They say that being a flight controller is one of the most stressful jobs in the world.  Monitoring the altitude, direction, landing sequence, and other vital stats of all those airplanes, making sure they all land safely.  That can be quite the responsibility.  So, of course, someone thought it would be pretty cool to take the world’s most stressful job and turn it into a game.  What a concept.  I shelled out my 99 cents to grab this one after it hit number 1 in the iTunes App Store, and boy am I glad I did.  I am now hopelessly addicted to maneuvering these tiny planes onto their runways.  But don’t just take my word for it.  Read on for all the details.

All right, like I said, in this one, you are the flight controller, which can be an incredibly complex and stress inducing position.  Fortunately, this game simplifies your task quite a bit.  No longer will you need to worry about altitude, speed, status, or any other factors.  All you need to do is steer the planes to the runways.

There are three runways at this airport: the longer, red runway is for jets; the shorter, yellow runway is for propeller planes; and the blue landing pad is for helicopters.  At the beginning of the game, planes will fly slowly toward the airport, generally one at a time.  All you need to do is use your finger to trace a path from the plane to the appropriate landing area.  The plane will follow any path you trace (a white line will show the path it is following).

Each time you successfully land a plane, you will get one point (as well as some words of encouragement).  Watch out, though, if any planes collide in mid-air then your game will be over.  This sounds pretty easy so far, but just wait until you gain some early successes, the planes will start flying much more frequently, giving you significantly less room to maneuver.  Additionally, although all of the aircraft fly at a fixed speed, you will notice that there are two different kinds of jets, and one is much faster than the other.  Be sure to take that into account when you are planning your landing order.

When a path has been drawn to the correct runway, the plane will change color to white.  Don’t worry though, you can still alter course.  If you alter too much and the plane is drawn off the path to the runway, it will change back to its original color.  The most important thing to watch for is the glowing red circle.  Anytime two planes fly too close, they will glow with a red circle.  This does not necessarily mean that a crash is imminent, but you should certainly pay attention and check for potential course corrections. 

The one complaint I have about this game is that it never changes.  It would be nice if the airport would move to a new, random location, at the start of each game.  I would also love to see a more difficult game mode with more runways and a greater variety of aircraft.  It would also be nice if there were different levels of difficulty, so that you did not have to start at the beginning every time.

The other cool thing on this one is that it keeps track of all of your stats.  In addition to your high score, it will give you all manner of information about your gaming history, including the most likely plane for you to crash.

All I can say is WOW!  This is an insanely original strategy game, which I found to be quite a fantastic time waster.  The concept sounds so simple, just guide your planes to the correct runway, but once they start coming in faster and from across the screen…well, I certainly got a whole new respect for flight controllers.  This is one of the best dollars I ever spent.

What I Liked:

• Insanely original and addictive gameplay
• Great concept
• Price…price…price
• Graphics are simple, but effective

What Needs Improvement:

• It would be nice if the airport moved with each new game
• I would like to be able to change the number of runways and variety of aircraft
• Add the ability to change difficulty levels

Developer: www.firemint.com

Price: $0.99

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