Guest Post: A review of Planet Fun, Inngoldmels, UK by Kieran May

It’s been a while since we had an arcade location review, as well as a guest post but Arcade Heroes reader (and frequent tipster) Kieran May sent us his review of an FEC in the UK known as Planet Fun. He gets into what they offer as well as the customer service aspect and whether that will make or break your experience there. It brings up an excellent subject all location owners should worry about – whether their staff on hand is making the customer feel welcome to be there (which equals repeat visits) or if they feel like they should spend their hard-earned money elsewhere. Hit the post break below for the review.

Review: Planet Fun, Inngoldmels, UK by Kieran May

In a time when it’s not always affordable to fly to another country for a holiday, most brits would resort to going to the seaside for their holidays and when British people think of the seaside, they think of ice cream, fish and chips, sand castles and of course arcades. This review is of the Planet Fun arcade in Inngoldmels, opposite Fantasy Island indoor amusement park near Skegness, UK. This arcade was first constructed in 2002 and has dramatic improvements since then by adding more games, an extension and a car park around the side. This arcade is really big and is the biggest one in Inngoldmels itself and it was my favourite arcade until this weekend.

The Good

As for the selection of games they have normally they have lots of new games each year but this year was a little disappointing as all they had were two Terminator Salvation games. Its not all bad though as there are plenty of other arcade games to choose from including Outrun 2 SPDX, currently priced at £1 which to me is really reasonable for a giant motion simulator driving game like Outrun. They also have others such as After Burner Climax, Rambo, Sega Rally 3,and The Fast and the Furious: Super Bikes and more.

Other stuff

They also have one of those mini bowling alleys that are not proper big balls but balls that children can easily pick up. They also have a target shooting game called Pin Point Shot by Namco which is really cool as you shoot targets from up stairs across from the other side of the ceiling. Last year or the year before they started having ticket redemption games too for younger kids to save up and win prizes and unfortunately lots and lots of fruit machines; “bandits” to you Americans which is typical really but I’m disappointed that there’s even more fruit machines and I’m not even including the casino areas. They have a kids motorbike track that are like dodgems but for kids on bikes. They also have two cafes upstairs both at either ends of the building. With one that has a balcony with table and chairs to sit outside.

Another great thing is that they have toilet facilities which you normally either have to pay for or go to a public toilet.

The Very Bad

Now it all does sound really great what I have mentioned however there is one drawback which stops it from being the best arcade in inngoldmels. I would love to be really positive
and I really love the arcade as I’ve been to it for years since it very first opened but the downside to the arcade is that the staff are not very nice. The staff in that arcade are  incredibly rude and horrible and basically don’t give a shit, which gives arcades a bad name all together and is probably one of the reasons are made out to be bad places. I went on Sega’s Primeval Hunt only to find that the touch screen feature wasn’t working at all and I needed the touch screen to move to another area in the game (I went on this game last year which wasn’t working also but had no problem getting my money refunded). I told one of the staff about the fault and said that I didn’t need the touch screen and that the game was find but I insisted that the game didn’t working properly without the touch screen and said I needed to put money in the machine for the touch screen to work while still explaining that it didn’t work even during game play. In the end he got another member of staff and he put money in so I could show him and he told me the machine would tell them it wasn’t working which I found to be false since the screen didn’t respond to anything .thought I was lying though when he put money in the machine and yet at the same time yet he just wondered away and he got yet another member of staff and told me that they paid for my game and that’s all I’m getting without even giving me back my money and all walked away chuckling yet at the same time they even admitted that the touch screen needed calibrating properly. I even said at least put an out of order sign on the machine which they also didn’t do and is left running still. Its not the first time though as one of my aunties won jackpot once on one of the fruit machine but wouldn’t pay up and the staff wouldn’t believe her and she lost all her winnings.

Conclusion

It is a really good arcade with a big selection of games to choose from and fun for all the family but the staff members are very ignorant and conning. My advice is go to Planet Fun if you want but if there’s something wrong with the machine that is not that obvious, don’t expect to get a refund from them other than rudeness. After this recent experience, I really don’t recommend going there at all;  just go to another arcade in Inngoldmels that have those games apart from such as Outrun 2 SPDX and Pin Point Shot etc. since you can play most of the same games, excluding those two I just mentioned.