So no doubt, this place is pretty chitty. Â But what did you expect as you walked up to this joint? Â
I have never done a trivia night anywhere and it was BARRELS OF HOOTS! Â Wednesday night is their trivia night. Â $2.50 domestic drafts and bottom shelf wells. Â The place wreaks of smoke, the clientele are less than stellar, but who gives a rats ass. Â Once again, have you seen the outside?!?!?
The night I went, the trivia prize was $25 towards your tab and a free appetizer. Â Not bad if you are wanting to have a couple of drinks and some fun with friends.
Did I leave smelling like Courtney Love on a all night bender? Â Probably worse. Â But did I have fun as I accumulated the smell of nasty crotch? Â YES! Â Just walk in with low expectations.
Tip: Â Treat your bartendress nice and she might unlock the pool table for you. Â (aka go a couple of times and tip nicely.) Â And no...they don't have darts....because someone stole the darts.
A co-worker and I decided to try Rocky's because Groupon offered a $10 for $20 deal. Â Unfortunately, we did not read any reviews for the place, so we were quite surprised by the experience.
I just came from the place, so I thought that I should write a review while the odd details were still fresh in my mind. Â The parking lot had about 5 cars. Â I think a couple of them were for employees. Â Upon entering, we were greeted by a wall of smoke. Â I quit smoking a while back, so this was a welcome experience for me, but my co-worker probably would have preferred to not go back to the office reeking of cigarette smoke.
There were seven or eight people sitting at the bar, a few of them taking turns on video games. Â The dining area was completely empty except for one man. Â We sat two tables over from him. Â I didn't notice when we first walked in, but after sitting down, I glanced over and saw that the man was standing at a table with a money counting machine, counting stacks of bills. Â I looked over at my co-worker, and he looked at me, and I'm sure we both had the same "What the hell?!" looks on our faces. Â The guy just continued to count the stacks of cash, put bands around some and set others off to the side.
The waitress came over after quite a while and asked what we would like to drink. Â We gave our drink orders and our lunch orders as well, since we had been sitting there unattended for quite a long time and my co-worker had gone to find a menu earlier. Â She didn't write anything down, but...ok.
I have to agree with one of the other reviewers who said that it's great to have multiple screens playing multiple things, but turn on closed captions, and mute the tv's. Â The tv I was watching had some interesting things showing, but I had no clue what anyone was saying. Â Frustrating.
After a while, our burgers came. Â They were ok, but certainly not worth $8.99. Â You get a similar quality burger from any of the fast food chains for 99 cents. Â Further, our french fries looked like they had been cooked in used 10W30 motor oil. Â I'm not sure how often they change the fryer oil, but the fries were about three shades lighter than black...and I would know, I can see a Pantone chart from here!
After our (for lack of a better word) "food" was served, the waitress refilled my drink once. Â We saw her twice in about an hour, and we were the only two people in the dining area. Â Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the guy counting stacks of cash went into the back, leaving the stacks of cash unattended. Â Then he came back out, stuffed the cash into his backpack, took the backpack out to a car in the parking lot, then left the cash unattended again to come back into the restaurant and pick up what looked like a microscope (?) from the table. Â Not sure what ANY of that stuff was about, but talk about ODD!!!!!
Ok, so when the waitress gets tired of shootin' the breeze with the folks at the bar, she stops back by to ask if we would like anything else. Â We ask for the check, and my co-worker says "I have this Groupon". Â She asks to take his iPhone to the back. Â He asks her to get a pen and just write the code down. Â She goes to get a pen. Â After a while, she found one and brought over a napkin to copy the code. Â We paid the remainder of our bill and shot out of there.
So yeah. Â If I could give it less than one star I would. Â Even at 50% off (because of the Groupon) it was a rip off. Â The service was horrible, and the food ranged from mediocre to disgusting.
One star only because Yelp will not allow less than that.... We stopped in here on a Friday night to check it out. The stinch from sewer gas was unbearable. The cleanliness of the joint was a good match to the smell. The replacement toilet paper roll in the ladies restroom was soaked in brown liquid. The pool table had quite a few dead rails and didn't seem level but that could have been me. We stayed long enough to finish our 1 bottled beer we ordered and our 1 game of pool and then we headed on our way and will not be giving this place another chance.
