Barcade — Restaurant in Detroit

To start off, I didn't try any of the food or drinks so I can't comment on that aspect.

Having visited my share of arcades, I found the Detroit location of Barcade, when looking for a new place to check out, which would be somewhat close to home.

I visited on a friday around 12:30, shortly after they opened and I was surprised to see how quiet it was. The bartender (who was very cordial, and professional), advised that friday tends to be a bit dead, and the summer months only add to that as people want to spend time outside more, which makes sense.

Barcade employs a coin-op model, with proprietary tokens, each equaling .25. The space can be described as both cramped and well-utilized, with there being a good deal of arcade, and pinball games, with the majority being the former. With the average cost of the arcade games being 2 tokens compared to 3 for the pinball, I would say the prices were pretty fair and you would be surprised how far you can stretch $20 worth for instance, even with less than optimal play.

The atmosphere was that of a dive bar with stickers, and quirky messages strewn around the walls, whereas the machine themselves were pretty clean and except for a couple games that were down, well maintained and well-looked after.

In terms of the variety, they had a decent mix of 80's-90's arcade games, shooting, racing, fighting and of course pinball. The pinball games featured were fairly standard, except for a couple (Alice Cooper and Pulp Fiction), while there were a couple arcades games you just don't see anymore (Nintendo Play10 cabinet, Point Blank, and my personal favorite, the Namco Quick & Crash Shooting gallery game).

All in all, this is a neat place to spend a few hours and a welcome addition to the Midtown...

Barcade is the perfect place for an adult's night out and a gamer's wonderland.

This bar + arcade is the only one of its kind in the area. If you're a lifelong gamer like myself, this place will flood your receptors with wonderful gaming nostalgia. Both levels are loaded with all sorts of classic gaming machines, from Crazy Taxi & Mortal Kombat to Ms. Pacman & Galaga. There's a row of pinball machines on the second level, but be careful, it gets addicting. On occasion, the coins have gotten stuck/lost in the machines, but the staff have never had a problem replacing them.

The bar is well stocked, and the bartenders are pretty quick, even on the busiest nights. The drinks are priced well, and there's always beer or shot specials going on. They serve classic bar food; burgers & fries, wings, Mozzarella sticks, etc. The Mozz. sticks aren't the traditional style, but they're pretty good. The vegan burger is just okay. The patty falls apart easily, and there's too many onions & tomatoes (thick slices) for my liking, but everything was fresh. The fries are a great snack, I could order them alone and be good. The steak egg rolls were yummy, and the sauce that accompanied them complimented them well.

Due to it being popular for adults, underage beings are unable to enter after 8pm. Security will begin checking IDs at this point, so make sure you have it. Parking can be tricky, as there's metered street parking and fills up quickly. There's a free open lot across the way, but it's often muddy and riddled with potholes.

I hope the city gets more "barcade" fusions. Until then, I'll continue to allow Barcade to...

Usually don’t leave reviews but my partner and I were very disappointed with our last trip to Barcade. We had just checked out the place for the first time this weekend and we had so much fun we went back two days later. The bartender, tall guy with tattoo sleeves and long hair, who served us our first night wasn’t over friendly but he was attentive. He greeted us the second time and we were excited to have the same bartender. However, he went on break and we were served by two other staff members. Everything was fine until the end of the night. We patiently waited for someone to help us close out our tab and the staff made every effort to avoid eye contact with us. When my partner raised his hand to grab someone’s attention, the bar back told us to “wait a second” from across the bar. The bar had about four patrons at the time who had already been served. They continued to take orders on top of holding personal conversations at the time that we were told to “wait a second”. At that point, we were waiting over 10 minutes at a bar with 4 people. Being a bartender myself, I would’ve completely understood had the bar been filled to capacity and they were short handed. This was a Monday night. Our business shouldn’t have been ignored for personal conversations. My tab was about $130 which indicates a tip of over $22 that I would’ve gladly paid had I not been...