Laser Tag

Over the past several months, we’ve continued to try to find new activities that the kids will like. While we always want new activities to do over the summer, we generally continue looking for activities well into the school year. We’ve been looking for fun activities that the kids enjoy, and that keep parents active.

Laser tag fits that bill just perfectly - you have to run all over the place, and your kids get to shoot at you. There are not many activities that can beat that in terms of staying active and having fun. Kids of all ages and sizes will really enjoy chasing after you, and trying to get you with their laser gun.

Prior to purchasing the laser tag toys that we have, I’d only ever played laser tag inside of a facility - it was easily one of my favorite activities. Moving around in the dark, hiding and shooting at people was simply an extremely fun and exciting activity. I would generally come out of those sessions a bit wetter than I went in as I would run and move around so much.

Laser tag facilities are always my choice if they’re available, but they are definitely not made for younger children. If your child is under the age of 12 or so, they’ll probably struggle to do well inside of the facility. Besides the equipment being a bit heavy, you’ve also got an age issue where the other people are just so much bigger than your kid.

Fortunately, there are home based laser tag systems that are a lot of fun, and they’re perfect for the whole family to play. You can bring your toddler in to shoot at you while your partner and other kids are running around and hiding. It really works out excellent for entire families, and during a time when you’re trying to avoid enclosed spaces with large crowds.

There are several options, but we’ve had great success with the Laser X system. It’s certainly not the cheapest option available, but it’s probably the most reliable option for the price range. As with most models, you’re able to start small and expand further as you’d like. We have a couple of the larger handsets, and a couple of the smaller handsets. They pick up shots quite well, and they’re quite easy for younger kids to simply run around and play with you as well. You can set them up to be teams, or a free for all - whatever you’d like. Overall, they’re fairly basic toys, but they work really well which is all we could ask for.

The only downside to laser tag at home is that you’re going to need space to actually play it. You may have a large enough house for it to not be a problem, or a yard. If neither of those will work, then heading to a park may be an option as well. You’ll need some room to spread out and be able to run.

If you’re looking for a bit of extra fun that works for the whole family, grab a laser gun, and get out there. You might be surprised how much fun you’ll have.