Arcade & Game Rentals in Phoenix, Arizona

Arcade games do a job at events that furniture cannot: they give guests something to do. A cocktail hour with nothing but a bar produces a room of people standing in a circle checking their phones. Two machines against a wall produce a line, a crowd around the line, and conversations between people who arrived not knowing each other. That is why arcade rentals turn up at corporate parties, trade show booths, school events and late-night wedding receptions, not just birthdays.

Power is the question nobody answers before booking, and it is the one that derails setups. Every cabinet in our collection runs on a standard 110V outlet, the same as a household appliance. The problem is rarely voltage and almost always circuits: put six machines on one circuit at a venue that was wired for a ballroom and you will trip a breaker mid-event. Tell us how many machines you want and where they are going, and we will tell you how many separate circuits to ask your venue for.

Space is the second question. Plan roughly a 3ft by 3ft footprint for a standard upright cabinet, then add three to four feet of clear floor in front of it for the person playing and the two people watching. Large-format machines need more: the World's Largest Pac-Man and Space Invaders cabinets, Giant Battleship, and the basketball arcades all want their own zone. Glow skeeball is rented per lane, so the footprint scales with how many lanes you take.

Access matters as much as floor space. Arcade cabinets are heavy, tall and do not disassemble. Before you book, check the width of the doorway the machine has to pass through, whether there are stairs, and whether a service elevator is available and how big it is. A venue that says yes to arcade games and has a 30-inch doorway to the event space is a problem we would rather solve two weeks out than on the morning of.

For a lineup, plan roughly one machine per 25 to 30 guests if games are a side attraction, and one per 15 to 20 if they are the main event. Mix the formats rather than taking four of the same thing. A good four-machine lineup for a 150-person corporate party is one head-to-head game like air hockey or bubble hockey, one competitive sports game like Golden Tee or the basketball arcade, one nostalgia cabinet like Pac-Man or Donkey Kong, and one high-traffic quick game like Whac-A-Mole or a claw machine.

The classic cabinets carry the nostalgia: Pac-Man in a yellow cabinet, Ms. Pac-Man, Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr, Frogger, Centipede, Galaga on a multicade, and pinball in Ghostbusters and Star Wars. The big-format machines carry the photos: the World's Largest Pac-Man and Space Invaders cabinets are the ones guests take pictures in front of, which matters when the event has a social media reason to exist.

For corporate work we also rent customizable games that can be branded with client artwork, a virtual reality system, and glow games for rooms that run late. Branded work needs production lead time, so bring artwork and the date early. Our crew delivers, positions, powers up and tests every machine before the event, and returns to collect. Send your venue, guest count and how long you need the games running, and we will build a lineup and price it.