Flipper McGill’s Pinball Parlor

This place was great! We could entertain the kids for hours here while watching the game on tv. They loved the macoroni bites and hot wings. We are really going to miss flippers. Laura is the best bar tender, friendly, attentive and a true mixologist and we look forward to seeing her again at another bar. I hope something family friendly opens up in this spot soon.

We came in from Houston, TX to Colorado for the firefighter memorial in Colorado Springs. We stayed in Central City for a couple days before heading down. We went to Idaho Springs to enjoy the brewery and ran into this amazing pinball bar. The bartenders Cole and Laura were amazing. They both made us feel like we were at home. We asked them to honor our fallen firefighters with beers poured half way (tradition thing) set at empty chairs and they never showed hesitation. They were glad to do it. They even sent us a picture while we were at the memorial. We will be back again.

Watching my hubby kill it at Galaga (he got the highest score!) while Living on a Prayer by Bön Jovi was playing made me feel like I was back in the 80’s!
We put $ 5 bucks in the quarter changer and spent the next hour or so playing all our old fave video games and pinball machines. I LOVE a good pinball machine and they had several. Was a perfect end to a perfect day in Idaho Springs and Mt. Evans! Would definitely visit this place again.

I never got his name, but one of the bartenders from here helped me jump start my car up at the campground down the street. He invited my girlfriend and myself for a drink once we finished our whitewater rafting trip. The trip was cancelled due to low water levels and we had to run to Denver to meet our Air BnB host, so we never made it in. But it’s great to know this place has a fantastic human being as an employee. I’m sure that guy is just one example of their great staff.

Delicious! Awesome staff, great environment, lots of fun to visit. Retro arcade games and good music, great reasonable prices and an overall awesome experience. Fits the Idaho Springs vibe to a key.

The usual stops in Idaho Springs were busy, so we decided to find somewhere new to eat. When we saw burgers, shakes, and pinball, we were sold. And with a name like Flipper McGills, how could we say no?
Oddly, they and many other local businesses were our of food. No one anticipated as many tourists as they saw that weekend.
We had a drink, played some games, and moved on in search of food. It’s a fun, nostalgic place. I’d return to try the food.

Granted shit happens… but we get in there we r told they have only 2 chicken breast, hot dogs and hot wings. Because their truck hadn’t come in. So we go ahead order wings, chicken sandwich, fries and onion rings and 2 rum and cokes. Told sever drinks had No carbonation. She tells us nothing I can do till truck gets here. next group of people told same thing plus no co02 for sodas. They left. Food was beyond greasy. We asked for waters since drinks sucked. Waited and waited. When check came she still charged for drinks. I’m sorry I could see this place as fun but overall that day totally sucked. Food drinks and atmosphere. At minimum we should not of been charged for drinks… and some kind of discount..

Pretty bad service. Only customers in the place and waited 45 minutes for just two burgers. Asked a few times for different things and got back silly excuses. Had to leave because we never did get our food.

