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Airline Tycoon Online 2 - Game Recommendation

Started by asaphxiix, April 18, 2016, 09:13:29 PM

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asaphxiix

Now I must heartily recommend this game. It is an intensive (but excruciatingly slow) Massive-Multiplayer Online game where airlines are run by ~250 players in each world instance (channel). The game is turn-based, and every turn takes two real-world hours and one in-game month. I think they should offer different intervals too, for players who are harshly addicted and need faster play, or players who enjoy sleeping occasionally and require higher intervals.


There are hundreds of cities, all rated according to potential passenger and business traffic, and numerous passenger and cargo planes to choose from according to their production years, as the game is run from 1960-2030. Fuel is a commodity you can stock and trade (but there's a "freemium" catch there).


Generally the game is a freemium, which means it is free unless you want to win, for which you'll need to pay a lot for the in-game credits that buy you airports, join alliances and benefit from code-sharing, and upgrade planes for higher speeds and ranges than their normal rates, which is of course wasteful. Even without paying, the player does get a nice amount of credits by completing objectives, and here i'll point out that they did a very good job in balancing the game and keeping it interesting through the years, as players join and leave the channel. For instance, the higher the player level in the game, the longer it takes them to buy planes and airport slots. But still, you have to pay and probably quite a bit, to be in a position to win a channel.


So although it is not a very complex simulation (at least to the player's eyes) as Simurans for instance, merely being a business sim MMO makes it a very interesting game. I would very much like to see there more possibility to research and analyze the player's affairs, and perhaps even the game environment, but of course I can understand why the developers opt for opaqueness in understanding the way this MMO works.


So all in all this is a great game, quite fun to play, while forcing patience on the player.