Earlier quoted context omitted.
Small town malls have suffered the most but a lot of large cities still have vibrant malls to shop at and hang out at if you happen to be a teen. Dave and Busters and other similar arcade/mixed entertainment centers are also way more common now plus random things like climbing gyms, trampoline places, etc. From what I can tell skating rinks and bowling alleys are still reasonably popular especially when you factor fo…
Forget corporate owned malls, what US towns need are actual downtowns. When I first came to the US I was shocked at either the lack of a downtown or if there was one, it was mostly run down and abandoned. Sometimes the "downtown" was just an intersection of strip malls. I suppose the oddball zoning rules in the US don’t help but so many "towns" in the US are just blobs of buildings and not actual towns.
Some are rundown, but theres thousands that are well kept. They just aren't the main shopping hubs they used to be, mostly boutique stores, coffee shops, barber shops, etc.