To preface... This place is litterally a scam. I'm embarrassed for who ever owns this place. An anomaly of bizarre experiences, staff seemingly roaming around without a single responsibility, ignoring customers. This is my 2nd time coming, and the experience you're about to read is identical to the previous. If you dont believe me, compare this review to litterally every other review, and you will find the same reoccurring themes. If you want to be insulted while you eat incredibly overpriced food, this place is where you want to be. Starting our evening off, in the lobby, waiting for 10 minutes, being ignored by every staff member in the building. Myself and a group of friends sat ourselves at a table (because no one else was going to do it) l. Waited 10 minutes for a server. Server is visibly annoyed with us for some reason. Finally ordered food and drinks. 20 minutes later, one (1) food order came out.... 20 more minutes have now passed. the drinks and rest of food finally come. My beer was apparently the largest size they serve; I was not asked what size I wanted when taking my order. Litterally a full hour has now passed (since the drinks came) Food finally comes. Waiter is near hostile and still seemingly annoyed with our bare minimum requests. I've finished my beer, the server asked if I'd like another. I said "no thanks, I'm driving this evening, so just the one drink for me" the server then insisted multiple times that I should still get more drinks. "How about just a pint then? Its smaller". Unreal. We come to the bill, which was inevitably screwed up, (because why wouldn't it be). Almost being straight up refused help and to remedy our mix up. We just paid the Bill's as they where, and paid each other back for the differences. Side note: during the entire time we where there, there was a large dispute between a bunch of disruptive teenagers, and 4 Madison Police officers. Litterally yelling 3 tables over from us in the dining room. Apparently the group where stealing from diners while they where not paying attention. read more

This is literally the worst place I've ever been. The service is terrible. We waited two hours for appetizers and probably about 30 minutes for drinks each time we ordered. 0/10 would recommend literally go anywhere besides here read more

Well, we had an unexpectedly positive experience at Dave & Buster's today for lunch after setting the bar pretty low based on reviews here and what seems to be the "scam" of chain restaurants these days (high prices, poor service, mediocre food, you know the drill). It looked to be yet another average to below average experience when nothing on the menu blew us away and then the long wait for the food. Less than perfect experiences at any restaurants seems to be the norm so we've gotten used to settling in with our phones and trying to roll with the punches. When our food did finally arrive, the waitress said something to the effect of our meals would be taken care of due to the long wait and perhaps that the items we ordered should have come quick -- we're unsure because the restaurant was quite loud. Anyway, getting any reduction in the bill is always a nice thing to hear and we were actually impressed with our meals. I ordered the turkey melt and wasn't expecting much but something in it (maybe the peppers) really brought it to life! Hubby had the Thai salad which was a low-calorie item and was pleased. We finished then prepared for the long wait for the check expecting we would owe at least the beverage I got with my entree or maybe we were only getting one entree comped. The waitress eventually came by and told us our check was taken care of and we were free to go!! We were shocked as nothing like this has ever happened. We pulled out a $10 cash tip for her because her service was great and of course we were quite happy getting a free meal. I'm only taking a star off because it was loud, but I also understand that is what Dave & Buster's "is" and the hostess wasn't very enthusiastic about helping us, seemingly to just want us to seat ourselves in the bar vs taking us to a table away from the chaos of the arcade. Great job Dave & Buster's for caring about your customers. We'll be back. read more

We were excited to get our kids out to enjoy some fun after being locked down for Covid. And I understand that it's been a difficult time and transition for many restaurants but we were told to seat ourselves and someone would be there to wait on us. We waiting 10 minutes without seeing a single person. I had to walk up to the bar and asked if that area was operational or if we needed to move. They assured me someone would be with us. After waiting again someone finally came and got our drink orders before leaving for the day. After a VERY long wait, another lady finally came with everything. The wait is unbelievable. I would've been more understanding had the place been full but no. A handful of people and still terrible service. I fear how a night with a full house would be. I was very disappointed. I will say they have took of COVID precautions and not all games are open wish was pretty sad but with the pandemic it was expected. We were just happy to get to go out. read more

