The 1up Arcade Bar - LoDo — Restaurant in Denver

first time visiting Denver took a chance on this place utter disappointment. smelled like BO and sweat along with dirty toilets, employees were rude and lazy as well as unprofessional . bar tenders over charge for drinks and don't even know how to make half of the drinks you ask for. to make it worse i witnessed a waitress go up to a group complaining how she thought it was screwed up she didn't get a tip on the big tab. I was thinking well I wouldn't have tipped you either with the way you serve people. the manager watched the whole thing happen and didn't tell the waitress (or whatever you call a female bartender) anything and in turn the waitress had the group kicked out by the bouncers. when I go out with friends I really wouldn't want someone giving me crap for just a tip. obviously if she was just relying on that one group then shes doing her job wrong. I personally go around a lot of bars to tell magazines and culture websites the new hip places. after seeing how unprofessional everyone was I DO NOT SUGGEST YOU COME HERE! your better off going to Dave and busters to get better service from some teenagers. new management is definitely needed. very offensive thinking this was fake but hopefully people will read other reviews and know I am not the only one with...

Older arcade cabinets (like Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker!) and the biggest Pac-Man screen in the world (floor to ceiling) this place has decent cabinets. Cabinets ranging from classics like Galaga to more modern games like Flappy Bird, this place is enthroned in game cabinets.

For the pinball fans, they have a whole section of ~10 machines. From what I can remember they have The Addams Family, Wizard of Oz. South Park, Indiana Jones, and Star Wars. All of the pinball machines are in great condition.

Most games are 25 cents, pinball starts at 50 cent. Some of the more popular games (Street a Fighter II) have control issues due to very obvious and vigorous use (control panel actually lifts up).

Not much for team based games like Killer Queen the only ones were a Pac-Man table top (4 player), the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. These were 50 cents per player.

Drinks were solid though! A good tap selection and of course l the liquor you would expect at a bar. Drink prices were reasonable...

I love 1Up, don't get me wrong. I like that there are vintage arcade games and pinball. Of late, I do think they have pushed in too much pinball to the detriment of the arcade games. Additionally, the downtown location is always crowded, so you're lucky if you get to play a couple games at all because people are terrible at cycling through players, and I think they let too many people in at one time. Definitely go on a non-weekend or try one of their other equally amazing locations where it's a bit less crowded usually.

That said, the drink prices are really reasonable, and you can even get nonalcoholic slushies if you want! The pizza isn't bad, but it's definitely more emergency fuel if you haven't eaten or need something to keep you going so you don't get completely trashed.

The bartenders on staff here are really chill, polite, and extremely efficient considering how busy this place gets, so that offsets a good portion of the wait and the crowds...