Review Source:Went here on Friday with some friends for karaoke night. This was one of my favorite places when it was McCarty's (never went when it was Golden Eagle), so I have a fondness for it. It's a little sparse on the decor, but you're not really here for architecture, right?
The bar's well stocked, and the prices are pretty reasonable (they move to great if you're ordering one of the specials). The friends we went with know the wait staff pretty well, so we got great service (though from what I could tell they are pretty good for everyone).
I don't smoke, but for some reason I can't place it irks me when bars are non-smoking so it's a plus that this place lets you smoke inside.
The lacking two stars in my review are due to 2 things: 1) I went for well vodka because it was on special and I'm fairly certain my drink was just a straw coating; there wasn't any vodka to speak of, and 2) the stage lights were broken, they couldn't figure out how to stop the jukebox so they just unplugged it... overall you really got the feeling the staff were just kind of squatting in the space and hadn't been run out yet.
It was overall a great night and I could see it being a go-to group spot, but I wouldn't make it my default bar for all occasions.
This place has been open, apparently, since Fall 2009, before which it was McCarty's, before which it had been Golden Eagle since the dawning of the human age. Â
Finally decided to check it out.
Ambience: Â Smokey, low-end bar but not divey. Â Like a Bennigans that had been stripped nearly bare after going out of business. Â Two decently-spaced pool tables in the back. Â Videogames were bowling, lawn darts, and safari hunter if that helps nail down the vibe.
Many flatscreens tuned to different channels. Â Nicely done, but with that many simultaneous channels the closed captioning should be on and volume muted.
Clientele: Â chain smokers, video poker players, high-functioning lake people in business clothes.
Food:  Saw  "$4.99 lunch specials every day" painted on the window but nothing on the wallboard, laminated paper menu, or server's spiel about this.  I got a cheeseburger plate with obviously homemade onion rings for $6-something.  The burger was okay but not special.
The rings were more interesting, and it took me a while to figure out how. Â They taste like they are battered in cod batter. Â Cod batter is tasty but I don't know that it goes with sweet onions. Â Entirely successful? Â No. Â More interesting than frozen, bagged onion rings? Â Yeah.
Drink: Â Iced tea; Â tasted good and that's not always a given. Â Not chalky, astringent, or overly strong.
Staff: Â one bartender / waiter. Â Polite when working with customers but rather coarse when talking to a buddy. Â I'm not choirboy but I don't talk like that around people I don't know. Â There were "ladies" in the bar at that point.
wifi: Â There's a "Rockys" SSID but it appears to be WEP protected. Â I saw nothing posted about it and did not ask. Â There was an open "linksys" SSID but I could not pull an IP. Â If I come back I'll bring the laptop and explore a bit more.
bathroom: Â serviceable. Â Not terrible for a bar, and the men's facility had enough room for four guys to relieve excess beer at once. Â That's a good thing.
Value: Â probably decent value for drink specials, not particularly noteworthy for lunch.
Neighborhood sketch factor: Â A little sketchy. Â It's worth noting that most auto thefts in Richardson occur along the 75 corridor (criminals get up on the highway and are gone quickly).
30.06 status: Â Large 51% sign posted outside. Â I didn't check the actual license but I will assume it is an actual 51% bar.
I'm a little conflicted about posting this last part, because I did not hear it clearly. Â But I overheard the bartender telling his friend that he altered at least one credit card total when keying it in to the register (ie, after the customer had signed the slip and left). Â Â Maybe it was for a legitimate and orthodox reason, or maybe not. Â So if you do decide to try this place out I'd encourage you to pay in cash, just in case.
So the old Mcarty's is now Rocky's. The space itself is pretty large, with multiple rooms. There are pool tables, an area they use for a dance floor when DJ's etc play, and lots of seating at the bar area. You can smoke inside which is a plus! They have drink specials that are pretty decent almost every night I think. I happened to go on a Tuesday when my friends spin breakbeat music....wells 2-3 dollars and beers 2-3....not bad cool place and the staff is friendly.
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