FEATURED DEALS
3.7
out of 5
Singapore
Telephone: (65) 6235-2160
Website: http://www.decoderscafe.com/
Category:
Restaurants » Italian, Deli and Cafe
Sports and Recreation » Board Games
De Coder's Café is the latest board games café in town. It is centrally-located along Bukit Timah Road within the reach of Newton MRT station. We offer a wide selection of board games and a list of delicacies for you to choose from. You only pay for the food and beverages, there is no charges for game play.
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Hi Everyone,
Thanks for your feedback. As food is a main concern for some of you, we are looking into our current menu. In addition, we will be having an outlet very soon with a more well-equiped and bigger kitchen to serve everyone. Food-lovers can visit our new outlet in the future instead, it has better food.
Anyway, we won't compromise our service standard which has always been our focus with the new outlet too. If you are looking for chill, fun and laughter, here is the place for you.
Garret Yap
Business Development Director
De Coder's Cafe
http://www.decoderscafe.com
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Decoders cafe is a name that hints at its intentions, more to the point, its about games, fun and most importantly about friends. I happened to have the pleasure of being invited to one such gathering with our beloved Yebber and boss, Claudia for her XX birthday. It was a nice gathering and meeting of new people. Thanks Claudia!
Cheese Sausage Spaghetti - I didn't get to try this but the birthday girl did. Not too sure how it tasted but somehow it looks normal to me.
Crackers - This was actually the best item that night in terms of food. Not that it was special or anything but it was at least decent.
Potato Wedges - It wasn't defrosted well. Thats the reason behind why the wedges, though thick and golden brown, were hot and yet soggy. Probably some items they got from the nearby minimart or NTUC by the taste of it as well.
Chicken Soup - Most definately and without a doubt, this has to be campbell's soup. Watery, salty and thinly flavored with very little chicken meat will sum this up pretty well.
Spicy Drumlets - Probably the next most decent item but thats not saying much. Also most possibly an NTUC purchase since i could have sworn i've eaten it before. Sadly, it was not defrosted well as usual and comes with all the usual sogginess.
Chicken Cubes - Absolutely no idea what they meant by cubes but its the usual items you'd find in NTUC fairprice again. Except that is badly defrosted and fried with so much oil you can practically see it in the picture. Pretty much losing all confidence in the cafe's cooking by now.
Chicken Burger with Cheese, Fries and Baked Beans - The same horrible wedges accompanied the burger which looked huge when served until you realize its the burger (bread) that is huge while the chicken patty was a miserably small piece. For what its worth, it wasn't too bad.
Seafood Pasta - Soggy seems to be the in thing in this cafe. So is this pasta. The squid, shrimp and other items were sprinkled sparingly with the watery sauce having minimal taste.
Cheesy Potato Wedges - A small upgrade from the wedges before it. This time with cheese. Its acceptable but still far from good.
Bite Sized Ham and Cheese Sandwiches - They couldn't go wrong with this one now could they? Apparently yes and no. Each bite contained no taste whatsoever so usually, you're just left wondering why you are eating it in the first place.
Brownie with Vanilla Ice Cream - The brownie was hard but thankfully had the taste of chocolate. The vanilla ice cream was normal but at least this combination went well.
Games and services - Now if i reviewed this place only on the food, it would fail quite miserably. What would you expect from a place designed to let guys play board games? On the selection of games and service of the staff, this place definitely lives up to mark. The staff will gladly spend time to teach the games recommended and they make nice recommendations to suit the players. Sometimes demonstrating and teaching till the gang gets the hang of the games. There are hundreds of board games to choose from and each is unique in its own way. Pretty well done.
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De Coder’s Cafe is one of the latest board game cafe in town, think along the line of The Mind Cafe, and Settlers Cafe and you pretty much get the picture. Located along Bukit Timah road at Balmoral Plaza, where Waffletown is also situated at.
Like what i mentioned previously, the place is actually quite accessible because its only about ten minutes walk away from Newton MRT. Taking a bus from Orchard road takes a mere ten minutes too.
It is puzzling as to why LIC haven’t been to any board game cafe when Mind, settlers, and De coder’s have open for quite some time, and are available in quite a few locations.
We are here for Claudia’s birthday. The Cafe isn’t very big, in fact its quite a squeeze for about twenty of us. The interior is simple, you can choose to seat at the sofas, or at the tables and chairs which are in red and black theme.
The highlight of De Coder’s cafe is definitely their wide range of board games. And speaking of board games, they aren’t your normal monopoly or you know those usual ones. They have so many different types which we totally haven’t seen before.
Root Beer float ($4.50)
The root beer float is really just your normal root beer float. Pour the root beer from a bottle, and add a scoop of vanilla ice cream. To charge $4.50 for it is kind of outrageous, but then again, they don’t charge for the games play, so i suppose their source of revenue will be through the drinks and food.