I read all the other reviews and I think the issue is that they were not prepared for all the customers that would show up in the first few weeks but I think it has gotten a lot better since they have had a few weeks to get up to speed. I'm 33 and I never play video game, but I really loved the arcade. They had some cool physical, carnival games that I had never seen before that were a lot of fun and different from anything I had tried. I got $20 in arcade credits plus a burger and fries for $28 plus tip. The burger and fries were delicious so I thought it was a great deal. I will definitely be going back. One reviewer says she thought it was racist that her black friend got carded and she didn't. When I went there it seemed like half the employees were black so I really don't think there is any systemic racism going on. read more

My wife and I went here for a evening out. We sat at the bar because the dinning area was closed. The food was very good. Unfortunately the service was not. It looked almost like the bar was short staffed....but there wasn't that many people at the bar. Our bartender hardly noticed us and some of the other people that came up. The tv situation was equal as unfortunate. The manager was struggling to get certain games on for different people. It never worked out. We spent an hour and got one appetizer a beer and a coke....it took that long to do just that....we didn't even play a single video game. Hopefully they can figure out the service for the future. read more

Staff were rude and unhelpful when I had a problem with the mobile app for chips to play games. Menu ordering through the website was confusing at best, with it unclear whether order placement had gone through. Poor cell service inside, and no wifi without password. read more

Wish I could give zero stars, we waited 45 minutes until someone came over to greet us. It then took over 30 mins to get a refill of wings. 4 wings for 20 dollars and waiting 45 mins for a refill, that will probably also take 40 mins to arrive. Take this as a warning go anywhere else but here. Also the Bill's were incorrect and needed to be updated twice. When asked to talk to the manager he blamed it on how busy the restaurant was, the restaurant was DEAD. read more

Sat down with a couple friends at the bar and was greeted and help to drinks almost immediately which was great. Asked for menus and then waited...and waited..and waited to be helped until we ended up flagging down another bartender. Ordered some appetizers and 1 meal between the 3 of us which took 45 mins to come out. When it did, all 3 meals were partially all or all wrong. The worst one, which was a complete mix up, (a small salad in place of 3 lettuce wraps) took an extra 20-30 mins to fix and be brought out corrected with not much of an apology. The food was good but the service was really not great an needs work. Overall not impressed and probably won't be back. read more

Went here for a staff social and it was a blast! Playing all the games with coworkers was like reliving a childhood. Definitely a great atmosphere to be with a group of people, especially with differing personalities. Plenty of sports to watch for the fanatics and fun games for the rest. The food was pretty decent. The pepperoni pizza rolls shareable was amazing!! Definitely my favorite item. The Philly cheesesteak sliders were average and kinda dry but not the worst. Also, all the reviews about the green beans are spot on. Also lookout for that bacon wrapped shrimp because you'll fall in love with it! The steak was decent, a tad dry. Overall, a great experience and fun was had by all who went! read more

Great arcade games, the food is at an ok price, you can also buy food for tickets (arcade game currency) which I found interesting.

This place has great potential, but the staff is awful. I was here last night and my girlfriend ordered the Cheese-crusted street tacos. They were not made correctly. She told the waiter, who was clearly on his first day, about it, and he got the menu to compare what it said to what we received in an apparent attempt to prove us wrong. Upon comparision he realized the Cheese-crusted tacos actually WERE supposed to have a cheese crust, among other missing ingredients. So he got the manager. The manager went to the kitchen to check and came back to let us know they were out of cheese. She ensured us she would be taking the tacos off the menu. The manager is an awful liar. The menu is national, she's not getting tacos removed because one location ran out of cheese one day. She could have just admitted she didn't plan well and didn't order enough and accepted the blame, but she needed to pass the blame onto whoever else she could. Likely won't ever be back. Not because a mistake was made, those things happen. But because the manager felt it was okay to lie to patrons. read more

