I know what you’re thinking.  I thought the same thing when I first heard about this game.  It’s probably something like “why in the flying flaming flannigan hell would I want to play a game as an air traffic controller”, right?

Well, this game won’t be for everyone, but Air Traffic Chaos on the Nintendo DS  is a great little title that blends micro-management with mid-air collisions.  The result is a fun and sometimes frantic look into the job of an air traffic controller.

In the game, the top screen gives an overview of the airport while the touch screen displays arrivals and departures.  Touching on any of the flights allows you to issue different commands to that plane; these will vary depending on what the pilot wants to accomplish.  As the controller, you dictate when and where all of the planes move.  There can be up to four arrivals and four departures all at the same time, so it can get to be a bit hectic.

For each plane, there is a bar which indicates the stress level of the pilot, as well as one which shows your overall stress level.  The longer that you keep the planes waiting, the higher the stress levels get.  If you can’t keep everyone happy, you’ll lose your job.  Happily, you’re playing as Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, so if you mess up you can just play that day over again.  This comes in quite handy when you mistakenly order an arriving plane to go to a gate which is already occupied…causing a collision.

That’s one big issue I had with this game; once you issue a command, you can’t stop it from happening.  There is no option to correct it, or give a new order to counter it.  This means that you really have to be careful and think about every order you give.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it can get frustrating.

The touch screen interface is perfect for this type of game.  It captures the feel of playing similar games on a PC, though with less depth than those full size counterparts.  The game uses a bright colour palette, which helps to offset how tiny some of the sprites are.  Overall, the graphics are quite functional, and any complaints about them really come down to the size of the DS screens.  The music, on the other hand, is crap.  Music on a handheld system does not have to be poor (as proven by any portable Castlevania game), so I don’t know what happened there.  Most likely,you’ll likely wind up turning the sound off; it makes crashing the planes much more enjoyable!

In addition to a tutorial, there are multiple levels of difficulty for each of the airports.  These should help beginners learn the ropes and offer challenges to more advanced players.

If you like management or tycoon-style games, then Air Traffic Chaos is definitely one that any DS owner should check out.