Version 0.2.1a Released!

Airport Master Early Access Public Alpha v. 0.2.1a RELEASED!

Changelog follows:

Game workflow

• Added Salaries mechanics to the game - very important step towards planned game economy model: previously each facility or business on Airport property had its own accounting for salaries (and paid those at 1750Z daily) - this now changes to centralized accounting: from this version on each facility or business employing workforce simply reports to Airport Administration the job in question, employee data and salary (including promotions & demotions - both as a result of Player's direct decision to promote\demote an employee and as a part of purchased upgrade: e.g. when Cafeteria 'Skill of Cooks' upgrade is purchased by Player, Current Cooks salaries increase etc.);
• The following departments within Workforce structure of Player's Airport are now implemented: Airport Administration Staff, Air Traffic Control, Baggage Handling, Food Processing, Drivers, Fixed-Base Operator: Refueling Operations, Fixed-Base Operator: Repair and Maintenance Hangars, Fire & Rescue Staff, Flight School Staff, Airport Maintenance and Engineering Staff, Meteorology Office Personnel, Airport Security Department, Passenger Terminal Staff;
• Upon starting a new game, the minimal workforce required to run the Airport is generated according to startup templates with salaries randomized within certain economy balancing limits; currently about 110 staff positions are manned when player starts a new game; further on, the Player will be able to fire\hire\promote\demote staff, currently only Hire mechanics is implemented; Note: the balance of salaries is very preliminary and does not depict what will be the final balance of salaries, currently the economy is balanced so that Salaries have a certain impact on Airport growth (taking into account that say Player already pays Maintenance hangar salaries, but no income mechanics for servicing aircrafts (Form-A and Form-B) are yet implemented) - so basically, at the moment the burden of paying daily salaries should not generate massive expenses Player would need to counteract with more profitable business, but that will definitely become the case, once the economy model is fully implemented, weighted and balanced; Also note: until the moment that Mayor's subsidies (quests) are fully implemented, we are not planning to raise the overall burden of Salary expenses to somewhat 'realistic' level, but once the Mayor subsidies are there - we'll do thorough re-balancing both as to number of employees required by each department and minimum salaries.
• Added Radar overlay popup on pressing and holding R key on keyboard (available in any free view camera);
• Added new (7th) Airline - AirForce (prefix: ARF); Despite the fact that no military actions will be depicted in game, AirForce training exercises and training flights to Player's airport will occur regularly; this new Airline being a government-specific institution will have more strict requirements as of service quality, it's rating will be harder to earn, easier to lose, but the impact on City Mayor's rating (which in turn means more subsidies) will be higher;
• Added electric power generation using photovoltaic panels; Solar panels generate realistic amounts of power taking into account sunlight coverage, time of day, clouds coverage; Airport electric power consumption is now calculated as follows: accumulated daily power usage value minus generated daily power value; upon payment (once a day) only said amount of power (actually used minus generated on site) is now to be paid for
• Modified solar panels power output calculation algorithm to depend on following: angle of Sun over horizon line, angle of Sun relative to a solar panel, cloud coverage, air density; the new algorithm creates very accurate simulation of solar panels power output affected by Sun visibility; ready for integration with weather engine
• Added solar panel blocks raging in mean power output from 2 kW to 10 kW to the following buildings' roofs: Administration Building (single 2 kW block); Passenger Terminal (double 5 kW block available as a single 10 kW upgrade + single 7 kW block); Flight School (single 2 kW block);
• Solar panel blocks at Power Substation split into three 3,5kW blocks (lower, middle and higher)- middle block is available at new game start (free), other blocks can be purchased and installed by Player
• Improved algorithm estimating average power usage during Time Skips - the new version takes into account the average of generated and used electric power, the average of photovoltaic elements Sun coverage, the actual amount of time Sun has been powering the solar panels during Time Skip phase and the average cloud coverage during that time (as the averaging data gets accumulated during play, the estimation of power used and generated during a Time Skip is naturally becoming more and more precise);
• Added support for cross-platform software identification (for compatibility with MacOS)
• All static lights have been re-calculated and re-baked using new optimized routine
• Nav, Strobe & Beacon lights on all aircraft in game changed to new version, resulting in great FPS economy on processing massive numbers of lights - the same improvement that previously been undertaken for landing and taxi lights of all aircraft in game - a big step towards even more dynamic lights in game world! Note: GPUs 3 years old and older will see moderate FPS increase; newer GPUs will see considerable FPS increase, especially when many dynamic lights are on simultaneously.
• Migrated our sub-engine graphics handling to newer version for compatibility with Unity 5.6\Unity 2017.1' new ways to handle fullscreen and post-processing effects

Aircraft

• Added new aircraft type Vertical Noble J58 (VE58) (real-life prototype Beechcraft Baron G58), the newest version of legendary twin-prop. The following liveries were added: N-445D (this aircraft will be used in game as ILS calibration\flying laboratory service in future versions, private registration), N-445D, FS-ODR, N-778G, LE-AMR (all privately owned), DY-DUN (AirForce Flight Academy training aircraft)
• Added new livery for V28A - FP-BHH (privately owned)
• Fixed Landing lights on PC13 aircraft with registration number ED-KTC not operating correctly

