Chuck E. Cheese
After seven years, I have returned to Chuck E. Cheese.
This is my story.
Seven years ago, I attended a little gathering at an obscure little restaurant known as Chuck E. Cheese (you probably haven’t heard of it].. My younger years are a bit of haze, and I have no recollection of going to a Chuck E. Cheese, so I had all but forgotten my brief encounter with the establishment. Soon, it would beckon me once more to it’s old, run down arcade machines, that would instantaneously collapse had they not been hastily duct taped them together. Once more, it would beckon me to it’s halls crammed with shoals of children, most of whom under the age of ten, devouring large swathes of pizza and screeching something about Minecraft. And it would once again beckon me to it’s pizza...which was actually pretty good. I’m not lying. You should try some when you have the chance. But the pizza is beside the point.
What mattered was that Chuck E Cheese was calling to me, and I was going to answer this call. But this time, I would not be a tiny seven year old. Oh no. I would go to the place as a fourteen year old adolescent boy. I can already hear you scoffing at me. “Wow, John seriously went to Chuck E. Cheese? That’s kind of low, even for him.” But you do not understand. This endeavor was purely for science. And also tickets. But mostly science. The moment my friend Henry (who was 14 years old as well) invited me to his birthday party, and said that the party would be held at Chuck E. Cheese, I saw this as the PERFECT opportunity to answer the question on everyone’s minds, “Am I too old to be going to Chuck E. Cheese?” After spending three hour of my time in that establishment, it had taught me one lesson That lesson was, “What happens in Chuck E. Cheese stays in Chuck E. Cheese.”
Chuck E. Cheese is, first and foremost, an entertainment business that specializes in children, not adolescents, so it is safe to say that my age group is not part of their demographic. But that didn’t deter me from going there in the first place, or else I wouldn’t be writing this article. For a long time the place has been known for using tokens, which you use play games, which you play to earn tickets, which you in turn use to receive miscellaneous toys and trinkets. However, things seem to have changed, and instead of using tokens, they give you a card which you can use a limited number of times to play said games. You can’t keep using it forever though, because each card has a set amount of points, so it’s possible to completely expend your card’s usability trying to beat one game. Towards the end of my visit, I had done exactly that on this one Spongebob game. I stood by and watched with a psychotic grin as dozens of tickets slowly dispensed out of the old machine, and grunted in frustration whenever I failed. Meanwhile, the entire time a family was sitting by, just watching me, and giving me odd looks. Evidently, they did not understand the gravity of the situation. It seemed odd to me that I had taken great pleasure and satisfaction in earning tickets. I didn’t even use the tickets to redeem anything; as a matter of fact I just gave all of them away to my friends. There is some simplistic, primal satisfaction I get from earning tickets for no other reason but for the sake of earning ticket.
Sue me, but I had loads of fun with the games, even though some of them were practically made for toddlers, and others were barely functional. I took childish pleasure in picking up a sci-fi laser rifle and pretending I was a space marine, blasting away dozens of aliens, and I developed an unhealthy gambler-like addiction to spending my entire card on trying to win the aforementioned Spongebob game. And that’s not even mentioning all the other attractions. They also had this huge maze of tubes that little kids were meant to crawl through, but some of my 14-15 year old friends (who shall remain anonymous) decided to cram themselves in. Now I need you to imagine for a second; you're a young 7 year old boy having the time of his life at this pizza place. You just crammed excessive amounts of pizza into that tiny mouth of yours, and had eaten just a bit too much candy. You are now extremely energetic and erratic and are now ready to run and crawl all over the place, and you are very pleased to learn that their is a place in the establishment built for the sole purpose of allowing you to release all that pent up energy, a gigantic labyrinth of tubes just for you and all your friends to crawl around in. And as you are crawling around in that maze of tubes imagine your dismay when a fully grown 14 year old appears out of nowhere and blocks your way. As my friend entered that maze of tubes I heard a blood curdling scream seconds later. Whether or not it was the children or my friend who let out that scream is something I will probably never know for sure, so I will leave it to you to decide who it was.
So now to answer that age old question: “Am I too old to be going to Chuck E. Cheese’s?” And after spending three hours and enjoying almost every minute of it, I can safely say no, you are never too old to be going to Chuck E. Cheese. If you can look past the boisterous screeching of some of its younger attendants, and the questionable condition of some of its machinery, it is a plain old good time, and a great way to spend some of your summer. It is indiscriminate when it comes to who it can entertain, I happened to see my friend’s dad with a huge grin on his face playing one of those racing games, and he’s probably in his 40s at this point and he’s STILL having a good time. This establishment welcomes all, and I highly suggest that you disregard any and all judgements and assumptions made about adolescent boy or girls spending their time in a Chuck E. Cheese. All you have to do is waltz into the place without a care in the world, and simply enjoy yourself.
