OK - hopefully I might be of some help here
Bodger I think you may need to re-install ATCC sounds like you may have a corrupt installation there. Dunno how powerful your PC is but ATCC is only a small proggy. If re-installing doesn't work try running ATCC is DOS and see if that helps.
The answer given to the maps question is correct - use Wordpad to view the little blighters. If you want to tinker with them I find loading them as an image into Word after a bit of jiggery pokery works for resizing and the like. Might be worth a try.
Bear Cub - hmmmmm - you should be able to press F1 then click on the flashing tag of the aircraft you want back, to retrieve a lost handover. It shoudl then say in your console "handoff accepted" or something like that. You really do need the right maps and for them to be the right size for ATCC otherwise chaos really does take over!
Finally kopbhoy. I'd say that ATCC was much more realistic then say FS98 and I really would say that the software is perhaps as far as you can take a PC based sim that also doubles as a "game" i.e something that can entertain also. Obviously there's alot of stuff missing out of there like VFR traffic requesting a service, level busts, callsign confusion..even the odd emergency would be "nice" if you know what I mean.
I believe the problem would be that if you added all of those elemsnts you may scare off some of the casually interersted people who use and enjoy the software. Not everyone likes to come home from work or whatever and engage their brain to the extent that a fuly featured ATC sim would require. I could be wrong there, but I suppose as with FS98 and the like, there is a fine line between entertainment and something really difficult and not that enjoyable to the casual enthusiast or player.
To stop this waffling I seem to be doing, yes, in my experience as a faithful (???) NATS employee - this is about as real as it gets on the PC - for the time being anyhow.
Very interesting point that kopbhoy
Hope this waffle is of some use anyhow!
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"Go around..I say again...go around"
[This message has been edited by niteflite01 (edited 05 October 2000).]