A Long Flight Navigation Guide: How to Pick a Direction and Where to Fly Next

Quick answer

A Long Flight has no map, charts or waypoint markers — you pick the direction yourself. In practice, flights run on one simple loop: after takeoff, fly toward the next visible building, land close to it, shut the engine off, clear the zombies, loot the building, then take off and repeat. Watch the fuel gauge, and head for an airport if you spot one while fuel is running low.

• Gas stations and other buildings hold kerosene, water, food and medical supplies
• The cockpit compass holds your heading and the fuel gauge tells you how far you can push
• Zombies respawn over time, so there is no reason to linger after looting a building

What you navigate with: the cockpit and the terrain

A Long Flight's cockpit gives you a compass plus altitude and fuel gauges you can read at a glance — and that is genuinely all the navigation the game offers. There are no charts and no route overlays like a flight simulator has. Nothing draws a course for you or marks where to go. That is the design rather than a missing feature: the game's own description hands the choice to you — pick your own direction, explore the skies, and see how far the journey takes you while you keep the airplane flying and survive the desert.

With nothing drawing your route, the terrain becomes the map. A road runs through the desert, and following it gives you a steady reference line the way early aviators once navigated by railroads. The remaining cockpit dials are hard to identify, and you don't need them: compass, altitude and fuel cover everything route-picking asks of you.

Picking a direction: fly building to building

Once airborne, you don't need a grand plan — you need a target. Every building you can see is a potential resupply stop, and the pattern below is how players actually cross the desert. If takeoffs are still shaky, the takeoff and flying walkthrough covers the flying itself.

Checklist

• Take off and climb

  Go full throttle, get airborne and climb until you have a clear view of the terrain.

• Pick the next visible building

  Gas stations are the classic target, but any structure out in the sand can hold loot and zombies.

• Land close to it

  You can only loot a building you land next to. If you stop too far out, start the engine again and reposition nearer before getting out.

• Stop the engine and clear the zombies

  Shut the plane down before you explore, and deal with the building's zombies before you start looting.

• Loot the building

  Take the kerosene canisters, water, food and medical supplies you need and load them onto the plane.

• Take off and repeat

  Pick the next building you can see. Zombies respawn over time, so a cleared building will not stay clear.

That respawn rule sets your pace: a building you have emptied is a stop, not a base. Land, clear, loot, leave — and let the next visible structure choose your heading for you.

Deciding which place to head toward next

Once the loop is second nature, the direction question turns into a series of small calls that your gauges and cargo make for you:

Decision guide

Choose for your situation

Fuel is getting low and you spot an airport

Head for the airport and land while you still have fuel — an airport can be used to refuel the plane.

Kerosene, water, food or medical supplies are running short

Make the nearest visible building your next stop and run the landing loop again.

You have just cleared and looted a building

Take off and move on. Zombies respawn over time, so a looted building has nothing left to offer.

Nothing is urgent

Follow the road or pick any visible structure and keep flying — choosing your own direction is the whole point of the game.

Keep the loop going and the question answers itself: every landing is chosen by what your fuel gauge and cargo demand, and every takeoff hands you a fresh skyline of targets. For more depth on each piece, the longest flight guide covers keeping the tank and cargo alive between stops, the scavenging guide covers what buildings give up, and the locations guide looks at the places themselves.