Main Street Amusements

As a child of the 80s, this brings me to my childhood! A great selection of vintage to more modern pinball machines that are well maintained. Games range in price from $ 0.25 — $ 1.00 and some have 4 plays for the price of 3.
The interior is clean and has a nice touch of the 80s with graffiti art decoration. To make it even better, the classic oldies tunes are from a vintage juke box.
There is no food and drink, but my friends and I brought in coffee from a nearby shop with no trouble and we spotted menus from nearby restaurants so perhaps they’d allow you to bring food in, but, if not, the location is surrounded by several great downtown Lafayette spots within walking distance.
You don’t have to spend a lot to have fun, but I could see this place draining lots of «quarters» from my wallet!

This place is absolutely awesome it’s like a kid in a candy store I never had a smile like the one I had today I’m going to invite all my friends over this is the ideal of Lafayette I was in love with all the games it was totally worth not staying home and having a boring Monday by far the best Monday a man could have so lucky I found this place i didn’t wanna go back home xD did I mention this place is a FREAKIN BOSS!

How is it possible that I went to Purdue (and lived in West Lafayette) for 4 whole years and not once heard about this diamond-​in-​the-​rough? HOW?!?
Quite simply, Main Street Amusements is one of the best places in the entire midwest to get your pinball fix. They have ~20 of them, ranging from the newest Stern ‘Tron’ to super old-​school Gottlieb tables with mechanical score reels. Keep your quarters at home, kids – these games run strictly on tokens, which can be purchased towards the back of the room. But wait! MSA’s token machine isn’t like the rest – it accepts plastic, so you can charge $ 1, $ 5, $ 10, or $ 20 to your Visa, Discover, or Mastercard. Talk about ultra-​convenient!
The pre-80’s tables cost 1 token, the 80’s tables take 2, and the rest – which is most of them – take 3. It’s $ 0.75/game, which when you compare MSA to other pinball palaces, doesn’t seem all that special (games are 75 cents here, at Logan Arcade they’re 50 cents, at Emporium they’re 25 cents, and at Headquarters, they’re free). However, the quality of tables here eclipsed even my highest expectations. Allow me to make a bold statement:
Main Street Amusements has some of the best-​conditioned pinball tables I’ve ever played on.
This is coming from a pinball fanatic, who owns one himself and knows waaaaay too much about the world of the silver ball. I want to send a GIANT kudos to the proprietor of this fine venue for maintaining such excellent tables. I have not seen pinballs of this caliber in my entire life, honestly. You can go online to see what all they have, but the ones that stood out to me were:
+ Creature from the Black Lagoon + Demolition Man +Terminator 2 +Twilight Zone +Theater of Magic +
Most – if not all – pins have been modded with LEDs and cleaned up to the point of looking brand new. Flippers are strong, jets seem super-​charged, and I didn’t notice a single hiccup while playing. I don’t consider their (relatively poor) street visibility or lack of advertising to be a drawback, because the more this place remains a well-​kept secret, the better condition the pins will stay in.
My only – and I stress only – negative criticism about MSA is their hours of operation. I would love to come here on a lazy Sunday afternoon and waste the day away, but they’re closed every Sunday, which kinda sucks (although is typical for bible-​thumping Indiana). In addition, they’re only open evenings from 7pm-​11pm, which is a pretty tiny window to get your tilts & nudges in.
In short, I’ve fallen head-​over-​heels in love with MSA. Major props to ‘Dan S’ for running such an outstanding pinball parlor. We share the same shiny passion; from one wizard to another, I THANK YOU!
Six stars.

Obviously, this arcade could be improved (like any) by a wider selection of games and a better atmosphere/​ambience/​interior (have you ever seen a ‘Beercade’?!).
However — for both what it is, & the audience it caters to, Main Street Amusement is the ideal game-​playing environment.
Reminds me of ‘Tron’ every time I walk through the door.
NERD OUT!

After dinner in downtown Lafayette, we stumbled onto Main Street Amusements — total blast from the past! This little gem is an arcade mostly full of a large variety of pinball machines. Love! Many were older (maybe antiques), but all were smooth functioning and very clean. The owner used the back of the store as a workshop. It, too, was very clean.
If pinball isn’t your thing, no worries! There are video games to play as well. All games (pinball included) require 1 – 2 tokens ($ 1 = 4 tokens), so the cost was no different than what paid to play such games 20 years ago in arcades. Very affordable!
In all, I am no pinball wizard, but I really enjoyed this place! If you like a little arcade fun, check this place out!

Many great nights have started here! Great place to bring a date too. Galaga for the win!

Best pinball arcade in the entire midwest. A well-​rounded collection from all eras and they are perfectly maintained.
The facility is clean and new throughout.

An old fashioned pinball arcade! What a blast from the past, and what a great time! We always intend to only spend an hour there and wide up staying far longer, trying to get that replay or high score. We can’t leave now — I almost got multiball! Dan has a wide variety of games from the 1970s through today, including some of the classics (Twilight Zone, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Revenge from Mars) and he really knows his stuff. We bring the kids here whenever they are in town, and we even held part of our wedding reception here! It’s a whole lot of fun for the whole family.

I like the idea of Main St. Amusements, but the décor is bland, the lighting is depressing, and it always smells like paint.

What a great arcade! Main Street Amusements focuses solely on pinball machines dating from the first half of the 20^th century with Bally’s ‘Rocket’ and ‘Morocco’ to modern machines such as the Tron reboot and Avatar. They’ve even got machines older than your grand dad that cost a mere nickel! If you ask nicely, the owner might even break out the cool fortune teller machine.
I envision Main Street Amusements as a great place for parties (no alcohol, though) and it’s certainly a great way to spend an evening downtown after shopping and dining. Bring your quarters and nickels!