Chuck E. Cheese, the entertainment restaurant best known for its animatronic characters and birthday parties for kids, has announced Chuck’s Arcade, a new attempt to attract a certain audience into its locations, most notably this time, adults. As you might note from its name, this is purely an arcade, with a mix of classic and current games including Mortal Kombat, Donkey Kong, Ms. Pac-Man, and other various games you would expect to see in a small arcade. There will also be various merchandise you can win of the current and classic designed characters.
Chuck’s Arcade is purely focused on the arcade experience. It appears that there will be no pizza offerings at these locations, and the usual animatronic stage shows you would see at a Chuck E. Cheese will not be available. That said, it appears each location will have one of the animatronics on display in a case, whether that is Charles Entertainment Cheese himself or one of the members of Munch’s Make-Believe Band. The press release specifically notes only one animatronic on display per arcade, so we imagine many of the old ones were dismantled and scrapped for parts after the Chuck E. Cheese chain filed for bankruptcy a few years ago. Apparently, even the remaining renovated restaurants have gotten rid of their animatronics, which we wonder may be a byproduct of the success of the Five Nights at Freddy’s series.
Where is Chuck’s Arcade?
Chuck’s Arcade appears to be focused on opening in only large malls, which makes sense with how dead most malls in smaller communities are these days. Here are the cities where you can currently find them:
- St. Petersburg, Florida
- Trumbull, Connecticut
- Oklahoma City and Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Victor, New York
- Buford, Georgia
- El Paso, Texas
- Nashua and Salem, New Hampshire
- St. Louis, Missouri
We doubt that Chuck’s Arcade will become a massive thing in the future, but we do respect CEC Entertainment’s attempt at mixing up the formula. Millennials like me have some fond memories of visiting Chuck E. Cheese as a kid, so cashing in on that nostalgia makes some sense. We’re just not sure arcades in malls in 2025 will have much staying power.
