Dave & Buster's Arlington — Restaurant in Arlington

It's unfortunate and still hard to come to terms with seeing customer service or simple friendliness as a thing of the past, especially in the SERVICE industry.

Brought my family here for dinner and games on a weekday evening. Made a reservation for the off chance it was busy (it wasn't) around 6:30 pm. When we walked in, there was a waiter/host and waitress/hostess standing at the entrance to the restaurant area. My wife and kids had walked in before me (cold so I needed a jacket) and my wife had told the host, who turned out to be our waiter, we had a reservation as I was walking in. He tried to get the hostess' attention to let her know since she had the restaurant iPad in her hand but she was a little busy doing something on her phone. Once he had a chance to let her know, another girl came walking up and they didn't care in any way that we've been standing there close to 5 minutes waiting for them to seat us and decided to start whispering back and forth while looking at something on the first girls phone (definitely not work related) while the waiter stood there awkwardly and clueless to whats happening same as we were.

I forgot to mention, the restaurant was completely EMPTY! Not a single person to wait on in there at all! Why they couldn't just seat us instead of pretend the reservation even made a difference makes absolutely zero sense to me. When the girls were done satisfying their itch for gossip, they asked for the name on the reservation and we were finally taken to our table by the waiter.

His service also ended up being sub-par along with the most of the food just being ok at best. The Brekky Burger (pictured) was pretty good, though, and the truffle fries weren't too bad, but some were almost soggy. We had to ask for one of our sodas a couple times before he finally remembered to bring it out..... after the food was delivered 🤦‍♂️ We also had to catch him walking by to another couple that came to dine in order to get our drinks refilled. BTW, that other couple and my family was as busy as it got the entire time we were there.

Finished dinner, paid the bill and went to play some games with the kids (elementary age to high school). Definitely not as many games as there used to be and didn't really stand out like they used to. More of an oversized average arcade for the most part other than a couple games like a large hungry hippos you sit on and an ax throwing game. It was still a good time though at least.

We definitely have no intention of dining there again and will be trying to convince the kids to try somewhere else if they bring it up.

The service wait staff was the biggest reason that turned us off to D&B. With so many other options that are similar in experience, and seemingly much less patrons than you used to have, it may be helpful to reiterate to the staff that friendly = more return customers, more return = more hours for labor = bigger paycheck/more tips. No worries either way, though. Peter Piper Pizza isn't far, is ver friendly, has enough games to be satisfied, and only cost 10-20% of...

Well, definitely a huge change since the last time we visited. There were 2 families there with children -barely- walking age that were running around without their adults. Climbing on all the games, screaming when a guest wouldn't let them have the ball/axe at whatever random game they wandered over to. Both parents were unconcerned on where their children were and one of the kids knocked their parent in the face when told "gently" not to do something when they finally found their kid after being without them for a good 15-20 minutes each time. The parents just kept smiling and acting clueless on how DANGEROUS that behavior was. We ended up just leaving the games side and went to try and get a table. After searching for a while for a host, we went to the bar to let them know we would like to sit and order, a server came out seemingly intoxicated with an attitude, saying "someone" would come take our order. She disappeared and then came back to take our order. I'm not sure if she was further annoyed by having to come back out & take our order, but man, whatever is up with her needs to be addressed by leadership, especially since she was like night and day depending on if he was standing there or not. She then spilled an entire glass of ice water all over our table. -sigh- No worries, the manager came over to help clean it up. 3 out of our 4 dishes came out, and the manager asked if we needed anything else. My husband told him we were missing his food. Around that time is when he sat my food down and I picked out a piece of plastic. Granted, he did offer to remake them, but I just picked it out and started eating. My husband's food finally came and the noodles were like gum. He sent it completely back. Then, the server came back over out of nowhere, standing way too close while I was eating and asked again if I wanted my food remade. I replied that it was fine, I was already eating it...like halfway done at this point. She didn't move and asked if I was sure. MA'AM I'M LITERALLY TRYING TO EAT. All I could do was stare straight ahead and not say anything or keep eating. She finally walked away. I know the service industry is HARD. Especially now-a-days...but dang. We did still tip her $20, which is very low for us, but we felt there was room for improvement. The manager was very accommodating and apologetic. He did remove the dish my husband sent back and also my dish even though we had eaten it, so that was very nice. We will still be back, solely based on the rapport that the manager built with us in that short amount of time, we'll just be a little more mindful of busy times now that it is summer and kids are out late. They have remodeled this location and under normal circumstances, it isn't a bad location at all. The restrooms are very clean and they do sanitize the gaming area. Yes, this is one of the locations that still carry the Skee-ball game, so that's a plus for me. Their garlic fries are still a hit with us as well. Try them if...

Yummy, flavorful food. Games over priced. Definitely a money trap. This could be a much nicer experience if they change the game monetary system. Most games or all popular games cost 9.8 to 16.9 points to play and you only get to play a minute or two at best which eats up game cards. You're constantly refilling your game card with more chips to play and before you know it you've spent $50-$100 for only 30-45 minutes for barely an hour of play not to mention any food or drinks which are also pricey. Simple fix and Dave & Buster's knows it would be to charge one reasonable price for an hour or day of play. If someone has paid to eat there and spent over $40+ bucks they should automatically get an hour of play for free and an entire day of play also should not exceed $40. This place really cost more than a day at Six Flags especially if you have a family with 2-3 kids. It's ridiculous! Yes, my kid enjoyed it as the money continued to pour from my wallet. Arlington in general has gotten so expensive since the stadium arrived and these businesses are taking advantage and ripping off consumers. You should not have to spend almost $90 for 1 child to play video games for less than an hour. That's highway robbery so we won't be going back anytime soon. Also, they can offer a family, kids or military day each week at reduced prices if they don't change the card system.

This was what I paid for 1 child.

$12 for 60 tokens last about 10-15 minutes $2 extra for a card $15 for 78 tokens last about 15 minutes $10 for 48 tokens last about 10 minutes $15 for 78 tokens last about 15 minutes $$$ for 120 tokens last about 15 minutes when playing games that took over 16 points per play.

A kid can play all these tokens in less than an hour when most games cost 10-16 tokens each and several games like the large boxers and air hockey require you to pay twice to play 1 game. The large virtual car racing game is over 16 tokens per play and the kids want to play it multiple times because it finishes so quickly. Don't waste your money on that over sized boxing game. The figures barely move and it takes too many tokens.

This is not a family budget conscience venue at all... it's a money pit. We collected over $3200 in points and my son still couldn't get a nice price because you basically have to pay them hundreds of dollars to get something you could buy at Walmart for $30. We paid almost $100 and my son got 3 cheap $5 Dollar General prizes.

Drinks cute but they skimp on the alcohol. Service slow. Staff really nice. Food very tasty. Restroom clean. Remember to request your military discount on games and food. I...