I keep wanting to like this place, I REALLY do. Games are fun. Good place to watch sports. Good selection of beer on tap. The service however seems to flop every. single. time. You can't sit down and eat here without it being a two or three hour endeavor. Put in your order for your drink, wait 30 minutes, get your drink, order food, arrives cold 30-45 minutes later, then the kicker add another 30 or so minutes on waiting for the check. Never been to any establishment anywhere with service this consistently terrible. This has happened the several times I've been here and from reading the reviews here and talking to friends who have also gone seems to be the norm. Love the brand, super fun concept, veg happy to have a D&Bs in Madison. Just think that this location needs an overhaul. read more

Terrible from the moment we walked in. We were sent to the hostess, who told us to go find a seat. There were plenty of tables available but none of them were bussed. We asked the hostess if she could help us out. She refused, and told us that wasn't her job. We ended up clearing off our own table, and asked a waiter to wipe it down. No silverware for the entire meal. When I asked for a napkin, we got a stack of cocktail glass napkins instead of the cloth napkins that you're supposed to get. Food was marginal at best. Do not order the sliders under any circumstance. 12 dollars will get you 4 silver dollar sized sliders, that are not hoot at all. Do not buy any of the game credit deals on the menu. We go 90 credits for $20 off of the menu. I later bought 250 credits for $35. Wait staff. Hung out at the area on the end of the bar on their cell phones mostly. I've never in my life given a 10% tip before tonight, and I felt generous giving that much. To top the experience off, my wife took our 6 year old into the filthy bathroom where there were no paper towels, and a pair of maroon panties laying on the floor full of poop. Last but not least, the armed security guard should have been my first clue to stay away. read more

Worst Dave & Busters Experience. Absolutely unacceptable and disgusting. We arrived there at 5:50 pm, there was no host/hostess present for 20 minutes with no explanation and a very long line of customers. Tables were not being cleaned and reset and were full of trash, old food and dishes at arrival. When we left at 715 these same tables were STILL un cleaned! We ordered drinks, apps, and dinner at 615. For 60 minutes our aps did not come. It took 30 minutes for our diet cokes to arrive after serval requests. It was not busy, just poorly managed and poorly worked. Worst experience I've ever had at a Dave & Busters and possibly at any establishment in my families life. We asked to pay for the sodas and be on our way after an inexcusable time. Our drinks were on the house and The Manager gave us credit for some games if we chose to come back. I thought this was great but the fact that the tables were STILL not cleaned after we were there for an hour and a half was just disgusting, I can't imagine how they run their kitchen. Not acceptable at any resteraunt to leave old food and trash on tables un checked the entire evening. Avoid. Disgusting. Terrible. read more

I've never felt the need to write a review but then again I've never had service this poor. I've also never seen a bartender whip glasses around, emptying the drinks all over the floor and bar area because the keg ran out then proceed to argue with a customer who called him on it and who was himself upset that he had to wait (literally) a half hour for his drink despite there being no more than 5 or 6 people up there at any given time. He didn't explain the Thursday deal well, we had no idea what we ordered or if he even put the order in until we got our bill which came an hour before the food. Wings aren't unlimited if you have to wait an hour to receive four of them cold. He charged me twice for things I didn't ask for, but by that time we had enough. Took an hour to flag him down but we paid for our drinks and cancelled everything else just to get the hell out of there. Spent about $100 at another bar nearby. I had low expectations but this was something else. If you have absolute minimal standards for quality of food, drinks, or service and you're just looking for Chuck E. Cheese's with beer than this place is for you. For the rest of us, literally anywhere else is a better option. read more

This was my 4th visit to this restaurant and the service has been pathetically slow every time. The place wasn't crowded at all but it took more than 45 minutes to get our food. We planned on playing some games afterward, but ran out of time. On the upside the salmon entree that I had was delicious if a bit overpriced. read more

