Some Big-Time Playing

“There’s no place quite like it,” boasts the slogan for Dave & Buster’s, the 60,000-square-foot interactive game and entertainment complex that opened last month at Ontario Mills Mall. That’s for sure.

Part playground, part arcade, part sports bar, part T.G.I. Fridays, this carnival-like nightspot represents a new genre of mega-entertainment palaces for adults, one of 10 D&Bs; nationally and the first on the West Coast. And people are lining up to get inside in a part of the L.A. area where people are not used to lining up for much of anything.

“I’ve had people ask me if they have dancing, because they see the long lines outside,” said Michael Lowe, 22, of Loma. “It’s different than any place around here.”

The dark, smoky, football field-size sprawl, punctuated by flashing lights and sound effects, is reminiscent of a casino. There is play-for-fun blackjack, where would-be gamblers can wager a $50,000 chip--without the consequences. But the half-dozen tables are not the main draw. Neither are the mahogany and rosewood-railed billiard tables built exclusively for D&B; to the tune of $15,000 apiece.

The Million Dollar Midway is the center of the action, a virtual fun house for big kids. There’s Alpine Surf, where riders can feel the sensation of snowboarding down a twisting slope. Or Daytona USA, where classic Grand Prix games can be linked to let Mario Andretti wannabes race one another. The motion-based simulation Turbo Ride Theatre features eight-minute takeoffs on heart-pumping action favorites like “RoboCop” and “Days of Thunder.”

“The individual chairs move in the theater,” Laurie Koehl, 30, of Upland, said. “It’s almost like a ride.”

The Virtuality corner hosts a crowd of cyberpack-toting players who look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in “Total Recall,” wearing high-tech headsets and visors. The object? To shoot at virtual aliens with hand-held joysticks, playing a video game from the inside out.

“It’s more frustrating than anything else,” said Brent Lecount, another 30-year-old Upland resident, after finishing the game. “It isn’t really 3-D, and there was a lag time between what you did with the joystick and how the game responded. After about 30 seconds I wanted to yank the thing off my head.”

For sports enthusiasts, D&B; has batting cages, basketball hoops and shooting galleries. One of the more interesting attractions is the 19th Hole, a state-of-the-art golf simulator with a real putting green that lets players tee off with an actual ball and club, then measures the speed and location of the shot.

For the purist, a whole area is devoted to more traditional carnival games: ring tosses, drops and grabs, horse racing, skeeball and the like, with plenty of stuffed animal prizes.

All this stimuli doesn’t come cheap. Games cost between 50 cents and $5 a pop. Don’t worry about running out of quarters or tokens, though. The ever-ingenious D&B; offers its own “power card,” which you must charge with dollars in order to play. The credits fly off the magnetically activated debit card, making it all too easy to spend.

“It seems pretty expensive, but we keep coming back so the place must be good,” Jim Miles, 40, who works in Ontario, said.

As if all this weren’t enough, plenty of singles action centers around the 40-foot Midway Bar, where thirtysomething sports fans can munch on popcorn, sip $3 beers and catch games on one of 20 suspended TV sets. There’s a $5 cover charge on weekends and the place still gets jam-packed.

The adjacent dining area is surprisingly subdued, with its hardwood floors and tables. The food, mostly pub fare, is just that: fair. There’s a mile-high cheeseburger, a tasty Southwestern dip and pasta and fish dishes that may be a tad ambitious. Appetizer, dinner and drinks for two comes to $30-$40.

With its position in the growing Ontario Mills Mall and the mall’s June opening of an ecological theme park called American Wilderness Experience, the entertainment palace should come close to getting the million visitors it expects in its first year. But with Club Disney already opened in Thousand Oaks and industry heavyweights like Sony and Spielberg poised to jump into the game center ring, D&B; won’t be the only game in town.

BE THERE

Dave & Buster’s, Ontario Mills Mall, 4821 Mills Circle, Ontario. Open daily 11 a.m.-1 a.m. All ages until 10 p.m., 21 and over after 10 p.m., $5 cover charge Saturday and Sunday after 10 p.m. Full menu, full bar. (909) 987-1557