If dodge ball isn’t challenging enough, add bows, arrows
Nerf guns and light-up swords provide exciting entertainment for kids, adults
There are two things that happen the first time you shoot a bow. The first is that your hands betray you — the arrow will arch, then tumble and bounce safely away from anything that isn’t the ground. The second is that you feel suddenly powerful. You get it. You are Katniss, and you’ve never even read The Hunger Games. By the third time you shoot a bow, it’s flying true and landing with a satisfying thud somewhere in the vicinity of your target. If that target is your friend, or your partner, or your child — that’s some serious dodge ball right there. That’s dodge bow. “It doesn’t hurt as much as you’d think,” promises DodgeBow operations manager Jamal Istiytieh. “Have you ever been shot by a paintball? It’s a lot less painful than that. You still feel something, but there’s foam, so a lot of the shot is absorbed in that.” The echoing “thud” against the back wall accords truth to that. There are three main ways to play at the DodgeBow facilities: with a fibreglass bow and arrow, with Nerf guns, or with sabres that light up and make a satisfyingly familiar ZZZZ sound when you swing them. Istiytieh recommends Nerf Hero for families with younger children because “you can mix up the age range. You can have parents playing with kids — everyone can participate.” The other games are better suited to children who are eight or older. “It’s not dangerous to play DodgeBow, but you need to understand what’s happening and create strategies. With Force Academy (light-up sword combat), once you put a sabre in a kid’s hand … they seem to like what comes with it.” The adventure starts in the tactical room with a briefing and training session with an animator. It overlooks the battle arena, the size of a gym but stark white with red accents and narrow windows near the ceiling. A weapons cabinet in the arena opens with a mechanical creak to reveal rows of black bows and dark safety masks. Inflatables create targets or cover, and battle lines are drawn with a wide red stripe on which dozens of arrows are spread out. Sessions last one hour and can include five or six games, depending on the players and the battle scenarios. The morality of putting weapons in children’s hands is something that comes up frequently, Istiytieh says. “I just don’t see this as a violent setting. Especially when we animate games, we’re playing to eliminate each other, to get each other. We don’t use the word ‘kill.’ We use vocabulary that keeps it recreational and not competitive. When we’re
It’s not dangerous to play DodgeBow, but you need to understand what’s happening and create strategies.
talking Nerf Hero, we’re definitely not talking competitive. … “Kids run it out and blow off some steam.”