I took 25 students yesterday to eat and play games and they were so helpful. They managed the kids so well and I really appreciate it! The food was great and the kids had a blast, and the service was wonderful! Highly recommend! read more

I successfully avoided Dave & Busters for about a year because I assumed it would be full of teenagers or loud kids. My recent visit proved me wrong in that regard, but it was still one of the worst dining experiences I've ever had to suffer through. We started by ordering drinks at the bar. It took the bartender a good 15 minutes to make my drink and let us pay. The bar and restaurant was mostly empty and no one was actively ordering a drink from her. She also made the drinks completely wrong - like, not just not to our taste, but completely incorrect if you know anything about the basics of bartending or mixing cocktails. But, given the slow service, it wasn't worth the argument. Our waitress was friendly, so I thought the bad service was behind us - I was wrong. I'll preface this poor review by saying that many of the problems appeared to be due to being severely understaffed. Our waitress' section was far too large for her to handle, there were no bussers or food runners, and plenty of managers just sort of lazily helping out here or there. To be as concise as possible, it took 20-30 minutes or more to get anything we asked for, and sometimes had to ask repeatedly. We asked for water glasses several times, which she finally brought but then set on a completely separate table, only returning much later and realizing her mistake. The food was good, but she didn't check on us, so we got no ketchup/mustard. I ordered another cocktail, then waited 20...30...40 minutes. I gave up, assumed that was never coming, and went to play games. About an hour later, after returning to the table, there sat my drink with a plate of food no one had ordered. It took a good 30-45 minutes to get our checks, then have the waitress actually take our payment and return with our cards. I had to ask twice to have the cocktail removed from my bill. What the hell is going on with this place? There's absolutely no reason that any kind of restaurant should offer this kind of dismal service across the board - the bartenders, the server, the managers were all useless. Again, this is more the fault of management than the individual servers who are overwhelmed and poorly trained. Do NOT eat or drink at this place - go play the overpriced games and then get out. read more

Long wait on a beer, pretty dirty....lack of personnel...kind of a glorified chunky cheese

D & B Corporate did reply to our complaint and sent us a $20 gift card. That was nice, but it's worthless since we have no intention of returning. read more

Came here to eat and play for my daughter's birthday. There's a whole row of open tables with no reservations and we were told it was a 45 min wait. This place has poor management and not worth it, as far as eating. Probably not coming back. read more

What Horrible Place Tables no one clean down table food came Cold after waiting 1hour 45min staff looked Lost and under staffed

Nothing special but a good spot to take the kids. Basically a sport bar with games at least the side we were in. Large TVs all over many different sports on a couple of party rooms to rent. Food was good a little overpriced in my opinion my bacon cheeseburger was 14 bucks sons chicken tenders were best thing we ordered philly cheesesteak ok. Bought most entree with 10 dollar play card which got you 48 credits games took on average 7 credits. It was oldest son Birthday so he got unlimited play on some games. Kids enjoyed the games. We spent 155 with tip for 6 of us including 5 10 dollar play cards. We will be back as much for the arcade as anything read more

Agreeing with previous reviews, if I could give this place ZERO stars I would. 3 of us came InWe sat ourselves after waiting, apparently this table was shut down and the hostess moved us to another section. Waited 20 minutes, zero service. We visually saw 4 servers working. 5 more minutes we approached a waitress in our area and asked if she was working our table, she told us that "she has 5 bills to deal with and said she didn't know we were sitting." *We were sitting at the table right beside the table she was currently finalizing checks from* We made contact with the other employees and nothing. After over 30 minutes without any acknowledgement, we left. Very poor service. WILL NOT GO BACK. Instead we're driving another 25 minutes for better service elsewhere. read more

Darn! Was hopping this would make the list for out night out list, nope. Food not impressed, lack of ingredients for normal bar drinks. $ credits did not last long. read more

I love the environment. Great place for dinner. Portions are enormous. The games are fun--especially the Jurassic World VR. prizes are decent and have a large range. Great place for night out with friends or kind friendly family night. read more

