The Main Event liability waiver is a short digital release that every guest signs before participating in the venue’s physical activities, acknowledging the ordinary risks of play and giving up the right to sue for injuries caused by ordinary negligence. You can sign it online through the Main Event website before your visit, or complete it on a tablet at the facility when you arrive. An adult 18 or older must sign, and that same adult adds any minor children in the group to the form.
How to Sign the Waiver
The form asks for standard personal information: your full legal name as it appears on your ID, date of birth, residential address, email, phone number, and the location and date of your visit. The digital version moves through several screens, and each one requires complete entry before you can advance.
Two checkboxes sit near the end. One is the risk and waiver agreement itself, confirming you understand the physical nature of the activities. The other is a photo and video release, giving Main Event permission to use images captured during your visit. Both must be checked. You finish by signing electronically, either typing your name or drawing it on a touchscreen.
An electronic signature carries the same legal weight as a handwritten one. The federal Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act makes electronic records and signatures valid for transactions in or affecting interstate commerce, as long as the signer affirmatively consents.1NCUA. Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (E-Sign Act) Tapping “I agree” and signing on the tablet clears that bar.
If you sign online before arriving, bring a photo ID that matches the name on the waiver. A name mismatch means re-signing at the counter using the name on your ID.
Signing for Minor Children
If anyone in your group is under 18, you add them to your waiver by entering each child’s full legal name and date of birth. The signer must be a parent or legal guardian. An older sibling or family friend who happens to be 18 doesn’t have the legal standing to waive a minor’s rights.
How much that signature is actually worth depends on where the Main Event location sits. A handful of states, including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Ohio, and Massachusetts, will enforce parental waivers for minors in at least some recreational contexts. A larger group, including Texas, Illinois, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Washington, consistently refuses to enforce pre-injury waivers signed by a parent on behalf of a child. In those states, the waiver you signed for your 10-year-old may be functionally meaningless if an injury occurs. The remaining states lack enough court precedent to predict how a judge would rule.
Even in states that uphold parental waivers, no court enforces one when the injury results from gross negligence or reckless conduct by the business. The form covers ordinary bumps and bruises, not situations where the venue failed to maintain safe equipment or ignored obvious hazards.
What You’re Actually Releasing
The core of the document is a release of claims for ordinary negligence. By signing, you agree not to sue Main Event or its employees for injuries that arise from the normal physical risks of the activities, whether that’s rolling a bowling ball, climbing the ropes course, or running around a laser tag arena. You’re formally acknowledging that these activities carry inherent physical risks and that you accept them voluntarily.
The waiver also includes an indemnity clause. Indemnification means that if you (or someone you brought) files a lawsuit the waiver was supposed to prevent, you agree to cover the venue’s legal costs, including attorney fees and investigation expenses. This is standard language across the recreational industry.
The photo and video release bundled into the same form is a separate legal permission. It lets Main Event use footage or images captured during your visit for promotional purposes. You agree to both at once, but they are doing different jobs.
What the Waiver Cannot Release
No waiver, no matter how broadly written, can legally shield a business from every kind of harm. Courts draw consistent lines around several categories.
- Gross negligence and recklessness. A waiver covers ordinary risks, not situations where the venue acted with extreme carelessness. If Main Event knew a piece of equipment was broken and let guests use it anyway, the waiver would not protect them.
- Intentional harm. Releases that try to excuse a party from deliberate injury are universally unenforceable as against public policy.
- State prohibitions. Some states invalidate recreational facility waivers entirely. New York voids agreements that exempt pools, gyms, and places of public amusement from negligence liability. Maryland enacted a similar statute, effective October 2024, barring recreational facilities from limiting liability for negligent conduct.
Courts also look at whether the waiver language itself was clear enough. If a judge decides the release was buried in fine print, worded ambiguously, or failed to specifically identify the types of claims being waived, the waiver may be thrown out. Judges generally look for conspicuous text that would catch the attention of a reasonable person; vague references to “any and all claims” without specifying negligence sometimes aren’t enough.2Texas Real Estate Research Center. Are Liability Waivers Enforceable?
Why the Click-Through Format Matters
Main Event’s waiver, like virtually every recreational waiver in existence, is a take-it-or-leave-it agreement. You cannot negotiate its terms. You either sign or you don’t play. Legally, that makes it a contract of adhesion, a category courts scrutinize more carefully than a contract two parties hashed out together.3Legal Information Institute (LII). Adhesion Contract (Contract of Adhesion)
Two doctrines give courts tools to strike down unfair adhesion contracts. Procedural unconscionability looks at the signing process itself: were the terms buried, was the signer pressured, was there any meaningful opportunity to read the document? Substantive unconscionability looks at the actual terms: are they oppressive or one-sided in ways that violate public policy? A recreational waiver that hides a sweeping liability release behind screens of unrelated text, or that tries to waive gross negligence alongside ordinary risk, could run into trouble on either ground.
The digital format actually works in Main Event’s favor. Click-through forms that make the signer actively check boxes and advance through separate screens tend to hold up better in court than “browsewrap” agreements where terms are passively available by hyperlink. Each checkbox is a small piece of evidence that the signer saw and agreed to the specific provision.
The Personal Data You Hand Over
The waiver collects your name, address, date of birth, email, and phone number and stores it digitally. Main Event’s privacy policy governs how that data is retained and used.4Main Event. Privacy Policy If any part of the digital check-in involves biometric data such as a fingerprint scan or facial recognition, additional state laws may apply. Illinois, Texas, Washington, and Colorado all have biometric privacy statutes requiring informed consent before a business can collect or store biometric identifiers, along with mandatory retention schedules and destruction timelines.
For most guests the practical point is simpler. The email you provide will likely be used for marketing. Read the photo and video release checkbox carefully if you’d prefer your image stay out of promotional posts. And if you’re signing for your kids, you’re consenting to the collection of their personal data too.