aMAZEment Action Playcenter — Attraction in Haverhill

Lesson learned the hard way, and at our young daughter's expense: You buy cheap, you get cheap. We wanted to support this local business so we took our daughter there to celebrate her birthday, but as my husband stated in the previous review, her special day turned into a nightmare.

While the cost to get her in was very minimal ($11.95), it still was not worth it. You take your chances putting tokens into any of the machines because they take your tokens and nothing happens, or you win tickets and none come out. The machines are also inconsistent - it works once or twice and you think you've found a game that won't steal your tokens, until it inevitably does. Even the ticket redemption machines were unreliable. It was extremely frustrating and awkward to take the time to make several trips to the front desk to ask for your tokens back, or for a game that was previously working to be reset. We absolutely lost money to these machines.

Then upon leaving, we discovered that our daughter's shoes had been stolen from the provided bins. We alerted the staff, to which they casually admitted "It happens all the time here." So instead of improving their system due to a known issue, or putting up an actually helpful sign warning you that it is a common occurrence to be aware of, all they have is a sign that says "We are not responsible for lost or stolen items", so they can rid themselves of liability when you are most likely robbed.

Tokens are 4 for $1, most games cost 2-4 tokens, the average you win per game is 1-10 tickets, and the tiniest 3" stuffed animal costs 300 tickets, with some of the most 'expensive' prizes requiring 8,000+ tickets. So while the entry fee is cheap, you'll more than make up for the cost in defective machines, buying enough tokens to get your kid more than a miniature rubber ball for a prize, and most likely being robbed of personal items by the clientele who frequent there, all things the staff are aware of. And now we'll be paying even more to replace our daughter's beloved shoes that she wanted to wear to celebrate her birthday. We couldn't even take her out to her birthday dinner without having to stop at home first for another pair to even be able to enter a restaurant. It was surreal leaving an establishment carrying our daughter to the car because her shoes were stolen from her.

This place cost us time, money, and heartache. Hopefully we can save others from the same by sharing...

Love this place as a playground, but avoid at all costs for organized birthday parties.

We go often to play in bad weather and the cold, have been for over a year. We went for a birthday party a few weekends ago and I’m questioning ever going again.

The party layout is awkward, especially for young kids. You play first, and only for an hour. With a group of 4-5 year olds, we spend more time trying to convince them to stop playing and come to the party room. The pizza is rubbery, and no one ate much, and then the arcade tokens sat largely unused because the kids just wanted to go play again (do not attempt to let your kids do that, we were screamed at by a young guy barely over 21). They also book parties so close together that between trying to force unhappy kids to stop playing, then food and cake, we had another party staring at us through the window waiting for their turn. 45 or minutes was really about 20 when everything was said and done.

It is clear that their parties are only booked by whoever happens to answer the phone that day. I suggest they invest the money into hiring an actual party planner to revamp and book their events if they want to continue with parties. So disappointing because my family loves this place so much and my son wanted his party there as well. After the train wreck we attended it’s going to have to be a...

I really wanted to like this place since we live so close but we will not be returning. Although my daughter had fun, I wanted nothing more than to turn around and leave due to the customer service as soon as we walked in. I paid for my 3 year old daughter as well as my TEN month old son to “play” even though the website said “under one is free” with a sibling. I met with the girl at the register eating her candy saying “the website is wrong and she will let her manager know that it’s the way it is”. It really wasn’t paying the fee- it was the attitude I had received from her while going back up there and asking AGAIN why I’m paying for my son. “Well he’s here to play isn’t he?”, Was one of her replies.. $25 dollars for my kids plus another $12 dollars for an additional 10 month old.. there are better options out there that are more reasonable and FRIENDLY.

The 2 stars isn’t just for the attitude (not even a goodbye back to us when We were leaving) but also because my 10 month old found open outlets in the infant play area available when that should be inspected by the...