A Sweaty, Screen-Free Way to Burn Off School Holiday Energy
We had already done the library, the trampoline park and two wet-weather playgrounds by day three of the holidays, and I was running out of ideas. A friend mentioned she’d taken her kids to CubeTown on the fourth floor of Kingsway Central in Glen Waverley and that she’d left with a headache and a very happy child. That was enough of a review for me. We booked an hour for that afternoon.
If you haven’t heard of it, CubeTown is one of a growing number of “active gaming” venues popping up around Melbourne, where the games live on light-up floors and walls instead of a screen. It opened in Glen Waverley in December, and it’s already become a bit of a regular stop for families in the area, judging by how many other kids were in there on a Tuesday afternoon.
What CubeTown Actually Is
CubeTown Glen Waverley has six themed game rooms, each with its own set of light-based challenges. You book a one-hour session, and in that hour you rotate through the rooms as a group, with staff moving everyone along so nobody gets stuck queuing for one game the whole time. It’s designed for ages six and up, and kids five and under go in free with a paying adult, which is worth knowing if you’ve got a mixed-age crew.
The games themselves are a mix of reaction speed, memory and basic problem-solving, dressed up as something closer to a video game than a gym class. That combination is deliberate. Physical, coordinated play like this is genuinely good for kids’ concentration and coordination, not just their energy levels. Raising Children Network, the Australian parenting site backed by government and university researchers, notes that movement and physical activity build coordination and motor skills while also boosting children’s confidence, since it gives them the chance to try new things and test what their bodies can do. It’s a nice bit of validation for something that, from the outside, just looks like kids running around a dark room shouting.
The Rooms Our Kids Actually Loved
My daughter’s favourite was the colour floor room — the whole floor lights up in different colours and you have to sprint to stand on the one that’s called out before it changes. It sounds simple until you’re the one tripping over your own feet trying to beat a seven-year-old to a green square.
The other one that got repeat visits was a giant, human-sized version of Tetris, where you physically move blocks around a wall-sized screen. Watching a full-grown adult try to rotate themselves into an L-shape is genuinely funny, and it’s the kind of game where the kids have the advantage, being smaller and quicker on their feet.
There’s also a Squid Game room — the light flashes and you have to freeze on the spot, and it is way harder than it looks when you’ve got a six-year-old watching to see if you moved. And there’s a giant, human-sized Tetris built into a wall screen, which is exactly as ridiculous as it sounds when it’s an adult trying to become an L-shape instead of a phone app doing it for you.
We went straight after an early dinner, thinking it’d tire the kids out enough for an easy bedtime. Wrong. We came out an hour later drenched — everyone needed a second shower once we got home — and somehow my daughter still wanted supper. She’d eaten a full dinner two hours earlier. That’s the kind of place this is.
One more thing: don’t assume you’ll be any good at this just because you’re the adult. My daughter flat-out refused to let me use her account for a second round because I “played too badly” the first time. I have never been demoted so fast in my own household.
One Honest Caveat: Bring a Kid Who’s Actually Tall Enough
Not everyone walks out loving it, and I think that’s worth saying. If your kid is under about 130cm, some of the rooms are genuinely frustrating rather than fun. The Tetris wall is the big one — a smaller child can’t see the bottom rows, and by the time they can, there’s no room left to move the piece anyway. A few of the other rooms need decent aim and quick reasoning, which a toddler just doesn’t have yet, so expect a bit of “died again, again” on repeat.
The room that works regardless of height is the colour floor one — it’s just running and reacting, no reach or strategy needed, so even a smaller kid can go flat out and actually enjoy it instead of getting stuck.
What You Need to Know Before You Go
It’s on Level 4 of Kingsway Central, at 73–75 Kingsway, Glen Waverley. You book a full hour, and that’s genuinely how long you get on the floor once you’re checked in. Officially it’s built for six and up, though anyone five or under can tag along free next to a paying adult.
Book online if you can. We turned up straight from school pickup and the place was already half full of other families with the same idea, so it’s not really a walk-in kind of venue during the holidays.
What to Do Afterwards
The good thing about where it sits is that you don’t have to go anywhere. Kingsway Central has food downstairs, and The Glen is a short walk away if anyone needs to change out of a soaked t-shirt — and someone will. We ended up two floors down at a Hong Kong-style dessert place, mostly because nobody had the energy to get back in the car, and someone was, inexplicably, hungry again.
If you want to slow things down after all that running, Brick Valley Yumcha is five minutes away and a decent way to get everyone sitting still again over lunch.
A Few Quick Questions People Ask
Where exactly is it? Level 4, 73–75 Kingsway, Glen Waverley, sitting above Kingsway Central.
How many rooms are there? Six, each with a different kind of challenge, all played through in the one hour you book.
Will a younger child enjoy it? Depends on the kid, honestly. Under about 130cm and a few of the rooms just don’t work well — can’t see over the Tetris wall, that sort of thing. The colour floor room is the safe bet for smaller kids.
What does it cost? $29.99 on weekdays and Friday before 5pm, $39.99 after that and on weekends — worth double-checking on CubeTown’s site before you drive over, since prices like this tend to move around.
Is it worth building a school holiday day around? For us, yes. Nobody looked at a screen for an hour, and everyone came out soaked and starving, which for a school holiday afternoon is basically a win.
Would We Go Back?
Probably, next holidays. It’s a bit pricey for sixty minutes, and I wouldn’t take a five-year-old expecting them to love every room, but for kids who are a bit older and want something more physical than another iPad session, it fills a gap this part of Melbourne didn’t really have before. Bring a change of shirt, book ahead, and don’t be surprised if someone asks for a second dinner on the drive home.
If you’re after more wet-weather backups, we’ve got a running list of indoor play centres, or check the 2026 Victorian school holiday dates to plan around them.