Gaming Lounge Opens In Red Jacket

Ellicott residents are eager to use the 48 new high powered battlestations

Students play Valorant, Overwatch, League of Legends, and more on the opening night of the Red Jacket gaming lounge. Photo by Dominick Matarese.

A new gaming lounge was made available to use by residents of the Ellicott Complex this Tuesday. Located in Red Jacket Quadrangle, the lounge is open every day from 12 to 8 p.m. but students may not arrive past 7 p.m.

Students appeared to be enjoying the new lounge, with a majority of the 48 chairs filled on the opening night, and some students even attempting to sneak in past the 7 p.m. cutoff. A respectful volume was maintained, broken only by the sound of occasional laughing, gaming callouts, and ASMR-esque clicking from the gaming keyboards.

Freshman chemistry major Isaac Latoski, said he preferred the new lounge over the LevelUp gaming lounge in Lockwood Library. He cited the lounge as a main reason he wants to move to the Red Jacket dorms from Spalding.

“I would say my dorm is kind of weird to play in. My roommates are in there and they definitely mess it up for me,” Latoski said. “They're a little bit obnoxious… And then also, I would say, because it's social, it's here. It's nicer than the stuff I have anyways,” he said.

James Basta, coordinator of esports at UB views the space as one where students who enjoy gaming can build community.

“The overall intention of this space is… for residents to come together to de-stress, to relax, to game with their friends...it's a lot different to game online with people you know, than to be in the same physical space,” Basta said. “So we're really hoping it's going to be just a good space for just people to come together and make memories.”

Basta also indicated that in the future the Red Jacket gaming lounge may also serve as a programming space for RA’s to reserve the space to get students together for gaming.

Freshman economics and marketing major Jack Matteis said he was using the lounge because his friends got him into gaming during quarantine and he fell in love with Valorant.

“My high school friend goes to UB, so we go to LevelUp, and now we live in Ellicott so this was right here for us…we love it because we could literally just walk outside our dorm,” he said.

The lounge comes complete with 48 Dell Alienware gaming PC’s with equally as many Alienware gaming oriented monitors, mice, keyboards, headsets and chairs. Though not currently available, the lounge will also eventually feature two “gaming stations,” each with an Xbox series X, Playstation 5, Nintendo Switch and the capability to plug in one’s own device.

Though not included in the current construction, Basta says there are plans to create a streaming booth for students who wish to stream content online but do not have access to proper equipment.

The total allocated budget for the lounge is $1,916,392, and the YTD spending currently sits at $1,252,356.

Looking into the new lounge from outside, in the Ellicott complex. Photo by Dominick Matarese

Student’s must use their UB student ID to enter the Red Jacket gaming lounge, and must be residents of Ellicott Complex to enter, unlike the LevelUp lounge which is accessible by all UB students.

Student’s using the lounge must log in and use software called ggLeap, and may only use the lounge for 15 hours per week. The 15 hour limit is shared between both the Red Jacket gaming lounge and the LevelUp lounge on the 2nd floor of Lockwood Library. Students' usage of either lounge will count towards a student's total weekly allowance.

The ggLeap software enables access to a suite of PC games, including many paid games which are usable for free by students.

The lounge is collaboratively operated by UB Campus Living and Student Engagement. Student Engagement has the primary role of operating the lounge and hiring and paying student workers to staff it, but Campus Living owns the space.

“We have to have a lot of conversations about what's going to happen, because while we are running it, it's kind of their space and we want to be good stewards of what's there,” said Basta.

Construction on the lounge began prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, and though students can currently utilize it, a grand opening is slated for January when students return from winter break.

Despite two separate flooding incidents during construction causing water damage to ceiling tiles and a table, the only delays in construction were due COVID-19 related supply chain issues.

When asked if the lounge would be used by the Varsity esports teams in any capacity in the future, Phyllis Floro, director of Student Engagement said that the current use is aimed only at residential students in Ellicott Complex, but Basta said “in the future we'll have conversations about opening it up for certain things” such as watch parties for the Varsity esports teams.

According to Floro, UB administration has seen the Red Jacket lounge, LevelUp and esports support as a way to fulfill an increased interest in gaming among students, build community and to provide an experience not previously offered on campus.

“UB is definitely ahead of the curve in terms of providing spaces and opportunities that public institutions traditionally haven't done,” Basta said. “ A lot of gamers, they just want to know that the university sees them and acknowledges them as a vital integral and ultimately important part of the university.”

Depending on the success of the current esports initiatives, there may be more support for gaming in future years.

“If this turns out to be a huge success, I can definitely see ResLife opening [another lounge] up in South Campus, I can see potentially when the new Wellness Center comes out, maybe there's one put in the new Wellness Center…if it turns out that every seat is full for every single hour, I wouldn't put it past the university to have the vision to be like ‘we need to do more’,” said Basta.

Originally written for the UB Spectrum, December 9, 2022