First, let me say that I am completely addicted to this game! I started playing AH about 8 weeks ago and cannot stop. It is so bad, find myself thinking about the game even when I’m not playing it. At work, I read about ACM during my breaks. At dinner, I think about a new technique I learned the night before (often at the expense of a death). I find my attraction to the game stems from my love of flying and to honor the warriors (on all sides) who flew daring missions not so long ago when the future of the world hung in the balance.
I thought I would post this as a perspective from a recent newbie to our little society. So many of you have been playing AH for a long time I thought it would be entertaining to read about one newbie’s experience.
I learned of AH from a commercial I saw while watching the Military Channel. My son said, “Dad, let’s check this out”. The rest is history. After downloading the game and doing all of the initial configuration, I took off for the first time in a late war arena. I thought this was going to be another arcadish, console game where I just point my plane at the nearest target and shoot. Boy was I in for a big surprise! After getting my butt handed to me a dozen times in a few minutes, my boy said “Dad, I thought you knew how to fly a plane”.
After swallowing my ego and telling my son to go dig a hole or something, I decided to dedicate myself to the art of virtual dogfighting. I spent hours, days reading anything I could get my hands on. Slowly, I digested the material and up’d again. This time, I got a kill before someone flamed me. That was it, I was hooked!
Over the next few weeks of sleepless nights and ticking my wife off, I began to understand the nature of the game and ACM. Dogfights became a rush and I found myself almost shaking during engagements. I wanted kills so bad, I could taste it. More often then not, an engagement usually ended with me thinking, “Ok, what just happened” or “I’ll never do that again”. I guess the thrill of knowing that I was dueling with a live person on the other end of the wire was the part of the drug that got me hooked. Once I got invited into a Squadron, the experience went to a whole new dimension. Go SWAMPDRAGONS!! (sorry, had to get that plug in there).
As time passed, I started holding my own and racked up kills. I often think about the guys who did this for real and wonder how in the world any of them actually lived out the war. I cannot fathom what it was like for them. They are heroes in my book. So, to all those “Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines” who fought, lived and died so long ago, my humble hats off to you!
For anyone I shot down and will shoot down, I am sorry but better you than me
HighGTrn