The only redeeming reason to go here is to play some vintage pinball. BUT – this place even screws that up. Slide a quarter into various pinball or video games – and nothing happens. Press the coin return – nope. Bye bye quarter.
We came there hungry for lunch. It was 1pm. There was no one in the bar/​restaurant. Bad sign. Still, the place had 3.5 stars average from my fellow Unilocalers. How could a place like this screw up burgers/​hot dogs and fries? Answer – easily. So sad.
We walk over to a table and sit. And wait. Finally, after seeing no one who appeared employed by the proprietor, a middle aged fella comes out from the kitchen. No logowear, no name tag. However, when he realized that we were there to eat lunch (we had to tell him), he somehow found two menus for us to look over. There were FIVE of us.
Typical bar food, as I said. Burgers, dogs, wraps, salads, appetizers. Nothing terribly special or memorable. But what was memorable was the fact that they had no Coke, no diet Coke, no lemonade, no unsweetened tea. «Our CO2 tank needs replaced» is his excuse. Forget about the fact that tea and lemonade don’t need CO2. He did explain that they had root beer, Sprite and Mountain Dew. But without CO2, whatever. I’ll have water. Two of our kids took him up on the Mountain Dew. We were on vacation… again – whatever. We were thirsty.
We ordered two plain hamburgers with fries, a hot dog with ketchup and relish and a couple of «fried pickle burgers». I wanted a cup of chili on the side instead of the fries. Off our waiter went with our order.
We adjourned ourselves to the arcade bill changer, which worked perfectly at changing $ 10 bills into quarters. (Coincidence?)
That’s where we discovered many games hungry for money but not interested in providing you the opportunity to play them in recompense. After seeing one too many quarters squandered, I went back to our table and wait for our food to arrive.
Arrive it did, via our completely inept server, who admitted to me as he dropped the plastic baskets of food in front of us, «I have no idea who ordered what, so here you go…» NICE.
And the food – of our five individual orders, not one was correct or complete. Three burgers were fully dressed with cheese (we ordered TWO without any toppings), the hot dog came with everything, and my fried pickle burger lacked the side of chili. «Oh, I’ll get your chili in a little while» came the absentminded response to my query.
Three of our five orders were for kids – picky kids. No, none of their meals were correct. I pointed the burgers out first, our server went back to the kitchen and simply took off the lettuce and tomato and brought the cheeseburgers back. «But we ordered two PLAIN hamburgers…» Oh yeah, Mr. Service recalled. Try again.
Eventually he produced a new hot dog with just ketchup and relish along with two plain burgers. One was dry and overcooked, the other greasy and truly raw in the middle. Disgusting. And my side order of chili arrived in a dirty white coffee cup looking like it was canned Hormel chili nuked in the microwave. Revolting.
«I comped your drinks for ya» is what our joke of a server sheepishly offered after this abortion of a meal. Oh, you mean the two 12 oz. glasses of soda? Wow. You are too kind.
One wonders how a place like this can stay in business at all when they display no regard for product or service. Terrible.

Cool ambiance but HORRIBLE food and service. We ordered a cheeseburger and a philly. The menu says best phillies around and made with cheesewhiz. The food came out burned. The buns were black. The cheesesteak had no cheese and when I asked the bartender to fix it we could hear the cook bitching and telling her to charge me extra. Also when we pointed out that there was no cheesewhiz she said the menus were wrong. The bartender said she couldn’t do anything to help us with the food. We paid the 30 dollar tab and left the food on the table and left. rude employees. would not go back or recommend this place to anyone. We should have just sent the food back and cancelled the order and went someplace else. Giving them one star for the games and ambiance.

Bar tender had her back to me for 3 minutes before she realized I was waiting on her. Half the games are broken. If you’re in the area it’s a cool pit stop but not worth the drive from the city.

Good selection of arcade games to play. Small seating area. The chicken philly sandwich was delicious and I would eat again. The downside was that they didn’t have enough ice cream to make a shake, one of the fryers were down, the cook was out. The one man show was great though and did it all. Ended up getting the bill reduced by 50% after the 45 minute wait for food. Will try it again and hopefully have better luck.

Cool place to catch a buzz!
I just had a chance to check this place out. I for some reason do mostly day drinking at this point… lol. I dont think they are open very early most days. but as far as having a few great beers.“recommended by Hooter” and hanging out with fun people «a nice mix of locals and tourists» This place can not be beat anywhere in I.S.
I really liked the patio outside and a variety of actual good music was being played on the jukebox. The staff were awesome and I had a really good time! The pinball games are cool but apparently after a few beers I’m no good at it… lol
I did not get a chance to try the grub but the cook Sonny was helpful and excited about the wings, which I will try asap!
I will reserve this place for night drinking as it is, well. open! Also, im guessing that there are a lot of families and kids during the day. and I would rather avoid that.
Thanks Flippers!

Knocked out a mountain bike ride close by, and was looking forward to a beer and some pinball to follow. I’ve been wanting to hit Flipper McGill’s for a while. I even checked their website: ‘open 11am till at least 10pm 7 days a week’. Well I wrapped up my ride and headed to Idaho Springs. It’s 12:55pm and Flipper McGill’s is closed. There was a family of four outside waiting. They told me they heard it will open at 1pm. I headed across the street for a beer and lunch, hoping the family was right and I’d get my pinball fix after I ate. Well, I am here at 1:26pm… Doors are still locked.
So I wish I could give you more than a 1-​star review, but who knows how good the pinball is if they can’t even open when they advertise. Huge let down Flipper. Thanks for wasting my time. Oh, I did try to call to see if there was any information, they don’t even have an voicemail message, just the default from the telephone company. Weak!

