Welcome to Experience Michiana and the show's producer, Kelsy Zumbrun.

And we have a great show for you today as we look back at some of the activities we've been blessed to get out and Experience.

Now our hosts are out on vacation, enjoying some time as we're enjoying this beautiful weather of summer.

But let's get out and look at some of the things you can experience in our area.

We are headed over to Elkhart, to the Green Queen selfie studio, where you can get all the shots in that you want.

And speaking of shots, a mega play is another cool place in Mishawaka that you can get some shots in on the joust or any of the arcades or miniature golf.

We'll keep the shots going as we head to Action Park Paintball in Mishawaka, where Courtney and Kelly took some shots at each other.

But first, let's head over to Waypoint VRrcade, where we put on the goggles and step into a different world.

OK, Todd, tell me about how this came to Mishawaka.

Well, it all started on my bachelor party to Las Vegas, and we were looking for fun things to do.

They just built a zero latency location at the MGM Grand.

A month prior to me being there, I saw I could take on the zombie apocalypse in real life.

And I said, yeah, that that's what we're doing for my bachelor party.

Normally people come back from bachelorette parties with regret.

So you came back with a life changing, awesome business idea, but you did open right before covid.

So how's it been over the last year?

It's been tough.

I mean, it took us over two years to actually get open to the public from coming back from the bachelor party to being open.

We were open for about two weeks and shut down for about four months.

So it's been tough.

But we're still here over a year later, which says a lot about not only the products that we have and the service we provide, but also the the community that we live in and the customers that we have coming.

So for the local community who want to come and experience this, what are some of the things that they can do?

Or we have the only place in Indiana to have any free room, virtual reality of any kind.

We have multiple free roam platforms, simulated free run platform on a treadmill system.

Yeah, we also have limited free roam platforms in our individual game spaces by making this large that can be.

And we have racing simulators, birthday party space for the younger crowd and a party space for the adults.

So for people watching who want to come here, like, do they just turn up or do they have to book in advance?

How does that work?

Most of the platforms we have or walk in only zero latency due to its popularity does have the ability to book online in advance.

You can go to zero latency VR dotcom book right then and there.

You just pick your day, pick your time, pick your game.

And if you're not sure what you want to play, it does have video game trailers, photo subscriptions.

It's very easy.

I would recommend as well that if you haven't been here before, you don't really know what you're doing, just turn up and have a look around.

I think that's the best way to find what you're into as well.

Oh, it is.

And if you mention that it's your first time and we have the ability to do so, we'll take you on a tour and show you everything we have to offer.

Now, this is the quietest I've ever heard Kelly or Courtney in the background.

Right now they are ready to go.

They look like they're going to do virtual scuba diving, which they're ready to go.

What are we going to be doing?

What's the game that we're going to be playing together?

You guys are going to be playing outbreak origins.

OK, zombie shooter.

And it is a story based zombie shooter where you were trying to find the cure to the zombie apocalypse.

This feels too much like real life right now, but we're going to try and find a cure for this.

So we're going to go in and play.

And I'm excited for this.

I've never done virtual reality of any kind before.

And I know this.

I'm starting at the top here.

I did the same, as you see, was my very first VR experience of any kind Nice.

So the cool thing is that we are constantly getting new games on this platform as well as every other platform we have.

One of the coolest things that we have coming is in May we're having Far Cry VR, which is going to be the biggest VR launch of all all time, and that is coming to the zero latency platform only never before played content.

Brand new Niles.

I'm sad that I just found out I'm on the same team as Courtney so I can actually beat her this week, which is going to be disappointing.

But yeah, I think we should just go play.

Oh yeah.

I'm going to root for you.

Wait, it's crazy, I actually just thought I was in an elevator.

This is so weird.

Uh.

OK. Hi.

I do you.

Oh.

Oh, my God.

My heart is like beating so fast.

Oh, you caught me taking selfies, but that's OK, because today we are checking out Green Queen Selfie Studio here in Elkhart, Indiana.

I'm so excited to be in the space.

It is so much fun.

