Chuck E. Cheese — Restaurant in Middletown Township

This review is geared towards having a birthday party here. When I showed up 10 minutes early as requested during the phone call I received, it was to a dirty table with cups and plates, while the other birthday children had set up tables. When my child arrived at 11, the table was still a mess and I didn't have any game cards yet to give him or guests. I asked the manager to please hurry the process and he yelled at his staff and blew me off. I was really embarrassed for him - a refresher in managerial skills especially at a children's place is desperately in need. A simple "I'm sorry" would have gone a long way, but I did not get that. I ended up helping to clean off the table (the lack of recycling is also pretty reprehensible by the way) and help set up just so it could get done, thus missing the arrival of most guests who were not directed to go anywhere and since we had no table set up, just sort of wandered around. Our server was completely overwhelmed and I never saw the manager step in to help with anything - it seemed that she was just left to fend for herself. Then food was served - fine. Janelle did a great job getting everything out quickly and kindly, even though they RAN OUT OF PLATES. Plates. There were no plates. what. Ok, then show time. My son, who normally digs Chuckie was TERRIFIED by the fact that he did not have mouse hands, but regular people hands. So, thanks for that recurring nightmare and also explanation I was forced to give. Then someone (not Janelle) brought out my son's cake and unceremoniously plunked it in front of him. His name wasn't on it, the candle wasn't lit, no one had sung. I asked why they did that as I see 6 4-year-olds sticking their fingers into the cake in front of them because they are KIDS and I was told: "oh yeah, we will sing in a bit". Who brings a cake out to a 4-year-old without a candle lit and without his name on it and says to wait? Ice Cream time! I was sold pretty heavily on rainbow dots, saying that the kids love it blah blah blah. I really hyped it to my son. Imagine how awesome it was to once again disappoint him by saying they had run out. Great. At the end of the party, I once again had to help poor Jannelle - I bused and cleaned and picked up. If your turn over is high, it is because the staff really works hard and they need better managing. Then, I am told I can't tip her on the credit card and there is no ATM in the place. If you don't want a person to get a tip, then DONT DESIGNATE ONE SERVER TO A TABLE!!! So I left Chuck E Cheese to search for an ATM, and after walking all the way down the strip mall, I couldn't find one. I had to borrow money from a party guest. Absolutely humiliating, and ONCE again, I missed a large portion of the party guests leaving. Between cleaning, straightening stuff out, and talking my son down after seeing creepy man hand chuckie, I spent about 20 minutes actually talking and seeing my son and his friends. As I am finishing signing my bill at 1:08, I am being told that I need to leave the table because the next party is there. Uh, I paid for 2 hours and nobody cared when I had to wait - no one cared when I was helping Janelle bus the table and clean up, but now suddenly I have someone telling me to leave?? If it weren't for Janelle's awesome service, I would give this experience 0 stars. I paid money so that someone else could do the heavy lifting and all I got was the same amount of work as a backyard barbeque at a ridiculous cost. I felt so bad for the next party coming in and for the servers having to go through all of the disappointing reveals all over again all day long with zero help or backup from the manager. I plan on telling every single parent I know in every social medium possible about how terrible my experience was and how ashamed I am at the lack of care for the environment, their staff, their customers, and most importantly the kids who come to have a freaking birthday party. Get it together,...

First off, my kids love coming here. However, today (May 22, 2022) I have to say I’m disappointed in how the Middletown, NJ location was handled during the time I was here with my children. First, one of my children is Autistic. When we initially came to enjoy ourselves and purchase points at 3:03pm, my autistic child was pushed out of the way trying to play a claw grabbing game by these children and not ONE PARENT from that party stopped them. I was right there attempting to calm the kids down and back away from my child as they were shoving him. This group of children were from a birthday party and not being monitored by the parents and climbing a few games during the duration we were here. A couple of children had even gone up on stage to throw their toy at one of your animatronics. It went from trying to enjoy our time to being upset this happening and my special needs child becoming stressed out. I had then placed an order combo #1 and 2 dippin dots. We waited approximately 5-10 minutes after purchasing. There were no other customers being assisted while I watched your employees hang out and one checked out their phone. There was a young gentleman with glasses, approximately 5’4”, short dark hair, and some facial hair with sweeping supplies nearby. So I asked him if anyone was available to help us at least with the dippin dots. He was annoyed also seeing no one had helped us and went ahead seeing we were taken care of. He then saw to it to bring the pizza we had ordered and plates. This young man showed the meaning of customer service by going above and beyond to help us. I was unable to get his name from his tag to properly praise him for what he did. By this time, the party had ended and the environment calmed down. Now I understand kids will be kids but this was unacceptable to have happen with parents allowing them to do what they did right infront of them with me trying to handle the situation when it is not my responsibility except seeing my...

I live about 15 miles away from this location so about a 25-30 min drive as opposed to the Edison location which is about 10 min away from my house less than 10 miles and we have been coming to this particular one for about 3 years now. The staff is amazing we usually go Friday evenings and its never packed but most of the time we go a little later to avoid all the traffic driving and in there. We recently went on Friday December 21st to celebrate my daughters birthday not only did they let me bring my own ice cream cake and decorations. They also put it in the freezer for us. We were having so much fun playing games and stuff we wound up not ordering food til late and then we went on to play again the whole time I thought they closed at 11 but they close at 10 by the time we realized that we were the only people there. After apologizing to the manager i asked if we could still do the cake and sing Happy Birthday at this time it was like 10:30 a half an hour after they closed but they did not say anything to us or make us feel rushed or like we had to leave. The best part was they also bought Chuckee out to sing which made my daughters birthday even better. I work in the service industry and its sooooooo often that people are quick to compain/write bad reviews and me personally i never write reviews good/bad but after this experience i feel like i absolutely had to. This is why we will continue to travel the extra miles to go here!! Thank you for...