Prior to my tactical laser tag session at Battle House Laser Tag in Plano, TX I had skimmed their company website, but I had not looked closely enough to notice something that was about to blow my mind. Battle House really breaks the mold in a particularly unique way. Let me tell you about my visit.
I called ahead and the young woman who answered the phone was delightful and helpful as I explained that I was in Texas just for the day and would like to play a game to experience their arena. I told her I was happy to purchase the entire session, but only had time for a game or two if it might be possible for me to join in. She was very accommodating and suggested if I could get there for the 2:45 session I could play with a large group of about 29 players, so I rearranged my plans a bit and headed off to this arena next.
When I arrived I was greeted at the counter and a game marshal named Riley came out to meet me. He says he heard there was a player needing a briefing.
I absentmindedly glanced at a poster showing the different taggers available. A lot of tactical tag gear tends to look quite similar, so even though something about these photos seemed slightly unusual, I figured there are only a handful of manufacturers whose equipment could be in use.
So I said I might not need as long of a briefing (ending the thought in my head that I have played them all). I asked whose gear they used here and he said “Battle House”. I replied, “I know this business is called Battle House, but who is the manufacturer of your laser tag equipment?” To which Riley said “Battle House. It’s made by corporate”.
Ok, insert your own mental image of me doing a spit take here. As the webmaster of LaserTagMuseum.com and the keeper of the collection it is very rare for me to encounter a system that isn’t yet represented in the archives somewhere along the way, so this was a big deal. Granted, I am not as familiar with all the tactical brands as I am the traditional, but this is still really exciting for me to learn that there is apparently a homegrown system, made in the USA and in use here that I have never experienced before. This visit just got REALLY interesting!
The Plano site is one of six franchised Battle House locations and Riley told me they are the only company to use this corporate-made equipment. As such, this became a really special stop because of the limited availability of this system, so I was eager to hear everything he had to share about it. I guess I did need a full briefing after all, lol!
With the Battle House equipment it requires four tags to “kill” or deactivate a player to send them back to respawn. The audible cues are three grunts and on the fourth tag you hear a scream of “medic, medic, man down”.
Riley walked me through the options in the armory, telling me that players all usually start with a standard tagger. He showed me a wide variety of choices for which I tried to keep up with my notes.
He said the SMG model is the short one.
However, the E-canon has the same body as an SMG, so it is really the internal tech that would distinguish them from one another.
Here’s a look at their M4.
The sniper model shown here has a red tip.
I am a bit unclear from my own notes about this one (hoping I have not confused any of the models), but I intend to reach out to the company at some point, so please forgive any error in ID. But it is cool to see yet another version.
The shotgun with two barrels is the easiest one for me to identify.
However, Riley told me that the shotgun and pistols are the only taggers they use that are not made by Battle House. Other than those, he said that the company makes all their own gear.
He shared with me that they do all their own repair work in house and showed me how hygienic the headbands are, which they wash frequently to make sure players get a fresh one for each game session. Then he handed me one and asked me to turn my hat backwards, so as not to block the head sensor as he upgraded me to the Battle House SMG model for my experience.
I asked about the imprint on the tagger identifying it as a Viper and he told me this main metal body style is integrated into various models as he illustrated with his hands the distinction between that and the pieces added to a standard tagger.
Let me pause here to say this has already been well worth the price of a session simply for the education and wealth of knowledge that Riley has shared so far and I have not even entered the arena yet! But I was also delighted to learn that Battle House is a veteran owned company and all the Battle House franchise locations are owned by veterans. I am impressed with everything I have learned and now I am ready to enter a game.
Riley walked me into the approximately 14,000 square foot arena.
It is impressively sized with eight two-story buildings and featuring stairways and catwalks to connect paths between the structures.
This arena is light on theming (save for a fair amount of camo net), but has plenty of space with easily identifiable call out points.
Riley led me over to my team’s respawn station where there was a map of the field.
There were two red respawn boxes in each team’s designated corner and I was instructed to get my head sensor close to the red box and push the red button so I would hear that the equipment was “ready to engage”.
Although the arena at its max can host between 36-40 players, this game with 30 of us felt quite well-sized within this space. I was placed on the blue team and ready to get into the action.
Riley shared an interesting philosophy they have regarding scores…they don’t track individual scores, only team wins because they put higher value on teamwork to complete the objective over individual bragging rights. This is really interesting to me. I certainly can’t argue with that logic, although I have never encountered any other laser tag business that utilized that approach. This is one more way they are breaking the mold. However, from what I observed, this seemed to work just fine and everyone was enjoying their team-based games.
The game format I jumped in on was called “Bombs Voyage” (which I think is a very clever name).
For this game the red team would be on offense to attack while the blue team defends the “bomb” device being moved around in this blue barrel on wheels. Now this also is a novel approach.
Our blue team tried to move the device to a secret location and the red team’s objective was to stop us and diffuse the device. During the first of the two rounds I was just playing around with the gear and experiencing how it felt to tag with this equipment, listening for audible cues and experimenting a bit.
For the second round we switched sides and the team took a more strategic approach with mass convergence on the device. The strategy failed, but the energy stayed positive, so all in all I think there is something to be said for this team score only idea.
After those two rounds I returned to Riley who had two more cool things to show me. He first he brought me over to a table with several white cubes and showed me how they could brightly light up with team colors for games where the object is to press the button on top and hold the cube for your team as long as possible. I said “so this is your version of Domination” and he replied “that’s what we call it.” :)
Finally, he showed me some props they use for a game called Bank Heist.
For this game it’s cops vs robbers and the cops have to defend the bank which is stocked with a safe full of gold bars. On top of the safe are money bags and the robber’s objective is to put two gold bars into one money bag and get that back while escaping the cops. I think the incorporation of props is a fun twist!
I knew I wouldn’t have time to play any more games here today, but the time I spent here was incredibly enjoyable and worthwhile. With this new understanding about the Battle House equipment and the limited locations where I can experience their gear I am definitely interested in visiting other Battle House locations on my future tag trips. My thanks to the team at Battle House Plano for such a great experience!
Comments or Questions?
Contact: Tivia@tiviachickloveslasertag.com
Websites: www.tiviachickloveslasertag.com
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