Airport is the 2-player version. College Queens is the 4-player version. Despite the very different names, themes, and art, the two games have identical layouts, rules, and scoring.
Pretty much nothing on Airport is lit due to anything the player does: instead, more and more scoring features are lit as the game goes on. Use the first balls to ensure that you find a way not to house ball on balls 4 and 5. Lit lanes (top, side, and even the out lanes) are the most reliable sources of points, so try to end up there when possible, including out lane draining instead of center draining if you can. Avoid the vary-targets, as they're difficult to get the max score on at the best of times and frequently put the ball in danger on the return.
All lanes (top, side, and out lanes) score 50 points, or 300 when lit. The blue and yellow bumpers score 1 point, or 10 points when lit. The red bumper and the four standup targets score 10 points, or 100 when lit.
Nothing on Airport can be lit mid-ball, with all scoring features basing whether or not they are lit solely on the ball number. On 5-ball play, the playfield is lit as follows:
I believe that when set to 3-ball play, balls 1, 2, and 3 correspond to the lit-feature rules of balls 2, 3, and 5 from 5-ball play.
The two vary targets at the bottom of the table can be pushed in to any of 5 levels, and score 10, 20, 30, 40, or 50 points. One of the two vary targets will be lit. The lit target scores 10x value, so 500 points are available. Which vary target is lit alternates every time the 10s digit of the score changes.
Shots to these vary targets are dangerous, and it can be difficult if not impossible to push them in all the way on some machines, so they're honestly best avoided by all but the most accurate shooters playing the most well maintained copies of the game.
The left side lane can be shot from below with the right flipper. If you can find this shot, it can be worth very strong and efficient points once the side lanes are lit, especially if the ball rolls up and back down for 600 points. The right side lane cannot be shot from below; instead, entering the lane from the top awards a repluinge. Go for this whenever possible, since you have 100% control over getting another 300 points for free from the top lanes via the plunge. Unfortunately, it requires both good nudging and pop bumper luck to end up going down this lane.
There is no end of ball bonus. All features stay lit from ball to ball (with more added for each ball, as described above).
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