Theme & Amusement Parks in Schaumburg

Sam Elias knows that being cooped up during long winter days can make people stir-crazy. So in 1993, after moving from Florida, land of palm trees and beaches, to Chicago, land of frigid winds and gray slush, he founded WhirlyBall as a way for people to release pent-up energy even as snow was falling outside. During each competitive WhirlyBall game, which combines aspects of basketball, hockey, and jai alai, players zoom across an indoor 50'x80' court in motorized cars called WhirlyBugs. They wield plastic scoops to toss a wiffle ball back and forth to their teammates before throwing the ball through an elevated goal. Refs keep watch during the games, eliminating score arguments that would otherwise end in sunrise duels. To fuel up for a bout, players nibble teriyaki chicken satay, gourmet pizzas, and prime rib, and swig draft beers, which vary by location.

All three WhirlyBall spots boast off-court diversions such as video games, pool tables, foosball, and air hockey. The Vernon Hills location hosts an indoor rock-climbing wall, and both the Chicago and Vernon Hills locations invite guests into multilevel Lasertron laser-tag arenas, which fill with fog and flashing lights as combatants duck, aim, and invoke Geneva Convention protocols regarding armed conflict.

The hum of Honda GX200 engines pervades both of Chicago Indoor Racing locations, where a duo of tracks takes Bowman go-karts through a series of turns and straightaways at speeds of up to 35 mph. When not trying to clock in top lap times from driver's seats perched 1 inch from the ground, guests can set other objects in motion at billiard tables and shuffleboard tables, which can be rented by the hour or millisecond. Clark’s Café at the Addison location and Stewart’s Bar & Grille in Buffalo Grove refuel guests with casual American fare and shots of motor oil.

A child's laughter precedes her as she emerges from a rainbow-colored tunnel on her hands and knees before scampering up the steps to meet her brother at the top of the spiral slide. When kids first enter the indoor playground, they're tasked with deciding which activity to tackle first: the GyroCopter or the Yo Yo Ball? Perhaps the maze of tunnels? The center is open for two-hour periods throughout the week, giving kids enough time to try each activity as well as take unlimited rides on the carousel or conjure a competing carousel for friends to ride on.

The Hub at Berens Park invites guests of all ages with a sprawling complex dedicated to wholesome fun. Groups can seek out par across the Hub's 18-hole miniature golf course, which encircles a scenic water feature, or protect the strike zone at the batting cages, where softballs and baseballs dart over the dish at speeds ranging from 40 to 80 miles per hour. A circuit of mini geysers erupts throughout the 6,000-square-foot spray ground, where tykes can freely frolic and arm themselves with big squirts—refillable water toys available for purchase at the concessions stand—for leverage in juice-box hostage situations. The Hub also encompasses a playground with youth- and tot-friendly equipment, an indoor facility with restrooms and a concessions stand, and a party room families can rent for birthday parties or guileless secret-society meetings.

Pump It Up’s giant inflatable playscape lets kids literally bounce off the walls. Under the watchful eyes of supervising staff, youngsters trampoline across floors or race up flights of stairs to leap headlong down a soft, inflatable slide. In addition to pop-in playtime hours, Pump It Up hosts children’s parties that have earned the bouncetorium a spot on Parents Magazine’s 2010 list of top 10 birthday chains for kid birthday parties. The fetes come in a panoply of exciting themes such as “super hero training camp,” “pirate quest,” or “algebra midterm madness,” and staff take care of setup and cleanup. Special events may include dedicated playtime for young children and glow-in-the-dark parties just for tweens with live DJs.

H.G. Wells first imagined a ray gun in his 1898 novel, The War of the Worlds. It took almost a century, though, before Milton Bradley’s first Star Trek-inspired electronic phasers allowed people to zap someone else with a ray of light. Now officially living in the future, these light-wielding marksmen settle their duels in the darkened halls of Lightning Lazer Tag, downing opponents with a mixture of Wild West bravado and whiz-bang space-age weaponry.

If players tire of navigating murky passageways and blasting friends, they can decamp to a nine-hole indoor miniature-golf course, which challenges bodies and minds with devious obstacles cast in the permeating glow of a black light. Competitive shouts and digital chatter drifts from linkable video game systems, which let players choose from more than 40 games.