Laser Planet – A Large Laser Tag Arena

One of the things that Kai wants to do in 2024 is go to a bunch of laser tag arenas. This is a goal he has, and since he is a teenager who isn’t that interested in much, this is something we are going to be doing each month! Our first laser tag outing was to Laser Planet in Watford. This was an entirely new laser tag arena for us, and we were pretty excited to get into it!

When it comes to booking your session at Laser Planet, they don’t have anyway to actually book online. Instead, you need to call. This is a bit of a hassle, as the first time they didn’t answer, so this took a few calls over a few days. You can email, but I am not sure when they will get back to you in that case. When you do call, they ask for the ages of players, then give you really limited time slots because they try to put kids of the same ages together. For some reason, they went with Robin’s age, as she was the youngest, so Kai, Amelia (both teens/tweens) and Dann and I (adults) were in with a group of 6-8 year olds. This was a little disheartening to Kai who felt on his toes about being around so many little kids. It also really limited the times we could attend the venue.

The arena itself at Laser Planet is really great. There is a caged area where you will go in and watch your mission video. This is the instructions video along with some cute mission-like stuff about the two teams. This specific arena is base-defending, so each team has a base that the other team can attack. We then got our vests and headed in. Our blasters did have a few power ups, and there was the chance to blast specific points in the area to get more power ups, but this didn’t happen every time so wasn’t something we focused on. The arena had lots of different buildings to hide in, walled areas, and paths that you could take. The bases themselves were a bit small, and people often camped in them, but otherwise they were fun.

Kai, Robin and I got placed on the same team, while Dann and Amelia got placed on the other team. We did book two rounds, so asked if on the second round we could be on the same team together, but was told no. The only other issue we had with Laser Planet was the number of kids that they let into the arena at once. This was packed – there were tons and tons of kids all in, running around and smashing their blasters into people. Though there was staff (and rules against running), that didn’t really help anything. Robin, because she is so little, had several older kids just follow her around, shooting her, and holding their blasters physically against her vest. I went to revive at a specific location, and as I went to place my blaster against the point to revive, after waiting for someone else to be done, some kid smashed their blaster against mine and my hand, which bruised two of my fingers. It just felt really aggressive and dangerous. When I reported to staff about kids picking on Robin, nothing was done either.

Venue wise, they did have a small cafe outside the arena, with snacks and drinks. They gave us score sheets at the end of the game as well. There isn’t any parking though, so you will need to scout it out before attending!

You can check out our other Days Out to see what else we’ve been up too!