Laser Quest
????? Warren Road ( by Westland Mall),
Westland, MI ?????
(313) 266-0888

Lobby

Before we even got to the lobby, I was quite surprised to be greeted by a door attendant. Once inside, the lobby design was very nice, probably the best I have seen. They had the stock selection of video games: racing, fighting, a few misc., and an air hockey table. The lobby had plenty of seating along the window. One of the nice features of the lobby was the TV display. Not only did they have a TV displaying the scores from the previous game, but they also had a TV that was running a commercial style video demonstrating the equipment and maze, as well as showing how the game is played and scored.The party rooms here were definitely the best I have seen anywhere. There are 2 seperate party rooms, both isolated off in a corner and seperated from the lobby by glass doors. They were very nicely decorated and very private. Another nice feature of the lobby is the members terminal, where members can easily look up their current stats and see how they rank among all members. When I paid for the game, I was quite pleased to find that everybody, including non-members, gets a codename. This is nice because it makes the game a little more personal than when everybody is just some number. The other nice thing is that there is no need to remember the pack number you used, which more than a few people tend to forget by the time score sheets are handed out.

 

Briefing

The breifing and equipment rooms were both decorated nicely. They were also seperated by an automatic door, keeping an exiting game from distracting a breifing (they also exit through a different door) and helping to ensure the safety of jackets and purses left in the equipment room during a game. One thing I didn't like is that almost all games are played solo. Most people agree that team games are funner overall. There is also a little more skill involved when you can coordinate teamwork rather than just looking out for #1.

 

Maze

The maze itself was decent. The layout was pretty good. It was a 2 story, 4 level (offset levels) maze. The arrangement of hallways and rooms was pretty good, even though a few hallways seemed a bit narrow. The second story of the maze also had a good (but not excessive) ammount of floor gratings. They were placed in areas that received a good amount of traffic, making them pretty useful whether you are upstairs or downstairs. The downfall of the maze was its excessive use of holes and mirrors. The mirrors were geometrically alligned, so that many shots can be reflected off 2 or more mirrors in a row. In one place, I noticed that I could hit someone by bouncing the shot off 4 different mirrors! The other bad use of mirrors are the full size mirrors, in which several people have claimed mistaking their reflections for themselves. Practically every wall has a hole or 2 in it. No matter where you stand in the maze, the is a combination of holes and mirrors from almost every angle. This makes it difficult (if not impossible) for even the best player to skillfully defend themself. However, as I said, the maze is pretty well laid out. I think if several holes were closed and several mirrors removed, the maze has the potential to be really good. One other note about the maze is that is contains no bases. This can be good or bad, depending on your opinion and point of view. I personally think that bases add an extra dimension to the game, and provide a secondary objective. LQ's reasoning for removing them is that it puts the focus squarely on getting your opponent, which is understandable. Its just a matter of opinion.

 

Afterthoughts

After the game, I had a few thoughts about the experience. First, the guns were pretty nice. They didn't require 2 hands, eliminating the situation where the gun doesn't recognize that both hands are on it and refuses to fire. However, the weighting and balancing of the gun made it seem almost necessary to use 2 hands to operate comfortably, increaing game safety. The packs themselves, however, were not as good. First, the sensors seemed very had to hit and required pinpoint accuracy, even at point blank range. Second, a lot of times, it seems that after you actually hit a player, it takes a second or two for the pack to recognize the hit and deactivate. As a result, I had dozens of cases where me and my opponent deactivated each other one after another. This was very annoying. The third problem with the pack is what has become known as the "invincibility bug", which dozens of people I have talked to have noticed. It seems that for a split second when you fire, you are invincible. If this is so then you could, theoretically, decrease you chances of being hit by firing very rapidly. In several cases, I have had an experience where myself and my opponent were shooting each other at point blank range for about 10 seconds before one of us deactivates. No place else have I ever experienced this situation several times in a single game (its actually a very rare occurence everywhere else). Some people feel this is a bug in the hardware. It could possibly be a side effect of the fact that the sensors are so difficult to hit, but not likely. As far as I know, LQ has not publicly addressed the issue.

 

Score Sheets

After the game, I returned to the lobby to pick up my score sheet. I was quite dissappointed with it, and felt it wasn't very useful. The first problem is that it contained nobody elses scores, so I had no way of telling how much better than me other player were ( did they beat me by 5 points or 5000 points?). In the lobby, you can compare the scores on the TV moniter, but I usually like to look over all my scoresheets for the night once again when I get home, and occasionally at a later date. The other problem is that the list of who hit who was broken up into 2 completely sepearte lists of "you hit" and "hit you". If one person didn't hit you, or you didn't hit them, then they wont even appear in that list. So it is possible for player X to appear in position 5 on one list, and position 10 in the other list, or maybe not even be on the score card if the 2 of you never saw each other (this actually happened to myself and my friends in every game). Overall, the scorecard was very hard to analyse and not very useful.

 

Overall Experience

All in all, I would say the experience at this Laser Quest is fair. The excessive use of mirrors and holes really ruined what was an otherwise good maze. I will say, however, that this design might be cool for young and/or first time players, but not likely for experienced players. This, combined with the problems with the pack, really brougt down the whole experience. Without these problems, the place has the potential to be pretty good. But considering the nature of the problems (at least the pack problems), it is highly unlikely that this will change. As a result, I won't be coming back too often, if ever.

Note: The review given here is completely impartial. Information contained in it was compiled mostly from the experiences of our small 4 person group, with various input from several other people we met playing there. The experiences we descibe here are based on 2 games played by each of us.

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