After being located on Cottage Grove Road since 2020 and disrupting a proposed housing development at that site by not agreeing to a buyout of its lease in 2021, Nerdhaven Arcade has moved to 5417 Monona Drive.

“All we can say is this location is a much better location for the arcade and our customers,” co-owner John Karalis said.

The new location does come with some challenges. Nerdhaven’s previous location had loading docks that allowed them to bring in large games. The new location has smaller doors, no loading dock and a layout that prevents them from bringing in these larger games.

“We had to leave some of our bigger pieces in storage, but we brought out some of our games that weren’t there, like our Skee-Ball tables,” Karalis said.

Co-owner Adam Wood has been working to get everything back to working order. One arcade game, Tron, proved to be a challenge.

“Four days ago, when I plugged it in — it was kind of on fire, Karalis said. “But that just all happened because of settling dust on the back of the monitor and it just fried everything.”

The game was eventually restored to working condition.

Though the arcade’s new location is smaller, Karalis plans to cycle through their games to keep the rotation fresh. To start, the arcade will have 10 pinball machines, including Attack from Mars and Medieval Madness, with another 34 to rotate into the mix. Aside from pinball, they have a large variety of video arcade cabinet games such as Mario Kart, Paper Boy and even Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker.

“There’s a little bit of everything here for everybody,” Karalis said.

Nerdhaven is also making some major changes to the business. The previous location had a liquor license, which made the arcade only available to those 21 years or older unless accompanied by an adult. Karalis has decided to open the new location without a liquor license to include people of all ages.

“It was a tragedy to us because we felt bad for turning people away, but we were just following the laws,” Karalis explained.

Nerdhaven Arcade’s pay structure is also changing. Previously, the arcade had a hybrid system where you could purchase tokens for pinball or pay for all access. At the new location, they are doing away with the tokens and shifting just to a flat fee of either $10 for an hour or $20 for an entire day.

Nerdhaven will be open on Thursdays from 3-10 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays from noon to 10 p.m. and Sundays from noon to 8 p.m.

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