I'm excited to watch this game continue to develop.

I wonder if it lets us simulate the baggage handlers; X-ray the bags.. find the wall-mounted sexessories.. open the bag / misplace luggage, etc.

Crazy feature request: It would be awesome if MS Flight Simulator let players fly to player controlled airports - maybe players can reclaim an abandoned airport. Or even go to airports where players must communicate with each other to coordinate landing / take-off.

I can see it being do-able with some kind of VATSIM-like integration, where you would just need to get the live plane movement data across, and then use that as the AirportSim plane traffic...

It’s not on MS flight sim but on another flight sim there are RP servers where people role play as ATC and pilots

That's actually across multiple Sims, including MSFS, using VATSim

The line where people stop simulating and start roleplaying is realy blurry. Clearly the people taking flight sims seriously enough to be using VATsim actually desire a higher-fidelity simulation experience that includes having to talk to an ATC.

Check out airforceproud95 on YouTube .

https://www.airportscannergame.com/

There's also Papers, Please, which is great and depressing, lol

I had to squint a bit to decipher the writing on this airplane https://airportsim.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/1016.png, but it seems to be "Luftwaffles" - a nice mix between Luftwaffe (the German Air Force, which however doesn't operate any A320s AFAIK) and Lufthansa (which seems to have inspired the livery of the plane - Lufthansa also has a circle on the deep blue tail fin, but it contains a crane instead of waffles).

Also appeared in Breaking Bad as one of Pollos Hermanos' sister brands!

Luftwaffe operates A320s as medevac - https://defencehub.live/threads/germany-rolls-out-first-a320...

It's also a class Onion article:

https://www.theonion.com/german-luftwaffle-chain-offers-waff...

And a great Hipster Hitler T-shirt http://hipsterhitler.com/comics/19_eastern_front.jpg

Is it just me, who spent few minutes on the website try to understand what you can actually do in the game? They make it super clear on steam - ground handler, but on the website - I keep on reading about weather.

Yes, the website is going out of its way to explain that it's very realistic and based on people who know, but doesn't want to tell you what the game actually does.

I came thinking this was an airport ticoon, and leave with the impression that it's a series of minigames themes around airports

I wish someone'd make a good SimCity-style airport/airline simulator. There've been a few attempts, including one looking a bit like Prison Architect, but none that have been super compelling to me.

I really liked this when I was a kid, it looks like it may be available to download

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_Tycoon

It was a _little_ buggy and felt like some feature's were about 80%, but overall pretty fun.

I enjoyed https://store.steampowered.com/app/598330/SimAirport/ when it came out.

SimAirport is the least bad one I've found, but still not great, both UI and graphics are kinda janky.

https://www.simairport.com/

Aerobiz?

I have really enjoyed AirportCEO on steam. I would check it out, might be exactly what you’re looking for. Another option would be to get the mods for MS Flight Simulator that allow you to create an airline and make money and grow your business, etc.

Airport CEO is good because there's nothing better in the space.

I do feel the space is wide open in transit based games. Transport Fever, for example, leaves a lot to be desired while still being awesome too.

I tried Airport CEO but never really got into it. Too much focus on running the business and designing the interior of the terminal building, and not enough detail/control on designing runways, taxiways, hangars, lighting, and performing various airport ops. It's pretty nice if you're interested in a business sim though.

Having played Prison Architect for ~200h spoiled me for this genre of games. I too wanted "more" but in a different setting, so I tried various airport sims, including Airport CEO and SimAirport (why don't they get sued by EA?) but refunded all of them.

I also tried "Another Brick in the Mall" but also made it only ~30 minutes in. I think I'm trying Timberborn next.

When Paradox bought Prison architect I hoped they were going to use the engine to build similar games with different settings. Instead they killed the game with buggy expansions and stopped to support it a few months ago. At least they (slightly) teased Prison Architect 2.

Timberborn is great, worth a try. You'll be stressing about droughts in no time.

>SimAirport (why don't they get sued by EA?)

