Airport Mania 2: Wild Trips

Airports are like the small autonomous states inside the countries. The life there goes according to some special rules and even the time runs somehow differently. Don't agree? Then you've never waited for the flight that has been delayed! If you want to see how everything works in the airports, the newly released sequel to Airport Mania: First Flight is right what you need. Reflexive Entertainment and Sound Winds Games did a wonderful job creating Airport Mania 2: Wild Trips as they managed not only to save the charming atmosphere of the previous game but also to add some new features and fun new places.

Color-matching and stacking combos are the key to score really big points.

Though Airport Mania 2: Wild Trips lacks any sort of story the reviewers of many game portals including Gamezebo believe it to be one of the best time management games of the year 2010. And you'll have 99 levels to get convinced of that, not counting the tutorial and 16 extra levels that are provided in the premium edition. Despite the fact that Airport Mania 2: Wild Trips has one mode only, the replayability of the game is rather high as it depends on the possibility to achieve a better score.

So here you go: there are 9 airports and your task is to set up the daily business in every of them, starting with one on the North Pole up to the Moon. Your job is to direct the planes to the runway or to the gates, to repair some of them and to fuel the others and don't forget about sending them to the luggage station and everything should be done as quickly as possible according to the rules of the time management genre.

Note that every plane has its own color that specifies the type of aircraft it belongs to and determines how much money you will earn as well. As in the majority of the games of this genre color-matching and stacking combos are the key to score really big points. It means that the more planes you land consecutively, the bigger score you'll get, and the same applies to color-matching bonuses. As for example, the more yellow planes you direct to the same gate, the higher the multiplier at this gate will rise. And here you'll face the shortcoming of  Airport Mania 2: Wild Trips that actually is the only one in the game, as I believe. Some colors look so similar that it is really   hard to tell certain types of planes apart sometimes. As a result it makes almost impossible to score the combos as much as you wish. Besides that fact makes some upgrades senseless. For example the difference between the colors blue and light blue cannot be noticed on the radar so that this helpful upgrade becomes quite ineffectual at times.

Talking about the upgrades they truly affect the gameplay. And trust me the order of purchasing them is extremely important when it goes about the strategy. You can buy the radar that was mentioned before and that will help you telling the colors of the planes that are on their way to the airport or a station where the planes can be painted in other colors etc.

Among the other merits of the game I'd like to underline the funny mini tasks that are special in every airport and the cute graphics. So if you have a spare minute just take a glimpse at the things going on around you such as rabbit that is running into the field only to have a hawk or some bird of prey swoop down and fly off with it. When you see such things you feel that the developers did a good job, don't you?

As a conclusion I'd like to admit that both hectic pace and multiple goals make it accessible to not only the experienced players but also the beginners. So the game is worth playing all that 8 hours it might absorb you for!

digg it! | del.icio.us