Laser Quest Preston: the laser tag venue and its building

The answer to one of the more specific things people ask a city guide.

Laser Quest Preston is the laser tag venue in the city, and it is the entry people reach by searching for laser tag near them, not by name. That is worth noting because it shapes what a directory entry should say: the useful information is that the city has one, and roughly where.

It sits with the other indoor activity venues in this directory — TeamSport karting, Flip Out and Energi trampolining, Ninja Age and Wacky World — and the full category is on the activities sheet.

Why this sits where it does

Darkness, not height, is what this format needs, and darkness is cheap to build. A laser tag arena can take a low first floor, a basement or a unit nobody else wants, provided the plan can be broken into a maze and the light kept out. That widens the range of buildings it can occupy and narrows nothing except the ceiling.

Laser tag is the one format in this group that wants a dark interior, and no great height, so it adapts to older and more awkward buildings than trampolining or karting can use. That makes its siting less predictable than the rest of the category, and it is worth checking the address; a retail park is no safe assumption.

Getting there

This is the one entry in the category whose address is worth checking rather than assuming. Because the format tolerates an older building, it is not automatically on a retail park, and the bus that serves the parks need not serve it. The one thing worth doing before setting out is reading the address rather than the category.

The free alternative: Moor Park

The outdoor version of running about is Moor Park, north of the centre: flat, very large, and the ground the city plays sport on rather than visits.

The rest of the category runs from soft play at the youngest end through the assault-course format and trampolining to indoor karting. The activities index has the full list.