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Documented 2017 to today · Mishawaka and South Bend
The arcade moved to the shopping center. South Bend's dedicated arcade history is thin in citable sources, and this article prints the county frame honestly, the way the Fort Wayne leg printed its school-district material: the region's documented survivor stands in Mishawaka, labeled as Mishawaka. Mega Play, in the Town & Country Shopping Centre at 2500 Miracle Lane, Mishawaka, combines an indoor 18-hole miniature golf course, a playland and a large token arcade that its own billing calls the largest video arcade in Michiana; Pinball News's April 2017 visit counted 11 pinball machines on the floor. A longtime patron's review recalls coming "since the early 90s," and that recollection is printed as a recollection: the opening year is unfixed and is an open item, not a founding date. Also in Mishawaka, at directory grade: the Putt-Putt Fun Center, 3615 N. Main St., miniature golf and arcade.
The lanes. Inside South Bend itself, the family's indoor standby is older than the arcade and thinner in the record: Chippewa Bowl, 225 W. Chippewa Ave., a 70-lane house by its own billing, with bumper bowling for small children, the form in which most South Bend children first roll a ball that is theirs. No founding date for the house was fixed, and the article prints it at house size. The city's other bowling centers and the mall arcades of the University Park and Grape Road era are real in memory and absent in the citable record assembled here; they are named as an open item rather than reconstructed from nostalgia.
Sources
- Pinball News, Mega Play visit report, April 2017: Town & Country Shopping Centre, 2500 Miracle Lane, Mishawaka; 11 pinball machines; large token arcade.
- Mega Play, house description and patron reviews (Yelp listing): 18-hole indoor mini golf; playland; "largest video arcade in Michiana" (house claim); patron recollection of visits "since the early 90s" (recollection, not a founding date).
- Directory listings: Putt-Putt Fun Center, 3615 N. Main St., Mishawaka (mini golf and arcade, directory grade).
- Chippewa Bowl (house site): 225 W. Chippewa Ave., South Bend; 70 lanes; bumper bowling for children (house billing; founding date unfixed).