That is strange. The only thing I can think of is that EA isn't terribly motivated since they aren't trying to keep a broader "Sim" brand alive, just The Sims and SimCity (and it's not clear how invested they are in SimCity anymore).

Poking around U.S. trademark database, EA may not have a general "Sim" trademark— as Maxis' appears to have lapsed [0]—and maybe "SimAirport" is distinct enough from "The Sims" and "SimCity" trademarks EA has to not be worth suing over.

[0] https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=74300602&caseType=SERIAL_...

Creator of SimAirport here. We fought EAs opposition to the trademark and won; we did the same for the SimCasino trademark. :)

I guess I assumed most studios wouldn’t want to go up against EA’s lawyers, but I’m glad you did. Congrats!

Tried Dwarf Fortress?

Not since the update (steam release).

I tried it years ago - I think even before Prison Architect and Rimworld (another great game, that spoils you for other games mechanicswise) - but could not get into it, because I felt very "disoriented". And a feel of disorientation is difficult for me to work through in games.

I think you might be able to get through it now, specially the steam version, as the UI is much closer to RimWorld than the ASCII version was.

Never tried Steam version, I think it wasn't available on Mac or something, but I tried the old ASCII version and it's super cool. My main problem is paralysis of choice.

Prison Architect was such a fun game before Paradox, but don’t kid yourself its always been a buggy mess. I think my favorite was designing prisoner escape prisons, and I loved playing them too.

I have fond memories of the game Airlines 2: http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/airlines-2/

Here’s a downloadable source. I haven’t tried it. Not sure if it is safe: https://www.myabandonware.com/game/airlines-2-iky

Awesome. I love sims like this.

On a cringe note based on hype cycles from couple years ago.. Imagine a future where nobody has to work.

Instead people get so bored they will log in to play simulators where they can farm, be ATC or ground crew, drive trucks.

Get paid in crypto that you can spend to support creators and have cool swag.

Find your purpose!

Blaze your glory! Work after work for cool crypto swag might sound appealing to some, but I'd just be crashing fueling trucks into airplanes and tipping cows over all night.

It reminds me of that bit in Back To The Future 3 where someone in the 1800s is astonished that people run for fun in the future.

Thanks for setting off the Airline Tycoon theme music that has lived rent free in my head for 20 years now.

Too bad it’s windows only

works just fine with proton

I'd like an Apple Silicon version.

If it's Steam Deck certified, it will run on Linux. No Windows needed these days, except for mostly FPS anti-cheat spyware.

I would love an updated version of Aerobiz Supersonic. That game was incredible, but every other airport/airline sim doesn't scratch the itch for me.

Does it accurately reproduce what happens when a passenger refuses to sit down before the scheduled pushback at JFK on a Friday at 5:30PM?

I'm more concerned if someone starts having a meltdown that another passenger is "not real" and off-boards.

Unruly passengers are the least of your worries in this game. If you can manage to get the plane fueled, boarded, and the bags in the hold on time you are are an airport god lol.

The passenger who wouldn’t sit was on my flight home to LA. The flight attendant asked him to sit or we would miss our pushback deadline. He took his sweet time and finally sat. After like two minutes he’s getting this attitude like why aren’t we moving.

The flight attendant comes on the intercom and says there will be a delay until the tower clears us for pushback. 90 minutes later we are pushed back. Apparently in that scenario, your plane goes to the end of the line. So every other jet that was fueled up and loaded went before us.

There's also this one. It's in VR, but I've read that it has fairly limited content.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2088630/Airport_Ground_Ha...

Is the goal is to sell this as a training tool to airlines? Otherwise wha?

There is a whole genre of games my wife lovingly refers to as "job games".

They have devoted, albeit niche, followings.

It's not a job if you can turn it on or off at any time you like with zero consequences though.

By this definition some playstyles of EVE Online definitely count as a job. :D

Working cyber at an airline, this kind of game would drive me fuckin nuts. This is where all the OT and aircraft cyber ops are, the worst shit.

