Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe

08/09/2026

08/09/2026

Grab your best jigsaw-puzzlin' teammates and get those tickets for Thursday's Puzzlepalooza Classic competition!

Puzzlepalooza heads to SingleSpeed Brewing this Thursday, September 10th, starting at 6:30 PM. Teams of up to 4 race to finish a 500-piece puzzle first – and yes, sabotaging the other tables is completely fair game. Do you have what it takes to win and take home the top prizes?!

$50 per team gets you in the race, plus you keep the puzzle when it's done. Registration is required, and spots are limited, so grab your crew before they're gone. There's a link in our bio to register. See you Thursday, Puzzlepaloozers 🧩

07/09/2026

We need your help, and the clock's ticking to nominate the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe for the GAMA Power Retailer Awards. The deadline to submit is TOMORROW!

Every year, the Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA) hands out its Power Retailer Awards, recognizing the best game stores and game spaces in the industry. It's one of the most meaningful honors we could receive – not because of a trophy, but because it's decided by the community we built this place for.

Nominating us takes LESS THAN 5 minutes. The form is short, and if the only open-ended question – what makes us stand out and unique – has you stuck, we've got you covered. We don't like to toot our own horn, but we do want to make this easy on you. So, here's some inspiration, straight from us:

💜 We live by five values every single day: Be Yourself, Completely. Increase Accessibility. Make It Memorable. Give Back. Live in the Moment. We built this place to be a third space – somewhere to gather, connect, and show up as your full self. It even went into our decision on location – blocks from both a bus terminal and a walking and biking trail – for accessibility and sustainability reasons.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 We host hundreds of events a year built around community: Prism Tabletop Club, CultuRoll BIPOC Game Night, Meet & Play Social Game Nights, Social Chess Club, TCG Tuesday, Adventure Sundays, and more. We also open our doors dozens of times a year for nonprofit gatherings, working meetings, and fundraisers, including hosting and speaking for Urban Ambassadors' Green Drinks.

🫶 We give back where we can – to One Iowa, Iowa Trans Mutual Aid Fund, Iowa Safe Schools, Project Iowa, and other local nonprofits – and push the gaming industry itself toward being more inclusive, accessible, and sustainable. We also make a point of supporting other small businesses directly, sourcing our coffee, tea, and other goods from local vendors, and mentoring and advocating for fellow small business owners along the way. That work recently earned us the One Iowa Community Partnership Award, and we're proud alumni and current supporters of the GAMA Horizons Fellowship.

🏡 That community spirit runs through our ownership too. Annelise and Tony are both recent Drake University Alumni Award winners and stay active outside these walls. Tony serves on the board of the Beaverdale Fall Festival and the Drake University LGBTQ+ Alumni Advisory Committee, volunteers on GAMA's Sustainability and DEI Committees, is a Des Moines Business Record Forty Under 40 alum, and is currently in the One Iowa Leadership Institute; Annelise has served on the Drake Neighborhood Association and is currently part of the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program.

🔬 And we've never stopped inventing: Puzzlepalooza, Rook Game League, Blood on the Clocktower Immersive Experiences, our yearly citywide Treasure Quest scavenger hunt, and our own card game, Decksplorers, now sold in a dozen stores around the metro.

If any of that sounds like the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe you know, we'd be so grateful for your nomination. Swipe through for more, and find the link to nominate in the comments. Don't forget: the deadline hits tomorrow! ⏰

07/09/2026

The Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe is open during normal hours all this week (yes, even Labor Day from 4 PM to 10 PM), with a bunch of your favorite events. And, of course, you're welcome to stop in regardless of coming to an event – there's plenty of room.

Here's a look at our calendar:

🧠 Monday – Geeks Who Drink Pub Quiz Trivia Night, 7 PM to 9 PM. Free to play, 7 rounds, every week.

⚔️ Tuesday – TCG Tuesday ft. Casual Commander, 4 PM to 10 PM. Bring your deck and battle it out.

🏆 Wednesday – Rook Room Game League Season 1, 6 PM to 8 PM. Your weekly shot at climbing the season standings. League teams only.

🎲 Thursday – Meet & Play Social Game Night, 4 PM to 7 PM, AND 🧩 Puzzlepalooza Jigsaw Puzzle Competition, 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM over at SingleSpeed Brewing.

♟️ Saturday – Social Chess Club, our free monthly chess meet-up, 8 AM to 12 PM.

🐉 Sunday – Adventure Sundays, our open TTRPG night with themed drinks, 5 PM to 10 PM.

Full details and registration, where needed, are on our website at therookroom.com/events. Pick a day, pick a few, or come to all of them. See you down here, friends!

07/09/2026

Q: Is the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe Open on Labor Day?

