Splatter Room Iowa- Merle Hay Mall — Attraction in Des Moines

Despite the conditions of this place, my daughter and her friend had fun, which in the end is what matters.

However, $149 for the experience received was grossly overpriced. We had a 12:30pm booking and arrived by 12:15 giving the girls plenty of time to watch the safety video and get dressed. The girl at the front desk was on the phone...FACETIME...the ENTIRE TIME! She greeted us without taking her eyes off of her phone and continued to have her conversation with her friend on the phone. She glanced at the computer and then told us she was going to go clean and set up the room because it wasn't done. Back to talking on the phone and took it with her while she went to set up. She returned, still in the midst of her more important phone call. Another party had arrived and was also waiting. She couldn't even recognize who was who because she just said, whoever was here first come on back.

My kids didn't get into their room until 1:15.

We followed her back to the room, only to stand and wait longer for her to bring in the printer and two boxes of beer bottles...which I assumed was being done in the hour she disappeared.

I understand its a messy place and debris is bound to happen, but we had to walk through a hallway COVERED in broken glass...and also walked right by the broom, dustpan and trashbins. You would think you would at least want to sweep up the hallway before leading people back to their room. A few stray pieces...fine. BUT it was like a carpet of glass over the regular carpet.

Since my girls were minors, I was told I had to stand and watch them. I was not offered safety goggles or anything and stood in the glass coated hallway outside of their room, which was a whopping foot of safety distance from the room and flying debris. I stood behind the wall most of the time and peeked around the doorway whenever it got quiet to avoid any shrapnel.

From other reviews, I expect a smart response from the owner, and honestly don't care...I just want to make sure other parents and patrons know what they are...

I set up this adventure for my women's adventure group (7 women in our 50s and 60s). Our adventure was right after the election and before Thanksgiving. Great time to smash away any frustrations.

Online booking easy. Appointment reminders and directions were helpful. They were ready for us when we arrived. Instruction video important and the teen supervisor did a good job giving us our protective gear. Having protection was good, but know that your neck and ears are exposed (although nothing really touched those areas).

They had several sizes of crowbars, a sledgehammer, and a metal baseball bat. They need to replace their bat because it was missing the top part - so it was only half a bat, so wasn't very useful.

They had 20 beer bottles for us to break. Wish there was more variety for glass breaking. Throwing plates would have been satisfying. I also wish that they had something higher you could place the glass bottle on, so you could bat it to break. You mostly had to throw the bottles or swing at them at a low level (Perhaps it is a safety set up).

They had a printer and keyboard to destroy. A stabbing area where you could take your aggression out by using screwdrivers to stab a foam slab. A padded dummy to punch.

30 min was about the right amount of time. We were satisfied with the experience in about 15-20min.

Interesting concept. It certainly is freeing to give oneself the pleasure to destroy something when in everyday life, that isn't really an option to vent. Might be fun for them to have an area with foam nerf balls to have a Nerf/foam ball "snowball" fight.

I thought the price was rather high for the amount of satisfaction, but can imagine they need cash to make sure there are things to smash.

I probably would not go to this again unless they upgraded somehow. Also, I have nothing to compare it to as this is the first time I have been to something like this.

Novel experience and funny to watch others destroy things. ...

Is it fun to break things? Yes! Is it cheaper to go thrifting and get wayyy more stuff to break than you would be provided here? Absolutely. Me and two others had a reservation for 30 minutes and we ran out of stuff to break within the first 10 minutes, i don’t even know if we actually made it a full 10 minutes. We were given less than 10 bottles to break and about 10 Items to smash with the tools, there was a printer and a waffle iron, there were 2-3 keyboards and other various tech that looked like it was thrifted/salvaged. After we’d broken everything we just smashed it all to teeny tiny bits, it was HOT back in the back, there weren’t fans or anything it was so muggy. Overall I do not think that they give you enough things to break for the $60 price tag (PER PERSON!!!) and 30 minute appointment, for $60 i could go get 30 random breakables from dollar tree and have more fun and spend wayyyy less while simultaneously getting to break a million times more. The amount of stuff we had in our room would’ve been fine if it was a single person appointment. It would even be better if they cut down the appointment time and gave you the same amount of stuff, it’s pretty awkward to get done more than halfway through your time and then have to stand around in this giant itchy jumpsuit with the goggles and face shield they give you just trying not to think about how it reeks back there like sweat or how there’s no airflow. Overall was it fun? Absolutely. would i ever pay for something like this again especially if it was the same conditions?? No!!! and after you get done it feels a lot less fun overall if consider how you’re being scammed. $180 (60 per person for our 3 person room) for 30 minutes and maybe 15-20 things to break, half of these things being partially already broken bottles, it was NOT worth it imo, fun...