Do they have regulation and management of air space in the game? The whole aspect of 3D terrain management would appeal to me.

Something like this? https://www.technobrain.com/atc4_g/

Oh god, I remember watching NerdCubed play this at various years

...the game was not good

Any chance of integrating with Vatsim ATC & therefore X-plane?

Apparently I'm Forbidden (403) from airports... :(

Windows only!

oh snap, it's out?

I played the demo a while ago, I hope they've ironed out some of the jank lmao

I downloaded the demo, and it seems to just be two different tutorials - chocks and cones (handling an existing parked plane at a gate) as well as GPU (ground power unit, also on a parked plane).

Really didn't get a good feel for the game, which is a shame because I usually really love these mundane simulators.

Shitty dark pattern on the cookie pop-up. Close tab, ignore.

Best Chrome add on: https://www.i-dont-care-about-cookies.eu/

> sometimes it will accept all [...] cookie categories

That's a shame, I like the idea of explicitly indicating that I don't want anything more than what's necessary (or at least not indicating that I don't care about them).

Consent-O-Matic lets you choose categories to allow: https://consentomatic.au.dk/

Well, you really don't care since you have temporary containers on your news browser installed.

From a technical perspective, if you actually care about cookies, then blame your client for not maintaining your privacy, because that is where your real complaint is.. Not with the site.

The client has a hard time telling useful and tracking cookies apart. The popups do a good job at this, since they don't affect cookies that provide actual functionality. I just don't like having to navigate them.

The popups are useless. Tracking is happening 1st party now too. Now it’s just an annoyance.

weird, it looks like an actually honest cookie pop-up to me - way more friendly default settings, and the "decline" button is not greyed out.

Maybe I missed the "shitty dark pattern", or I was shown a different popup than you?

Here is the copy-pasted popup text:

---

We use cookies on our website. Some of them are essential, while others help us to improve this website and your experience.

Essential (selected, not changeable, as essential) External Media (NOT selected by default)

Accept all (white on black button)

Save (white on black button as well )

Individual Privacy Preferences

Cookie Details Privacy Policy

I'm not ever buying anything on Steam ever again. Not after they started deleting games of my machine. I feel like someone came into my house and robbed me.

I feel like this needs more information. Please don't assume we all know which incident you're talking about.

I'm betting it's their recent CS2 rollout, where instead of adding it as a new listing they released it as an update to CS:Go. This meant the next time you logged in, it downloaded the new game and removed the old. The goal was to funnel people over to the new game.

Upsides: CS2 should immediately have the full player base.

Downsides: CS:Go is no longer available. CS2 is not a drop-in replacement, it has higher system requirements and no longer supports Mac. No opportunity for CS:Go to live on through custom servers.

It's definately an odd situation, but it's very much not the norm. Steam tends to be ridiculously good at leaving your library intact. I still play Rocket League through steam even though it's been Epic exclusive (and free) for years.

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_noteworthy_games_d...

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_games_delisted_fro...

If we're talking about CS:GO, it is still available as a "beta" for CS2 - https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/73EF-08A3-0935-63...

That said, Valve isn't running any servers for the game anymore, so matchmaking will no longer work. But you can relatively easily download the game and play on community/private servers.

I wasn't aware of that, thanks for the correction!

In that case I no longer see any issue.

A recent possibility could be Valve releasing Counter Strike 2 by replacing Counter Strike: Global Offensive entirely. Technically you can still play CS:GO by selecting the version in the Betas drop down (for now at least) but there are plenty of people who purchased CS:GO years ago before it was free and are upset because their "paid" game was replaced by a "free" game.

Paid game replaced by a free game replaced by a different game entirely. That’s an anti-trust lawsuit waiting to happen. At the very least consumer protection law.

I believe Overwatch was originally a paid game, went free-to-play, and then was "upgraded" to Overwatch 2 in a similar way to CS:GO>CS2 did, but I don't remember there being as much anger over it.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com