I still, on occasion, play that game from 2000 (yes, it’s been 17 years since a good airport game came out) which Krisalis Software never really decided how to name (and became bust after that). And there were quite a few things I liked/enjoyed:
From 1970 and beyond: You started in 1970 with buildings and services unlocking depending on the year you’ve reached and new types of aircraft being introduced. Though the game only allowed you to start in 1970 IIRC. You should have the option to start at a later date if you want to (if, of course, you decide to follow a similar pattern).
Choosing your location (which more-or-less realistic PAX numbers). You can’t choose to build in Athens and expect London Heathrow numbers.
Buying the land (and having the option to buy more land by reserving it) with price according to proximity. If you want to build close to the city you serve you’ll pay more, have higher PAX numbers, but will be difficult to find land to expand.
Accepting contracts from Airlines (flights and later for establishing hubs), Shops, Hotels, Fuel, etc.
Planning the timetable (with could mean losing the flight contract if the airline wasn’t happy with the allocated slots).
Dedicated check-in desks and cargo facilities.
Opening/Shutting Down the Airport due to weather/bomb threats etc.
Premade and start from scratch terminals which you can build in any shape you like.
and, last but most important of all:
Two floors: Ground Floor for Arrivals and First Floor for Departures (which is I believe is the standard used by all international airports). Yes, there is probably a Second Floor for Airport Offices, a Basement for transport (train, underground), and of course most local airports only have a ground floor for both arrivals and departures. But the two floor design (Ground and First) is a standard, a must-have. And hopefully it will be the first thing you will concentrate on after pre-alpha release.
There are probably other features, but these come to my mind right now.
Finally, don’t overdo it with the airlines. You are building AirportCEO, not AirlineCEO.
I don’t see why I can’t get Heathrow demand. I agree start demand should not be equal but after year and if I’m doing good I should compete with bigs. That will good challenge to beat.
First point to make - as you will probably be aware, you won’t get to choose your exact location when the game releases (although the devs will implement this later).
I think it would be quite difficult to map an airport to its local population. The drivers of airport passenger numbers in the real world are very complex. Some places have higher than expected numbers, some lower; and there are quite a lot of reasons for this. Airlines tend to gravitate towards hubs, which give places like Heathrow, Gatwick and Manchester pride of place, whilst airports like Birmingham relatively underperform in comparison to the surrounding population. Airports can also trigger economic growth to some extent, and whilst I don’t think that in the real world somewhere like Ullapool will ever rival London, it’s fun to dream. Ultimately, the majority of the world map could well end up being unplayable because we humans congregate in a relatively small proportion of the world.
I’m not a huge fan of trying to equate demand to the local population in the game. As well as being complex for the devs, it will encourage us to build airports in the same places over and over again. We’ll all end up choosing London because that will be the easiest ride.
I think we should just let the airport grow naturally, without too much concern about external factors like population. Distance to nearby airports and the size of said airports should be the primary factor in triggering offers of direct flights, with the difficulty factor affecting behaviour of airlines making offers (i.e. to be more likely to grow quickly or more conservative in their plans). For really isolated areas (I’m thinking middle of nowhere Australia, Svalbard etc), the simple lack of nearby airports to serve would automatically restrain growth.
Furthermore, as much as I’d like to see multiple levels, the OP’s thoughts on terminal design are very much limited. Plenty of international airports do not have multiple levels, and plenty of those that do have much more complex arrangements than “upper floor for departures, lower floor for arrivals”. We should be able to make some good airports on a single level for the meantime, and when multiple levels are implemented I’d hope we could end up with more complex arrangements like Dublin Terminal 2 if we want.
I am only suggesting a simple low/medium/high demand differentiation between locations when you start a game. Nothing too complicated. Obviously you should be able to grow beyond that if you can.
If you want to have arrivals/departures on one floor, shops/offices on another obviously you should be able to. With two floors you can do whatever you want. My example is just based on how most airports operate, nothing more. Airport Inc didn’t restrain you in that respect. You could do whatever you want.
Choosing your location (which more-or-less realistic PAX numbers). You can’t choose to build in Athens and expect London Heathrow numbers.
Buying the land (and having the option to buy more land by reserving it) with price according to proximity. If you want to build close to the city you serve you’ll pay more, have higher PAX numbers, but will be difficult to find land to expand.
Both of them are good suggestions… but i downvote them. This would really make more 80% of the world unplayable. And everyone would be building in London/New York/Dubai, Etc.
And choosing the proximity is useless, cause everyone will choose the nearest distance. No one wants thier beloved and ‘perfect’ airport to be empty.
And if u want variable passenger supply, then we always have the difficulty settings.
And also multiple floors would be definitely added later in the game…(We are not going to leave the Devs peaceful if they don’t add it).
You are indeed talking about Airport Inc, but you’re also stating that you want to see these things implemented in Airport CEO (so they are actually also suggestions…).
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘Dedicated check-in desks’, but I suppose this is already implemented. Cargo facilities is not on the roadmap for the first release, but has already been discussed on the forum: Cargo handling? - #5 by CanadaCEO
Don’t think this is already discussed on the forum, but isn’t the point of Airtport CEO that you can design and build your own terminal in the shape you want and like? I don’t see the value in adding pre-made terminals.
(Multiple floors) Answer is stated in the FAQ: http://airportceo.com/faq/ (not on the roadmap for the first release).
As you see, with a little bit of search, you can find a lot of answers…
