Malls – Vivera Mall (AGS Cinemas) – FUN and Bowling – OMR (Navalur) – Autism Spectrum Disorder

Hi All,

We take our son to kids play area whenever we find time, the main purpose is to get his physical and sensory needs filled in, and most importantly how to socialize and behave around other kids. At his home, everything is owned by him or he is used to have everything for himself, but at outside he has to wait, he has to take turns, etc…. this is still a work in progress area for him.
The more we take him to such places the better he will behave is our logic. I also realized few parents may not be aware of the various play areas that are located in the city, hence decided to post our review/experience on the play areas as and when we visit it.

This is one such post, where we went to the Vivera Mall located in Navalur OMR. This is the mall where AGS cinemas is available. We were on a long pointless drive on one fine evening, where we came across this mall, we simply wanted to have a look inside, to our
surprise we found a play area in the 4th floor.
The play area is called FUN and Bowling, which is a poor imitation of fun city you find in Phoenix / Express Avenue malls. The place is very small (roughly around 1500 sq ft floor space), quiet, no crowd whatsoever, they had arcade games, riders, play area and snow bowling.

I have to first say about the employees / owners who run this place, they are not professionals i.e. not trained for performing any work, no interest in their job, constantly watching IG, YT videos on mobiles, you have to search for them if any arcade game is not
working …. (Have seen such workers in most of the places, it happens due to the salary I think… you will not get good people for lower salary), they would be most unwelcoming to the extent possible…. (This clarifies why this place was not crowded on a weekend evening)

This place is not a franchise, there are no branches available anywhere else (thank god for that), as a result there is no one to supervise them for maintaining the brand or standard. This is their official website http://www.funandbowling.com/ – which does not work.

The Air conditioner is not working in the play area, the kids playing inside the play area were sweating. A north Indian family made a complaint that it is very hot inside to the person in charge, they mentioned AC is not working…. (I have seen this scenario in many places, to make more profits every establishments is now resorting to switching off AC to save on the electricity bill, but the issue is all the places are built keeping in mind AC will be used, hence when they switch it off, there is no ventilation for clean air circulation)

Coming to the pricing, they are not very flexible … they have only two options … option 1, pay 750 Rs. and get play time worth 630 Rs. … option 2, pay 1000 Rs. and get play time worth 1000 Rs. I think … This rate is not a fixed one, as it was written in a marker on a white board, which means they will jack up the price as they wish… Also they do not accept card, it’s always cash..

The play area has a trampoline, slide, ball pool, a small swing … there is no dedicated person in charge for this play area, if parents does not go inside, no one is present to take care of the kid. As the people running the place are extremely and religiously busy in chit chatting with each other and watching YouTube and Instagram’s on their mobiles and ignore us to the extent possible…. They do not insist on socks when kids are inside the play area. Parents were allowed inside the play area…

At an average you can spend one hour with your kid in this place (Excluding snow bowling)…. Suggested age would be less than 6, older kids would find the arcade games boring, as they would finish it off quickly.

In the same floor you will find a 7D place as well which contains Cool 7D Pix, Fish Pedicure, 3D Max Virtual Reality, Tattoo Designs and Fun Land for Children’s. Since we were pressed for time, we left the mall without exploring this place.

We came down to food court for snacks, there isn’t much there … McDonald’s was available, nothing much apart from that.

In short, they have done a decent job in making the play area and arcade games, it should not go to a waste, little more politeness, functioning air conditioners, flexible fares, and fake as if they are caring towards children, respect the parents… will go a long way… it’s a place where you can go one time ….not welcoming enough for a repetitive visits.

Below are few pictures taken about the place..