Overpriced and their game selection is very new, bad thing. I would equate the game styles to slightly more adult than Chick E Cheese but not by much. Quite a few oversized smart phone games. Which I think is sort of lame since I have a smart phone and can play those games for free. Kids like them though. Probably because they've heard of games like Angry Birds but never get to use their parents phones to play. A handful of fun ones for adults. The floor was overran with kids, which is great, but I thought this was more of an adult arcade with beer. Most of the adults were in the bar drinking and their kids were in the arcade part. Overall I would not recommend this place for adults. Try Geeksmania, just down the road from here, Rossi's Pizzeria, or I/O Bar when it opens. read more

Sat at the bar for almost 10 minutes while the 4 bartenders congregated on the other end and never got served. I thought D&B priced themselves on service? No wonder this location does so horribly. read more

Yeah we waited almost 2 hour after being told it would beba 30 min wait....then they didnt bring one of our party's meal until after the rest of us ate....the comped it...after we all all were done....and then there was a hair on the food read more

We waited for 20 minutes to get service, we received our chicken sandwiches just to send them back, they were burn. We loved the games.

Taken my family and friends here a few times now. Good service and great food. The whole family loves the games. Everyone has a great time. Even the food is kinda fun. My only complaint: you don't get out of here without spending a bundle. read more

Paying $3 to play a video game just seems like a rip-off to me the food is okay not that you couldn't get it at any sports bar in town it's worth checking out at once just so you can say you have but you probably won't go back read more

The service here is absolutely horrible! We literally waited at the bar a minimum of 20 minutes each time to get a drink. The Bartender was literal eating a candy bar and taking her sweet time. The other bartenders were swamped and very slow and inattentive. They did not know how to tend a bar at all. They need schooling! They helped customers who waited 1 minute over those waiting 20. Pathetic!!!! read more

Mediocre at best. The plates were unclean, much too noisy, and refused to seat us in a group of 6. Very noisy and bright. Server took 5 minutes to even ask us what we wanted. Disgusting pigs-in-a-blanket. Arcade is the only thing that gave it two stars. Do not go here. read more

I've heard of Dave & Buster's but going to one is quite an experience! I had an early dinner with two young men who were just as happy to gawk at all the screens and games as I was that evening. We were seated right away and the server was patient with all of our questions about the different game cards and deals. He even came and found us when our food was up so that we could play games after we ordered. We will be back but plan for a longer period of time to play. This place is like a casino for kids so be mindful of the money being spent as their game cards are like credit cards and it is hard to know how much you are really spending! It is a wonderful evening of entertainment for all ages though and I can see myself returning during football season to enjoy all the large screens around the bar. read more

My husband and I went here for a beer and to check it out. First problem: it was 4:30, few people in, but it was over 5 minutes before we were acknowledged. After our drinks arrived, no one ever came to check on us despite no more customers arriving, and we had to wait for someone to show up to close our tab. They need to work on customer service a lot or we won't be back. read more

Honestly we loved our time here. Bar was clean easy to get served while waiting in a table to eat. Tons of fun though and a good place take people to have some fun. One of the best servers we have ever had named Noah our thanks to him for making the experience that much better. We seen some low ratings but clearly they were d bags. Seriously lol if they are slammed and you don't wait for a table and sit in the open seating, well it isn't the priority. Otherwise great environment and it's huge. Teens and adults able to play. Try it, we enjoyed and will likely return soon. Big kids arcade.. with drinks.. =FUN read more

A bit overpriced but still a darn good time. Plenty of different kinds of games to choose from, and the food is actually pretty decent.

Updating my previous bad review, I completed the process requested by management on this website. They contacted me a couple days later saying they would be sending me a gift card to try to make amends for my terrible experience. They stated I would receive it in 1-5 days. 5 days later.....nothing. This place is terrible even when trying to make up for a terrible experience. read more