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Brand New We Like Big Putts at Lane7 Midsummer Place
Milton Keynes might actually have one of the best nights out hiding right in the middle of the city centre.
Milton Keynes might actually have one of the best nights out hiding right in the middle of the city centre.
Recently, the Midsummer Place Stylista and Ambassador team headed down to Lane7 in Midsummer Place for a team night. There was bowling, bumper cars, arcade games and pizza on the cards, but there was one thing I wanted to try before anything else. Their brand new game, We Like Big Putts.
I'd seen little snippets of it online, but I genuinely had no idea what to expect.
Turns out, it's nothing like mini golf as you know it.
If you've been to Lane7 before, you'll know they don't really do ordinary. We Like Big Putts is proof of that. It's not the kind of mini golf where you're wandering from hole to hole with your scorecard in hand. This does things a little differently.
Instead, your group gets its own lane. Think bowling, but swap the pins for a putting green.
You tap everyone's names into the touchscreen, grab a club and look up. That's when the giant screen above your lane comes to life. It keeps score for you, throws new challenges onto the screen and, very glamorously, also decides to put photos of your face up for everyone to admire.
Once we'd finally accepted our golfing fate, we wandered off to see what else we could find.
The bumper cars were first.
There's something about bumper cars that instantly makes grown adults forget every driving lesson they've ever had. Indicators? Mirrors? Personal space? None of it exists anymore.
It quickly turned into everyone chasing each other around the track while trying not to laugh too hard.
The arcade wasn't much calmer.
One minute you're saying, "I'll just have one go," and the next you've somehow spent fifteen minutes trying to beat a score you didn't even care about five minutes earlier.
We also found the interactive floor game, which looked easy until it was my turn. All you have to do is step on certain squares while avoiding the others.
Simple.
Until the timer starts.
Suddenly your feet stop listening to your brain and you're hopping around like you've forgotten how legs work.
After that we wandered over to the pool tables for a few games before attempting ping pong, where confidence levels were considerably higher than ability.
Interactive darts was next, and I loved this far more than I expected.
Everything is tracked automatically, so there's no standing around arguing over scores or pretending someone definitely hit the treble.
The digital games mix things up as you go along, which is good news if, like me, your darts occasionally have a mind of their own.
By then we'd properly earned some food.
We grabbed a bunch of pizzas, ordered nachos for the table and finally sat down for five minutes. Just good food, everyone chatting over each other, laughing about who'd been stitched up on We Like Big Putts and replaying the funniest moments from the evening.
Then it was time for bowling.
I'd love to tell you I suddenly discovered a hidden talent.
I did not.
Everyone else looked like they'd secretly been training for this moment. Meanwhile, every ball I threw seemed absolutely determined to introduce itself to the gutter before going anywhere near the pins.
I kept convincing myself I'd worked out the perfect technique.
Reader, I had not.
Thankfully, Lane7 is the sort of place where nobody really cares whether you're smashing strikes or celebrating the fact you've managed to knock down three pins. The music's on, everyone's laughing and there's always another game waiting once your turn's over.
Thankfully, Lane7 is the sort of place where nobody really cares whether you're smashing strikes or celebrating the fact you've managed to knock down three pins. The music's on, everyone's laughing and there's always another game waiting once your turn's over.
By the time we wandered back out into Midsummer Place, we'd somehow spent hours there without noticing.
I think that's what I liked most about the evening. You never feel like you've finished one activity and need to decide what to do next. You just drift from one thing to another, and before you know it you've spent half the evening laughing at your own terrible bowling technique and arguing over who actually won We Like Big Putts.
I'm still not convinced the bowling lane wasn't against me, though.
Stacey Mina @minasjourneys
