Summary / Quick Breakdown 🏃♂️ :
Rating: ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
Location 📌: 1725 99 St NW, Edmonton, AB T6N 1K5
Good 👍 : Has many games, great way to pass time
Bad 👎 : Can be expensive and not all games are maintained properly
Price 💰 : $$
For my tenth adventure I would like to talk about The Rec Room, a chain of Barcade’s (Bar + Arcade) which is targeted towards the demographic of young working adults. The chain is owned by Cineplex which has a monopoly on all the movie theaters in Canada.
It is truly interesting how they are attempting to take over the entertainment industry in Canada by providing all these offerings.
Although there are locations all across Canada, the location that I went to was the South Edmonton Commons. This location has a standalone Rec Room, which is housed in its own building unlike some of the other Rec Rooms which are attached to a mall.
Most of the locations follow the same playbook, where they have a variety of arcade games, a pool table or two, racing simulator, and a restaurant/bar.
This location is special because it has other additional attractions like bowling and axe throwing.
The way The Rec Room works is you get a card that can be used like a credit card, and you add credits to it in exchange for money.
Personally, I always go for the $50 option whenever I go there, as the credits can be used at other locations and do not expire unless they go out of business.
Pro tip: If you subscribe to their Cineclub or Student discount, you can save a considerable amount of money!
That day I played various arcade games, including my favorites like the Tower Stacker, Monster Drop, and Pop the Lock.
I also played pool, which is charged differently here, as one tap is the equivalent to 30 minutes of play, instead of 1 tap = 1 game.
I had also participated in the Axe throwing, and I was not very good at it. Despite this, I’m still glad I had the opportunity to try at a low cost.
Finally, I tried out their racing simulator, which was a bit different to the ones that I see locally here in Burnaby, but it was a worse experience overall. The rig just looks good but performs even worse compared to the simpler one at the Burnaby location.
All in all, for $40 after discount, if you bring a few friends or just yourself, you’re guaranteed to have a blast for a few hours. This means that it only works out to a few dollars every hour to create possibly lifelong memories.