A: Yes, 4 PM to 10 PM.

Q: Will Geeks Who Drink Pub Quiz Trivia Night still be happening?

A: Yes, definitely!

See? You're already rockin' this trivia night stuff! You might as well bring all of your smartest friends to Geeks Who Drink tonight, starting at 7 PM, for 7 exciting, themed rounds of test-your-smarts trivia – including a round to celebrate the holiday (of course) where we'll be quizzing you on some of the greatest things brought to you by, well, labor!

Since those cookouts are probably on the back burner 🌧️, you may as well plan to have fun with us instead! Doors open at 4 PM, and trivia kicks off right at 7 PM. See you there!

04/09/2026

Grab a partner because it's game ON at our monthly Euchre Tournament tomorrow! No partner? No problem – we'll do our best to pair you up.

Join us Saturday, September 5th, 11 AM to 2 PM at the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe. It's $5 to play, round-robin style, and no need to be an expert – all ages and skill levels welcome.

Prizes go to the top team, and spots are limited, so register now at the link in the comments.

See you trick-takers at the table tomorrow! 🃏

04/09/2026

Labor Day plans? We've got you. We're open our normal hours on Monday – 4 PM to 10 PM. And for you trivia lovers out there, Geeks Who Drink Pub Quiz Trivia Night is still happening as usual – 7 PM to 9 PM, free to play, 7 rounds, tons of friendly fun!

Skip the cookout small talk and come play with us instead here at the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe.

03/09/2026

You ready for fall, y’all?! We are 🍂

Introducing our perfect leaf-peepin-cozy-sweater-weather specials. Go ahead, swipe through.

🍁 Maple Cardamom Latte - A cozy sip of fall where just a hint of sweet maple flavor meets a floral pop of cardamom over freshly ground espresso and your choice of milk. Served hot or iced.

🫚 Chai Whiskey Ginger - Your new favorite fall classic. Four Roses bourbon, spiced chai, and triple sec, topped with ginger ale and garnished with a dried orange slice.

🧈 Not Her Butter Beer - Non-alcoholic. Back by popular demand. Root beer, spiced brown sugar, and caramel topped with cold foam and a magically sweet caramel drizzle. A portion of each sale will be donated to the Iowa Trans Mutual Aid Fund.

🍎 Apple Jacks Crispy - Fall has come for your classic crispy. Apple Jacks cereal and marshmallows combine for a deliciously large, ooey-gooey sweet treat.

Ignore the fact that it’s like three million degrees outside. Get in here and get your fall on! Get these specials while you can – they won’t be around forever.

01/09/2026

Big news: Starting today, there will no longer be a PlayPass at the door for the Rook Room Game Lounge & Cafe. Nights, days, weekdays, weekends – any day, any time – it's now FREE to come in and play.

If you're new here, the PlayPass fee was our per-person cover to come in and play after 4 PM. Today, we're getting rid of it completely. No PlayPass fee, no time restrictions – any day, any hour we're open, for everyone who walks through our door.

It's a huge decision for us as a business, so here's some transparency into why we're changing this. The past couple of months, we ran a Free Play Days promotion and dropped the PlayPass fee Sunday through Thursday, knocking down the barrier to summer fun. Crowds on those nights doubled. That's not a small signal, and it's not one we could ignore – seeing our space full with all of you filled our hearts.

But there's a bigger reason too. We opened the Rook Room to be an accessible third space – somewhere gaming groups, book clubs, workers, students, hobby clubs, community organizations, and neighbors who just want a table to sit at can gather without a cost getting in the way. A cover charge, even a small one, is a hurdle. Getting rid of it lets us live that out fully.

As we've always said, the PlayPass fee helped us keep our game library in good shape – replacing pieces, repairing boards, renewing cards, and swapping out games. That cost still exists, but don't worry, we'll continue to maintain our famous Game Wall – we're just choosing to absorb that cost ourselves, because more people in this space, building the kind of community we opened this place for, is worth it to us. It's our investment in you and in this community.

So come on in. Grab a table, pull a game off the shelf, stay as long as you like – today, and every day after. Whether you're here to play, meet, work, study, drink, eat, gather, or anything else, we can't wait to see you down here. 💜

- Tony & Annelise

31/08/2026

We're looking for someone to help us throw the best events, experiences, and parties in Des Moines. Sound like you?!

We're hiring for an Events & Experiences Manager to lead our ticketed, private, and semi-private events from the first spark of an idea to the after-party cleanup – planning, logistics, staffing, and being the friendly face our partners and guests talk to along the way.

If you love bringing people together over good games, good food, good drinks, and good times, we want to hear from you.

Help us banish boring – learn more and apply at the link in the comments ♟️