I really want to like this place as I’m local and want to support local biz. I’ve been here 2x’s now and well… I’d have a hard time giving it a 3^rd. Ok 1^st time: My hubby the collage pinball wizard who would play for free for hours was really excited to hit this place as its been years since he hit a game hard. So right at the door is the big shiny wizard of oz machine. He’s hot to try that one, but 1^st we need to get some coinage. The change machine in front says «broke» on a handwritten paper. I go to the bar and wait a little too long for the bartender to even say «I’ll get you in a minute» Now there were a small group at the bar about 4 and a table of 3. So I finally ask, «can I get some change?» I’m informed that they give change out from the drawer that I have to use the change machine. I tell her that its says its broke. She says use the other one. What other one??? I get a finger point towards the machines and near the broken one. Really? I do order beers before I go to investigate the «other machine» (as she was irritated that I couldn’t figure out where over the bar, over the wall, over the machines she was indicating) I knew that if I wanted those beers I’d better do it now before she got busy with her crowd. She hard pours my beer with a head from hell. so she pours out half and tries again and now just pours till it runs over the glass and the head is almost gone. she tells me it’s be $ 10.00 for two. WOW Sunday afternoon and not micro brews? I had to ask her to wipe the glasses down as she was just gonna leave them all wet. So after 5min, no kidding, I go to find the hubby and the machine. He has already played the Great and Powerful OZ to find that one of the flippers did not work. I find the change machine and see one I want to play. It takes my money. I then wait and watch my hubby play another machine. He does ok as his manhood is hit hard because he is rusty. We move to another machine and he plays that for a couple of games and I try to play the one next to him. it just sends my quarters to the return slot. UUGGG!!! So we take turns on the working machine. The flippers were slow in response but it was still fun. After a couple of games together we boogied out and home.
Now the machines are packed in pretty tightly — its hard to get behind someone who is playing and you almost touch each others hands on the pinball machines. There are some really cool classic machines… if they work. I was surprised to see kids under 10yrs old running around and trying to get by while your playing… in a BAR!!!
The 2^nd time, I went in by myself to grab the much talked about burger and shake. I wait at the bar, where I’m seated, again for too long as the bartender chats with her buds. When I do get a menu, I ask for a shake. She tells me «we don’t have any shakes» HUH? I say but you have shakes on the menu… hello! she then says «we are out of milk» Really, on a friday afternoon? Now this is a small town and I know other restaurant owners and they have gone to Safeway… walking distance… to get stuff they need. So i get water, not really up for a $ 5 domestic. I order a burger. now the really cool thing they do is let you have whatever side for the same price. I thought I’d try their fried pickles, being from the south and hoping somewhere in Colorado they would make them like home. The burger comes out and its shockingly good. they used a butter lettuce but it was wilted from the burger and needed a 2^nd or 3^rd piece. the rest was good. the pickles were just right. Spears cut into sections and with a nice batter, although cornmeal would have made this these best I’ve had. My food was dropped off and I was ½ way thru before I was checked on again, thus I didn’t get more lettuce. My water was empty by that time too. HUGE pet peeve. The bartender leaves to talk with a person who came in about a website. The guy who replaced her ignored me the entire time. I even said «excuse me» when he walked right by to get something out of the cooler to the left of me. No response. the UPS guy sitting nest to me rolled his eyes and smiled. So I finally got the guy to look my way instead of hanging with the crew at the end of the bar and give me my bill. Paid it and left.
So Burgers really good service sucks big time. So the food is not worth the effort.

Growing pains but it’s way better than before… now I get to drink beer too! The pins are always really clean and work well considering that they all pretty much require constant maintenance. If your coming for the food then you don’t really get it anyway. I have not eaten there yet but it seems to be just regular bar food so don’t expect to much.

Drinks are strong, food is delicious and the pinball is awesome. Just passing through town but I would make a trip to come back again. Plus the owner is freaking awesome!

Came for out of town and basically ran in to Flippers and I am totally a fan! I had the sliders with onion petals and my friend had the Italian dip.
When we are back in town, this is part of our ‘must stops’!!!

nice bar. lots of pinball tables. the one i was looking for was not present — if they had Addams Family it would be 5 stars. If you like video games or have kids that need distracting while you drink some beer, this place is good. Pretty good selection of colorado beers too.

I’m so pleased that places like this exist. Having a beer while playing pinball is one of the finer things in life. The game selection is choice!