And I have with us today Danielle, who is the owner and of course, hello, Gorgeous is right there on the wall for us.

This is such an awesome space.

How did you come up with this idea?

Well, it kind of initially started the fact that, you know, selfie studios are starting to pop up all over the place.

And I'm a very artistic person.

I love to paint and draw and have fun.

And I'm like, well, I can do that.

So I did.

There you go.

Perfect there.

I know.

Like, this is the first time I've heard of a selfie studio.

And when you walk in, there is it's overwhelming how many different options there are to choose from what really is a selfie studio.

A selfie studio is essentially a place that you can come with your friends and your family and take pictures of yourself.

And it's actually pretty convenient for a lot of people because, you know, some people are insecure.

The angles, they don't know how to pose.

And you're able to look in like to the ring lights and actually see how you look when you take the photos along with some clickers so you can take it, you know, secretively.

Oh, look at that.

These are the tips and tricks behind the camera.

And you can become a photography assassin yourself.

And I say, let's check out some of the other spaces.

All right.

So this is kind of the red yellow Disney.

I like Disney vibe.

We've got like over here, you know, the Willy Wonka feel.

I love this is like poison ivy kind of.

Well, then we're going to come into this room is basically essentially like supposed to make you feel like you're at the beach, you're at a party or poolside.

You can get tiki margarita.

There are balls, there's a ball pit.

It's like my favorite thing, including, like hot dog and donut floating.

Like, how ridiculous that is that fun.

And so this is part of your VIP experience?

It is part of my VIP experience.

There's two experiences.

There's my regular Experience and then there's my VIP this.

And then my clouds are only included in the VIP section to check out the clouds.

The clouds?

What is that about?

The clouds?

Would you mind if I turn this off?

Oh, wow.

It's wow is a total Experience.

This can be used for both videography or pictures.

And not only that, but, you know, some people might want just plain colors on here.

So I change the color.

I can coordinate.

Coordinate with your outfit.

Yes, yes.

Yes.

So that is an option as well.

I try to make everything is interactive and special, make everyone's experience different.

Absolutely.

And you have lots of fun props that people can use everywhere.

Even if we go over to Candy Land, you've got like movable cupcake, old school pasto candy necklaces.

Oh, my gosh, these are my favorite.

But this is so much fun.

So in order to check this space out and to do yourself this year, you need to book it right.

How does that process go?

So you basically can either go on Facebook.

I have a page.

It's Green Queen Selfie Studio.

Give it a like.

You hit the book button and you can reserve a time.

My reservations usually go between an hour or an hour and a half if you just do a walk in the Experience is the prices are listed on my website in the surrogacies.

Or you could, for a whole family, book it out for seventy five dollars an hour or one hundred for an hour and a half.

And that's the ultimate Experience.

It will only be your party in there.

OK, great.

So it will be private.

You know, it's great for, you know, covid friendly.

You know, I'm all about infection control and keeping everyone safe.

So if you want a great safe, healthy Experience, that's what I'm aiming for.

And I know we were just talking about having birthday parties here where I love to bring my teens here where they can take all the selfies that they could possibly desire.

You could you can totally book out my space for birthday parties, graduation or even company picnics.

Speaking of graduation, I know those graduations going on right now.

And I heard some commotion here.

And what is this, the speakeasy room?

Is that something like that?

If you want to be classy, this is for my classy.

Oh, my gosh, we are having so much fun.

So my daughter is graduating tomorrow and we heard about this place and we were like, this is totally where we have to come and get pictures then.

Doesn't she look great?

I know they've taken all these selfies, but you know what I mean.

I put her through school for four years, and in this selfie, I feel like we need to make it really realistic.

So watch it, guys.

All right.

OK, I made it.

Yes.

It's always good.

You get it right.

You get in here, love.

I'll go get real people.

But so much fun.

This place is totally fun.

You know what I'm going to do next?

I'm throwing in the pit bull.

I was talking to her in there.

I heard that.

I just think this.

So empowering.

I know you were talking about how empowering it is to see people coming here, even some come with their photographers or videographers and and can kind of rent the space out.

