Playing Flight Control on the iPhone
I’ve been playing Flight Control on my iPhone since it was released, because it’s fun, and a great time waster whilst on the train. It also prescribes to my flying ambitions.
Flight Control has spawned a bunch of related apps, including games like HarborMaster, which I also have, and enjoy playing.
The game play is pretty simple – aircraft appear on the screen at random times, and you have to route them into their proper airport, by drawing a track on the screen with your finger. The game finishes when two planes collide. Generally there are three types of aircraft (fast, medium, and slow movers), and a helicopter. The action starts off slow but ramps up to the point where you can end up with 15 or so aircraft on the screen at once! Quite a handful to keep separated, which I still have not worked out a reasonable strategy.
I discovered this morning on the train that Flight Control has been updated again with another map. Flight Control has teamed up with the Royal Flying Doctor Service, so the map is themed after the Australian outback, with the usual two airports and a heli landing pad.
However, this is where things depart from the usual Flight Control gameplay, which I think is a great change from simply adding another themed airport.
The first screen shot on the left is the main screen after I’ve selected the RFDS airport. The high score, after a very quick play once Flight Control was upgraded is 38 *sigh*. I seriously have issues playing this game – my highest score is about 130 on Seaside. I am not worthy!
Where this map becomes quite interesting, and a departure from the usual Flight Control gameplay is the interaction of the RFDS aircraft. The icon on the left of the display in the second image is the alert showing that an RFDS aircraft is inbound. The track that it is going to follow is automatically selected – there’s no choice as to which airport it is going to land on, nor where the track is placed. Thus, as in real life, you have no choice but to route your aircraft around the RFDS plane. Very clever, and adds to the complexity, especially when lots of planes are on the screen at once.
It’s also not the smallest plane in the fleet either! The icon is quite large, at about the same size (or slightly larger) than the Jumbo aircraft, so the chance of collision goes up. It just adds to the challenge of maintaining clearance, and getting it on the ground successfully! The track in the third picture shows the RFDS plane is going to land on the small airfield, but I’ve also seen it go to the large airfield at times too. There’s no way to control the RFDS plane!
This latest addition to Flight Control adds some new spice and challenge to an otherwise great game, and just in time too, because I was watching how many updates were being released for Flight Control versus HarborMaster (who have released three updates with new maps and changes of gameplay (a hurricane which changes the routing of the ships, a pirate ship which you have to destroy using a cannon, changes to the dock layouts, and now a monster which gobbles up ships in the dock)). I was becoming bored with the Flight Control gameplay.