Games, tickets and prizes - the HORROR!

We went to Chuck E Cheese's tonight. As a parent of a 5 year old and a 2 year old, you'd think that my kids would love this place. You'd think that announcing to the children "we're going to have pizza an play games" would be something they'd be jumping up and down. Not my son. He was nearly in tears at the thought of his terrible parents dragging him to this horrible place. Here's the deal though... in November we were at Disney World and grandma spent lots of time with our 5 year old in the "Arcade". Grandma even hit the jackpot once and got hundreds of tickets. My 5 year old was hooked. He was addicted... to tickets. So, my husband and I thought, he'll love Chuck E Cheese's.
He's been there 2 other times (ok, maybe 3). Once when he was 2 for a "birthday party", again just after turning 5 for another party and then another time or 2 at random times. My 5 year old HATES birthday parties. Why, I don't know. Add the loudness of this joint with the "nightmare" of a birthday party and I guess that's why he thought he wouldn't like it. Oh yeah, he hates large humanoid robots (buy loves his roboraptor, go figure) so the memory of the "show" wasn't not enticing at all.
So, tonight we drag him to his nightmare. We aren't trying to torture him, but sometimes we just have to force him to do things he will really end up liking. So tonight we lured him with the promise of token. He went in thinking he'd get 100 for himself. We explained, no way, we have to share. Turns out we bought the deal with 50 tokens and the kids won 20 more for themselves. We had 70 tokens. We ordered the pizza, waited for it until I offered to take the kids to check out the games. 2 games into the whole ordeal and he was hooked.
After eating we indulged both of them with tokens and tickets and rides on Clifford. They had a blast. There was only one minor glitch when the 2 year old thought she could play games on her own, which unfortunately she can't, and it caused some minor tears.
Anyway, the evening was a success. They walked away with 315 tickets which bought them some princess stickers, a bug, a shark slinky, a rubber lizard and 2 tattoos. Oh yeah, and the 2 year old ran up and gave Chuck E a hug! :) All in all, it was a nice little family event and the 5 year old was already asking when we could return. See, we aren't terrible parents at all.