ATC

• Added intersection PAROM (North IFR arrivals and departures);
• Added the following STARs: PAROM 2A (for runway 17), PAROM 1B (for runway 35); added the following SIDs: PAROM 3V (out of runway 17), PAROM 5Y (out of runway 35)
• Added VFR point PT-NE, for North-Eastern VFR operations
• Added new airport - Mulhouse Airbase, a military-only airfield, operating 24x7 and situated 382nm northern of Player's airport
• Fixed annoying (and randomly manifesting) bug when an arriving flight would stalk and look like it's starting all over and over and over again - actually the thing was that upon certain conditions, ATC for some weird reason would consider recurring flights by regular Airlines (TravelAir, FongAir, SkyFly - these three Airlines were affected) that are scheduled for 7+ days later (1 week difference in flight date) to come on actual schedule as thou they were planned for the same day - we have found and isolated the cause (finally!) and made sure the Slot Coordinator at ATC never makes such an error again ) This was a pretty critical bug, sometimes causing the entire game to become locked and further unplayable; fixed

Facilities

• Added water reservoir tower next to Fire and Rescue station

Vegetation

• Some tropical plants and trees added to high-detail layer of vegetation (currently testing the performance, some may be included in 'Normal' vegetation density setting

Sounds

• New real-world engines sounds for Vertical Noble J58 aircraft (thanks, Tony!) recorded again in very high quality with almost zero rogue noise on a 58 with Continental IO-550 engine with dual directional microphones, remastered in Stereo with dual channel input. Very distinctively sounding engine!

User Interface

• Added Salaries tab to Airport Administration UI, left part lists all the departments of the Airport along with analytical data: the number of employees, total monthly salaries per each department (along with bar-graphs visualizing the proportion of workforce expenses among departments; each department data block has an 'Info' button; upon pressing said button, all current employees of a department are listed in the right part of the tab (scrollable list), currently providing the following data: type of job occupied, name, job name, workplace, monthly salary. Should Player want to switch between monthly salaries view and daily wages view, he or she may press and hold key on keyboard and while holding it, the daily wages display mode is on; in future versions the arrows will appear next to the amount paid allowing for Salary increase\decrease and a meter, displaying Employee's happiness (please note: all HR-related perks' bonuses apply here - e.g. the 'Appealing Looks' perk will render in 10% lower salaries for the gender opposite to that of Player's avatar (Airport General Manager) to keep employee at the same level of happiness (i.e. say an office staff Female employee has a margin of happiness starting to go down at $850\mo salary, if the GM has selected a Male avatar and 'Appealing Looks' perk when starting the game, then the margin moves down to $765\mo - this is just an example of how this mechanics will work in new Salaries UI - it is also possible that a special small icon indicating that a perk affects salary may appear next to affected employees in future versions; the lower bar of Salaries tab displays total number of jobs, total monthly expenses on Salaries, average daily wage for Airport and the most important value to keep an eye on - the amount to be paid today at 1750Z time.
• Added Radar overlay to main UI - this is an enlarged version of the radar screen as can be seen in Control Tower view, available while in either of the following views (Airport Overview, Object View Camera, Passenger Terminal view and General Manager's office view); in order to bring up the Radar overlay into view, the Player should hold R key on keyboard pressed; once R key is released, the Radar overlay is closed; this is a convenience option allowing Player to have a quick glance on radar screen when needed, without having to switch to Tower view;
• Added tabbed UI to help screen;
• Quick Help screen expanded to become Help and Airport Management Knowledgebase; with this step we start adding more in-depth aviation-related and airport management related knowledge data for Players to learn or use as a reference when playing the game
• Added screen #4 to Help and Airport Management Knowledgebase - Understanding Radar Readout, which contains a brief info on how radar systems work in real world and in game, clarifies the meaning and usage of elements displayed on radar screen and provides information on reading and understanding aircraft labels
• Fixed 'Total Meals Ordered' instead of 'Total Drinks Ordered' in statistics display; the statistical values were correct, stat parameter name was wrong; fixed
• Added display of next flight operation for all idle aircraft on ground right in its InfoWindow (no need to check the weekly schedule to get this info); this displays type of operation, flight rules, flight number, day and time for next upcoming op; note: Flight School aircraft only have flight plans filed after Flight School opening hours (9:00) - so after daily flights end for Flight School aircraft and before the next day's Flight School Daily Roster Planning takes places, no info on next flight op will be available (e.g. at night); all other operators should have their flight plans filed long before their aircraft arrive at Player's airport, so such information theoretically should always be available for all Airlines and Private aircraft;
• Added 'Power used today' and 'Power generated today' to Electric Power Management UI (see Game workflow section for details on changes in Electric Power Management system);
• Added 7 new statistics parameters to statistics display screen
• Added new game tips to game loading screen