Tell us about the empowerment of the space.

Oh, the empowerment of space one.

I am a single mom.

I'm a hard working mother.

I sacrificed a lot and I basically put my all into this place.

And not only that, but I also want to empower other women.

I had a hard life.

I struggled.

I built myself up from where I was.

And I want other women to come in here and feel great about themselves.

I want them to feel strong, confident and powerful and glamorous when I come into this.

I really feel it could be a prop, it's good, good.

Well, thank you so much for showing us this space and I think we have some selfies to get to take it.

Totally do this..

Yes.

Oh, my God, what a wonderful place I love now.

This was the ultimate excuse to take as many selfies as we could possibly want.

And, you know, it's great for someone like me who doesn't know how to take selfies.

OK, it's so easy to do.

Super easy to do.

Yeah, totally.

Lot of fun.

All right, Courtney, you have way too much of a tradition of beating us.

Well, I just can't help it when it happens.

So today I have one goal.

What's that?

The goal is would be coordinate everything.

Your number.

I have a different goal because she savage.

I'm not going to survive, not just survive 40 years.

I've got to go to work.

All right.

You're an absolute savage for me.

Well, I'm excited to see what they have here to offer to make a play.

So I'm going to go run off, see if I can meet up with the general manager and see what's going on here.

Megaplex.

All right.

We're going to warm up so we can be you get ready for that.

I can just walk out of here and I'll be happy.

One of the best staples for fun here in Michiana is mega play, and they've been around for decades.

I'm so excited to be here surrounded by all the noise and entertainment.

And I have with us today Susan Hughes, the general manager here.

Thanks for having us today.

Thank you for coming.

I appreciate that.

There's so much to do here.

And I know I've been here with my kids before, too.

What are some of your favorite things to do here at Mega Play?

Drive, drive, drive.

I can safely drive crazy.

I love that.

I know.

I like the motorcycle Kelly and I have done the motorcycle before too.

But you guys have over 300 arcade games.

Yes.

We've got anything from.

Oh, skeeball to the spin, Turin's to driving games, to helicopter games, to shooting zombies, of course.

Dance yourself to death.

That's right.

I have dance clubs that do come in.

I will use my DDR.

What would you say is your oldest one?

Because when we were walking around, I saw some very nostalgic options over there.

What's your oldest video arcade game?

I would have to be Pacman, OK?

It would have to be Pacman.

A close second would be Centipede here.

A close third would probably be Dungeons and Dragons.

OK. And you also have options for the little ones.

Absolutely.

We have got an incredible 800 square foot enclosed playland.

Currently, because of covid, right, we do have our our our ball pit shut down.

OK, but we still have a 15 by 15 bouncer as well as that enclosed area that's got plenty to play with from slides to.

Oh, gosh.

Just tries to get them out for the little one.

I know all families right now are looking for places where they can let their kids go and release an energy safely.

What are some of the precautions you're doing with covid restrictions?

Right.

OK, first off, we clean on a daily basis or we're using CDC sanitizers.

Anything that can be touched, sat on.

Yeah, surfaces, gets wiped out.

It gets wiped out.

You know, whenever you think about it, I mean, that goes to trash can lids.

We make sure everything is wiped down and everyone should be wearing a mask when they come here to we do we do something.

So do you guys use their own player cards too?

So if someone wants to load their card up, they can do that.

Absolutely.

And that that actually is is a much more sanitary way of doing things, Jack, because you're not having to deal with dirty tokens.

Yeah, exactly.

You're not having to worry about, hey, where was that chokin last.

Exactly.

And you guys even can do birthday parties here, too, which I know people are starting to get together in small groups and that's an option.

Yes, that's a it's a huge option.

We do have a room that can seat up to three hundred people.

So we now know we are we we do small groups, 10 to 15 at a time.

And those are those are group two hours apart.

So given the space there, they're able to, you know, not be on top of one another.

Absolutely.

And you guys have food and drinks here.

Yes.

So this is kind of an all all bounced off here.

Yes.

