Dave & Buster's Des Moines — Restaurant in West Des Moines

I went with friends for a birthday celebration. When we walked in, the birthday person announced to the hostess that it is their birthday, and ask if they get a free dessert or a play card. The hostess shrugged and said “I think a dessert but I’m not sure.” Then proceeded to lead us to a booth that was filthy. Hostess apologized and went back to the stand to see if there’s any free table for our group of 8 people.

The table the hostess sat us as had kiss marked silverware. We waited 15-20min for someone to take our drink orders and food order by that time but no one was there. We started to question if the hostess sat us at a section not being serviced. With the growing thirst n hunger of the party I was attending, I decided to get up and hunt one down. There were a total of 10 tables being serviced at this time, so it wasn’t because they were busy. I went to a bar tender and asked them if they could help us since the hostess seems to be clueless. The bar tender apologized for delay of service and said as soon as she’s caught up on drinks she will send someone over there. I went back to the table and we waited another 5 min.

Finally a guy came over. This guy looked too stoned to be working. His eyes were barely open and he couldn’t keep focus. He seemed surprised when we said we’re ready for drinks and food orders since he took so long.

I have been in service industry before, and personally if I see a group that large, I would ask first if the bill is together or separate to avoid chaos at the end when people are trying to pay(foreshadowing).

The server finally gets all of our orders and puts it in. The food was horrible. Things came out soggy, under cooked, or over cooked. My BBQ chicken flat bread pizza had 5 chunks of chicken on it in total.

After everyone got their food, I asked the serve for my ticket. He asked I repeat everything I ordered so he could separate it. I understand not being able to remember everyone orders at a table so large in number, but that’s why you ask if it’s together or separate at the beginning to avoid this. I asked for my receipt after paying. I warned the rest of the party that the server is going to ask to repeat their order. Server spent over 10min trying to get peoples orders in place.

Some people got double charged, and there was wrong line items on their receipt as well. At this point I was just fed up. I asked to speak to a manager because the server said I still owed money.

While waiting on the manager, my friends complained they were forced to tip such lousy service. I asked what they mean and they said they only had the cheapest option of 15% to tip at the end while they were paying. Dave and Busters used intimidation tip tactics to get more money from you. I told my friends that they had to look for the grey out portion that says “other” then put $0 for tip amount. The fact there’s no default $0 or “no tip” option is extremely annoying.

The manager came around and I told her everything. Manager said she will comp the rest of the meal and give the birthday person extra play cards. She informed the ones that tipped, a refund would take place 10 business days later, and they wouldn’t get the tip back, just the money they spent on the meal.

The manager handled it the best way I think she could. She saved the night because everyone was ready to just bounce out due to the poor conditions we...

I wouldn't recommend Dave & Buster's if I could I would have given them zero stars if that was an option. We had family in from out of state we had 9 people in our party total for my nephew's birthday. With all the hype of Dave and Buster's coming to the Des Moines area a these years. I didn't see the hype all it was was an overpriced Chuck E. Cheese geared towards adults.Nothing about this place is geared towards family friendly or budget friendly. We waited well over our 45 min wait time to be seated then when they finally did seat us at our table we had to wait well over an hour to see our food, we never received our appetizers until reminding our server that we never seen our appetizers we had ordered. Finally we received our appetizers, but not everything we ordered and found out they took our stuff and served it to another table did nothing to make it right for the trouble of absolute poor restaurant hospitality service. Our waitress would serve other tables before ours only a few people at our table were offered and given refills. Never again will I be back in a Dave and Buster's. It reminded me of an Iowa State Fair on Eastside night with the trashy skanky majority of the people that were in there were dressed not really family friendly dress attire for a supposedly "family friendly" establishment this place is definitely a money pit / trap. If you've never been to a Dave and Buster's save your time and money and go else where to eat then go to Check E. Cheese afterwards. You will not only save money, but leave both places happier. P.S. The menu is small for option choices and how do you run an arcade and not have Skeeball as an option? I see Dave and Buster's closing as fast as they opened if things don't change for the better you've only been officially opened for a month and a half and you already have other bad like reviews. Your going to end up a vacant building in the Jordan Creek mall district just like Joe's Crab Shack. All I can say is thanks but no thanks for a non memorable first and last experience all in a one night setting.

** Update I reached out to the Guest Relations Representative per the said "Owners" reply to my initial review immediately, only for it to fall on Deaf ears no one follows up with you. We never heard any correspondence from anyone from Dave and Buster's guest relations dept. So that was just a default message that they obviously tell all their guests. P.S. It's been 3 weeks since our visit and review this place is clearly a money pit like the midway Carni's at a state fair or carnival take your...

his D&B is cool and all, but there are a lot of problems with the games in the arcade and in their service.

Problem #1: There are not enough balls in the throwing games. The two-minute drill only has three footballs in it, and there are supposed to be eight in there. Down the Clown barley has enough balls; Pixel Chase doesn't have the same amount of balls; and the same with Gold Fishin and others, I'm sure.

Problem #2: Baseballs Pro is not on global settings; it posts to be where if you get a foul, you get a strike, but at this location, you get an out if you foul.

Problem #3: A lot of the digital games are laggy, which makes some of them unplayable. (Willy Crash, Piano Keys, Crossy Road, Floppy Tickets, Treasure Cove, and both of the Pop the Lock machines) I told the amusement manager about the Pop the Lock machines, and he said that it's due to overheating. I've been to other stores that have Pop the Lock, and they don't deal with this problem. The machines could be faulty by BayTek, but I would have expected both machines to be fixed by now since they opened on July 31st. Also, floppy tickets are sometimes unplayable due to the lag, and they don't even give you the correct amount of tickets because they only give you 6–8 tickets no matter what you score.

I also feel like the techs don't test the games. I know that at the stores in Kansas City, the techs walk around and test the games to see if they are working right. If I were working at D & B, I would be testing out the games to make sure there are enough balls, if the buttons are working, if there are any coins jammed in the pushers, etc.

This location has been having problems with games since opening. I waited 4 months to see if they improved or not, and the games are...