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Airmen at Kirtland Air Force base find camaraderie in gaming
Galen Clarke/Tribune
Airman Emery Esperanza celebrates after scoring a touchdown against Senior Airman John Sadowski in "Madden 2007" on a PlayStation 2 in his dorm room at Kirtland Air Force Base. The dorms are chock-full of gamers - and almost every night is some sort of tournament night, Esperanza said.
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Take an evening stroll down the rows of identical wooden doors on identical small dorm apartments at Kirtland Air Force Base and you'll see another common thread.
Game systems and gamers in just about every room.
Clad in camouflage and used to working mostly a 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. schedule, the clean-cut airmen might not look like typical gamers — but they have a love of electronics, gadgetry and competition, said Staff Sgt. Christopher Frost, 24.
"I think technical people, gamers, they want to join the Air Force because we have so much technical stuff to play with," said Frost, who edits the base newspaper and has been in Albuquerque for two years.
Frost, who grew up in Wisconsin, lives in base housing near the dorms and likes to play flight-simulation games on the computer.
On a sunny Tuesday evening, he escorted The Tribune through Kirtland's dorms, waving hello to airmen as they gathered at open doors and on walkways, getting ready for some nighttime play.
Frost's favorite game is "Microsoft Flight Sim X," which is very realistic, the former flyer said.
"You can start at Albuquerque, with your plane at the gate," Frost said. "Then you talk to the flight tower and get permission to take off."
He stopped a moment and laughed.
"It's really in-depth — it's a pain in the butt to learn," Frost said.
In the dorms, airmen tend to prefer console gaming over PC gaming. PlayStation 2s are probably the most common system, although some airmen have Xbox 360s and even hard-to-get Wii systems, said Airman Basic Emery Esperanza, 18.
A nearly ceiling-high wooden dresser in Esperanza's dorm room hides a PS2 and a big screen TV. Almost every day, he plays "Madden 2007" and "NCAA Football 2007" on it, he said.
"Back home, we'd have tournaments," said the Sacramento, Calif., native. "Everybody would put down $10, and somebody would leave rich."
Actually, tournaments aren't so hard to find in the dorms, either. Just head down the walkway any evening and the gamers will be there, he said.
"Gaming is a good way to stay out of trouble," Esperanza said, noting the occasional drinking that goes on in the dorms.
If he wants to play on newer systems, Esperanza doesn't have far to walk.
His next-door neighbor, Darren Goodnough, 18, has a Wii and an Xbox 360 — with a drawer loaded to the top with games.
He's a mechanic with the Air Force who "fixes stuff that they use on planes," Goodnough said.
He came to Albuquerque from Michigan, and uses his two systems to keep in touch with his friends across the country.
He and his friends back home play shooter games together online, Goodnough said.
"I like `Halo 2' and `Gears of War,' " he said. " `Gears of War' helps me, because I can blow off steam in so many ways - there's so many ways to shoot your friends."
He paused for a second, thinking about what he just said, then burst out laughing.
"We have a good time," he said.
Gaming with other airmen — no matter the rank — is also a good way to build camaraderie and a sense of teamwork, Frost said.
In his five years in the Air Force, he's spent a lot of time playing with all sorts of people, he said.
"We play with people who have lower ranks than us, higher ranks than us — we'd still say our `sirs,' though," Frost said.
Still, you don't want to get too absorbed in a game, he said.
"One time, the general walked in while we were playing 'Halo,' and nobody stood up to salute," Frost said. "That was pretty much the end of our 'Halo.' "
But even if you take all the games away, the Air Force still has one unique perk for hard-core gamers — real flight simulators used for training.
"Everybody on base wants to play on those flight simulators," Frost said. "It's the best game in the world."