And you guys have been around forever.

Yes.

Under our ownership since nineteen ninety seven.

I mean, the concept was actually opened in nineteen ninety two under a different family.

OK, in nineteen ninety seven our family took over through the years.

We've just kind of gone with whatever has been most popular.

Yeah.

And stuck with that you know we, we take care of.

Basically, the whole family, it is so, you know, we're going to get the little guys and we're going to get you.

Well, I don't know about everybody else, but I'm ready to play.

So I'm going to go get Kelly and Irish Dave and see if we can get some competition going, because that's what I'm all about.

Absolutely.

Oh, my gosh.

By my the.

Oh.

So one of the things we both love doing about Experience Michiana is that even though we live here, we still keep finding all of these new things to do.

And today, I don't know about you caught me when the equipment room here at Action Park Paintball with Matt.

I don't know about you, but I feel like I'm about to prepare for war.

I look at it.

I feel like, you know, this is going.

OK, first of all, tell us about the equipment, because you know, this so much stuff in here.

And it really does look like it's about to you know, this works for our retail store and our equipment room.

So we have rental equipment available for players like yourselves who are not just going into the store.

And then we have the retail side, too, that we can sell you once you're hooked, which once you guys tried today.

I know you don't want a gun.

We have a gun.

The word perfect for you.

So don't worry.

We got we're all ready for you.

So, yeah.

So we've got basically whatever Experience or age level you're at.

We've got something for everybody.

So there's so much equipment in here.

Can we talk about some of the things I see kind of guns here.

This is our rental rack right behind me here.

Those are all for rentals.

We've got different levels of rentals.

We've got the funding for that.

We don't know what they're doing here.

And then we've got to slightly upgrade rental.

I spent a little bit more money, get a little better, going to be a little more Biegun.

So we have that available.

This is good to kind of have the variety.

So if you think this is something that you want to stick with, you can kind of check them out before you buy.

Right now, I see the best.

What's that all about?

Well, I mean, all the vest and padding, it's your own personal taste and flavor and what you like to do.

Everybody comes out very concerned and nervous, really shaking.

Oh, my gosh.

I've heard it hurts.

I feel these massive bruises.

I have to say, that's the only thing that I'm really familiar with about people is the bruises that come from it after we've done it before.

No, I've seen the bruises after effect that you'll go home and I even notice it when you're playing.

You got such an adrenaline rush when you're playing the you will go, oh, that didn't hurt, right?

Yeah.

You'll be shot once your adrenaline is pumping and you're looking down the barrel and you see your target and even they hit you.

The adrenaline, the pain is a moment.

I mean, it's it's frustrating.

It's like, oh, wow.

Yeah, that hurt all the time.

People are trying to get in here.

You're a minute later.

You're fine.

You're good to go.

Patty, you know what we have?

We have full office.

We have full padding.

If we need to buy that or rent that, we have full jerseys.

Well, full pants, whatever level you want to be, you could play like that.

And we have customers that come out just like that ready to go.

I suggest not so bright of a color.

Tiger Woods I would like, but that's that's just being far more camouflaged.

You're not going to hide in the woods.

Well, either.

But that's OK. We need targets.

Everyone needs a target.

So there's targets and there's you and I would say, OK, so let's head out of the equipment room and let's go.

Let's go.

OK, so we'll get you guys geared up.

All right.

Matt has us hooked up with some beginner here.

And I've learned so far not to put my finger on the trigger just yet, but there's a safety on it.

So there's a lot of safety features here, too.

Yeah, I mean, one of the things we really stress out here is people's fun until someone doesn't do it correctly.

That's not fun.

I mean, so our biggest safety features out here are one, you've got a Burgét plug in the gun no matter what, any time you're not playing, which is pretty much when we're in the staging area out there.

We're on the field right now.

But pretty much any time you leave this facility to go out, there were other people are going to be out.

You have to plug on because we don't trust the safeties just in case something happens and there's nobody out here right now.

So we're breaking protocol right now.

But normally, if you're on this side of the playing field, which is out here where the playing field is, all the tires behind us, any time to come out here, you have to have goggles on.

