Ground handling vehicles should no longer instantly spawn next to an aircraft. Instead, they should always enter the airport from defined service roads or depots.
How would it work in the game?
When a service is triggered, the assigned vehicle spawns at a defined service road or depot and drives to the aircraft stand. The service starts only after the vehicle arrives. Existing service times remain unchanged.
Why is this a good idea?
Instant vehicle pop-in breaks immersion and looks unrealistic, especially at larger airports. Visible vehicle movement makes airport operations feel more natural and believable without affecting gameplay balance or adding complexity.
If it was a PC game I’d agree but I’d rather resources were used in-game on the aircraft and the landing and taking off. Maybe in 10 years or if they ever get big enough for a PC version of the game but right now I don’t think it’s something worth spending time on if older devices would struggle with it.
I don’t like to mention other games on forums specific to a single game, but we can see this idea happening in UATC. I know that comparing two very different games is a bit useless, as WoA is superior in many things and both have very different gameplays. The questions that have come up on my mind are:
We have a time limit for each operation, and if the “Lavatory” is occupied on Plane-A it cannot go to Plane-B, but if it ends its task on Plane-A, I can immediately use it on Plane-B. If the “Lavatory” has to go from Terminal-PlaneA-Terminal-PlaneB-Terminal how can we guarantee that the handling time is enough for each plane and task? Do we have to wait for “Lavatory” to go to the terminal to then be used on another plane, or can it go from Plane-A to Plane-B immediately?
If the handling time is counting and the ground vehicles have to cross an active taxiway, how do we make this work? Do ground vehicles stop for incoming planes? If so, during that “break” does the time freeze or keep counting?
WoA has huge airports and great graphics, I imagine that all this little routes & tasks happening at the same time would end up being a problem on old devices (and even modern devices). Would the player have a button to have more in depth handling vs as of it is now?
I’m assuming that the current way we handle the airplanes (time limit, every task has another one waiting) would need to be changed, no?
I think I’ve more or less found the solution. Instead of the ground vehicles spawning on the sides of the planes, they could spawn in front of them. My concept maintains the animation we already use, with minor tweaks. The images attached show what to expect on different apron styles.
As of now, the ground vehicles spawn on the sides which means that the vehicles of two different planes can overlap. On the image the red circle is a despawning vehicle, which evidently overlaps with the other plane’s vehicles.
They would still spawn out of nowhere, but now they spawn on a path and somewhat distant from the plane. In this specific airport (HKG), the vehicles could circulate behind the plane (doing a full circle) as the only planes that pass there are the planes being handled. The limited space between each airplane becomes a challenge
The vehicles would spawn below the terminal, which the player is not able to see, making it look more realistic as the vehicles don’t spawn out of nowhere.
The vehicles would spawn somewhat distant to the plane, which still means “out of nowhere”. This apron layout is the best one as it has a huge working area.
This would be a better solution, but would still involve a lot of work. Currently, the vehicles are related to the aircraft type. Whatever you park in a stand, the vehicles will span around and do their animations. To do this would have to link the vehicles to the airfield, as different airfields have different setups, so each stand would have to have its own animation, which would then have to be different for each aircraft type, as you wouldn’t want buses spawning out of neighbouring stands, under other aircraft, out of walls or pits and the such.
I agree it would be nice to have them looking a tad more realistic but it would be a large job that likely would be an airport per update, whilst taking resources away from new planes, liveries and airports and tbh, that’s where the money is at.
Yeah, I agree with you, and I definitely don’t want to shift resources from ways to modernise the game (planes, liveries, airports, etc.) to focus on something that works just fine.
I was just trying to solve a problem I created myself . Let’s omit the fact that I completely forgot that the animation is specific to each plane and not to each apron .
Ground Vehicles Should Not Spawn Instantly
What is your suggestion?
How would it work in the game?
Why is this a good idea?
Imagine
. Let’s omit the fact that I completely forgot that the animation is specific to each plane and not to each apron 
.