Pasta ($9.80)
We ordered quite a few pasta, like Beefy beefy, ocean catch, mushy mushroom. All their pastas does not really suit our tastebud. Period.
Spicy Drumlets ($5)
If their main course doesn’t works, what else is there to eat you ask? Finger food, but again, we tried almost all of their finger food, and most of them can’t quite make it as well.
The spicy drumlets is one of the few that is decent, but the consistency isn’t there. The first round we ordered this the drumlets are still okay, but the second time we ordered this one again, the chicken is kind of soggy, and its supposed to be fried and crispy.
Chicken Cubes ($5)
The chicken cubes is definitely on the list of finger food that you should not be ordering. Soggy and tasteless. Period.
Cheesy Wedges ($5)
They have two types of wedges, the potato wedges and cheesy wedges. We had both, and i guess the two wedges are still all right.
Americaya ($10)
American’s all time favourite chicken burger served with wedges and baked beans. They are right, American favourite is chicken burger, but unfortunately, its not the Americaya served here. I literally had a hard time finishing the burger, and its not because i am full.
All in all, i may seem quite harsh on the food in De Coder’s cafe, but really the food isn’t good. Then again, you are there to play board games, and not because of the food, so we shouldn’t be complaining. But i feel that a board game cafe is a great idea, and to serve simple and good food actually isn’t that difficult.
Desserts like cheesecakes and brownies are decent. Fried food is in fact the easiest food to do it simple and nice, but they mess it up. If only they can improve on the standards of their food, i'll foresee myself making perennial visits, otherwise, stay away from most of the food, maybe just the desserts and drinks.
You are always welcome to visit ladyironchef for a full-up on this trip. Whatever written herein are my genuine feelings expressed in words. Food, my dear, is what they call an adventure!
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Went to decoder cafe over the weekend for Pingsters gathering. Initially I was reluctant to go on my own as I have no idea where Balmoral Plaza was. There wasn't any direct way of getting there from my house. But still, not wanting to miss the fun with fellow bloggers, I spent 30mins searching online on ways to getting there. Finally found the fastest way... Take bus to Sengkang station... take NEL to Little India.. take 170, 48, or 960 from bus stop at Exit B (or was it A?)... alight at the 5th stop infront of Balmoral Plaza. It's not that difficult to get there after all!
I was greeted by the hugeee collection of games at the entrance of the cafe. Behind it were two computers set up for customers to use for free. (Can do live blogging from there! hee...) The place is small and cosy. There's 3 sets of bigger tables and chairs and 2/3 tables for groups of 2-4. Tables and chairs were of nice height and comfortable enough for long hours of play.
The menu was thematically designed to fit into the gaming environment. They cleverly made it in a way that they can expand or change the menu whenever they have to. And in my opinion, they probably have to soon...
Feeling famished, I ordered my favorite mushroom and cream pasta, and topped it up with $3.50 for the soup and a drink. When the soup was served, I knew what I was going to expect for my pasta. The soup was a tad too diluted. When I saw my pasta, the cream that came with it was diluted too. Too plain for me. The only thing I enjoyed was the canned green tea from Heaven and Earth.
However, food aside, I still love this place! For its friendly, attentive and helpful staff. They are very patient when teaching you the games and demonstrating how its played.
The next time I go, I'll probably stick to their finger food and cakes. Wedges and chicken bites look good. (More stars next time if they improve on their menu.)
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I went there once. As Rachel had said, the cafe uses minimum charging concept which means all the money you spent goes to food and beverages. I think it's a good idea; it's cheaper and we get the flexibility to choose the food and beverages we like.
Something I want to share is the management of the cafe allows the staff to play board games with us and interact with us. I think that's another good point, we were short of players to play citadels and the staff are able to join us for the game so that we can enjoy our games.
Games are definitely new, staff are friendly and the environment is cosy.
Location is a bit way off if you don't drive. You have to take MRT to Newton and either take any bus for 1 bus-stop or walk 5-8mins. However, it's worth the effort for the fun and food that you get at that price.
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I notice that no one wrote an review of De Coder's Cafe. So I thought i will start the ball rolling. I have been to this place twice so far. This cafe just started recently, thus the board games are new.
The interesting thing about this board games cafe is that they do not charge standard packages. They use something they called minimum spending. Which means that you have to spend like $5 an hour to order any food or beverages you want. The games and Internet comes free with it. I like this concept as I can order any food I want.
There is not much crowd at the moment as compared to other board games cafe since they are new. That's something I like about it. It's much more quieter than other cafes. I cant stand the noise level at other cafes. Buay tahan at times. The games are new, staff are friendly, food is nice and games play are free. What else can you ask for? I only tried the cakes, appetizers so far, those are good. Go try their cheesecakes, very nice!
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