Right now.

You talk about the different fields.

Can you tell us a little bit about them?

Yeah.

That I see out here.

We've got fields for a little bit of every level of play.

I mean, this we call our tire field.

This is our perimeter field one because very spectator friendly.

Yeah.

Oh, my dad and uncle, grandma, grandpa come out and they can walk along the sideline, they can watch their kids, grandkids, parents, whoever playing, and you can get a flavor for the game.

So then we've got what we call we'll go out to the woods, we have a wood school we call the Woods Field, which is primarily played in the woods.

And then we've got a village field that has little structures all over the place in the middle of it.

And then we've got a really nice 40 foot castle.

It's a second can really attack and defend that.

And then we've got behind us.

It's not completely inflated yet, but we've got a tournament field, an air ball field, the next level player that wants the competition in case it rains or the weather is not good.

It's actually an indoor.

Yes, we also have a big all the way down there to fill a big red barn.

And that's great for indoor play.

Indoor play.

It's fun when you can't play outside.

Talk to me.

I'll play.

I'll pick outside ten, ten times if I can, OK?

I mean, that's just me indoors.

For new players, it sounds exciting, but it's close range.

It's intimidating people as much.

It's loud, so it's a little harder to play inside versus out here.

You've got more room to roam and it's great to be outside right now.

What are your crisis hours here?

You're open Tuesdays from.

Eight Saturdays and 10 to five and Sundays from one to five and pricing information, people can find a price range anywhere from 30 to 40 dollars, usually for a day of play, depending on what your budget is.

I mean, if you say I want to shoot a lot more paint, your budget might spend 50 or 60 dollars.

If you say, you know what, no, you can get away with twenty five to thirty five dollars, depending on what day you come, how many people you have, how much pain you want.

OK, so it's, it's not overly expensive.

All right.

Ready to play then.

OK. All right.

All right.

Courtney, you're going on the other side.

Oh gosh.

Tarago OK.

I'm sure Courtney could help me.

You in.

Three, two, one.

Go, go, go.

Quite a ago.

Oh, my goodness, that we had so much fun now.

We said right now we're out.

And as you can tell, we really are beginning, as have we do, OK?

I mean, there's a good reason why you wear masks.

That's also the best place to shop.

It doesn't hurt at all.

All right.

It's also usually what you see on people.

But, yeah, it's an exciting adrenaline rush.

I mean, if you're in a short time period out here today, so when you're actually getting a full game Experience and you get to play for 10 minutes or 12 minutes and you got 20 people outside the castle, mean, that's intense.

It's very intense.

Very exciting.

I mean, great for talking half of the game with friends and family and saying, yeah, that's great.

I love about it.

I mean, coming out here with family and friends, it's a really having a great time.

It's really the only sport that I can think of.

The Dalton child can play and be on the same level because people hit you.

Doesn't have an eight year old shot it.

That's fifty 58 year old child.

It breaks and hurts and you're out.

So, I mean, the Experience level helps, but yeah, kids kids can play with parent parents, both kids.

It's really great.

It's a great environment.

But yeah, we were in everything you guys need if you need to visit us.

We have a website, action park, paintball, dotcom.

All of our reservations are down there.

All of our waivers are down there.

We also have Facebook that updates our events as what's going on.

We have our first tournament coming up in June.

So if you want Srei, you two want to try, you can draft one more person.

We have a three man tournament coming up all day in here to fellow players.

We have a good, a bad and a really bad division.

All right, we're in and they'll be up.

But thank you guys for coming out.

It is great.

Thanks for joining us for another great show.

We hope you can get out and experience some of these exciting things that are in our area.

And remember, if you're out doing other things and you think we should be there, let us know about it on Facebook.

You can either send us a message or use the hashtag Experience, Michiana, and we'll find out about it that way to get out and enjoy this beautiful sunshine and a warm weekend.

We can't wait to Experience more with you until next time.

Have fun, everyone.

This WNIT local production has been made possible in part by viewers like you.

Thank you.

And.