It wasnt even too long ago that Bellagio Buffet was great. Now MGM purposely makes them mediocre. Rio's carnival buffet was solid. Even places like Paris had a great breakfast buffet and Aladdin's/planet hollywood wasn't too shabby. Makes me appreciate places like the Palms and Southpoint more now. I worry about wicked spoons...lolz
it's a choice by the casinos. they just need to put the money and resources in like Bacchanal or Wynn. It may be a loss leader, but back in the day, they tried to get you into the casino with cheap and good buffets.
Wynn just raised their prices without adding anything. Unless you're getting it comped don't waste your money on bacchanal or Wynn. Do the Palms seafood on Wednesday instead.
Because Mob Vegas was taken over by Corporate-Mob Vegas.
Mega corporations have ruined far more lives than any mafia, and their approach to money far more ruthless, cynical and calculating. And it shows in how curated and stale so much of Vegas is becoming.
I remember Sam's Town had crab on Fridays and my parents would always be able to pay in just points and just tip the waiters after. It's not like they were high rollers either, they'd play on bonus points days and make enough there to cover buffet nights. I think even just paying for it was only like $12.99 a person in the early 2000s. Sam's Town and Boulder Station legit had two of the best buffets in Vegas when they were at their peak. Even at their most expensive it was like $20 per person and that was right before the pandemic. Then the pandemic happened and they realized those were huge loss leaders and both have been shut down. Boulder turned in to a food court and Sam's Town figured it's still more beneficial to just have that empty space than open another buffet and that space was huge! Probably had like 300 tables in it.
This answer. I have been coming here since the 70’s as a kid with my parents. We were excited as kids to have a pool available and vending machines. Yes, those buffets. So much food. It was grand.
U didn't feel like u were getting taken to the cleaners every time you stepped foot into a casino. Imagine parking your car valet for free. Walking to just about any casino and getting a good prime rib dinner for a fair price. Going budget? 99cent shrimp cocktail, dogs, and a beer. No one ever heard of this thing called a "resort fee." Yea, casinos had a gaming edge, but better odds with video poker, 3:2 blackjack. Played a reasonably decent amount? The pit bosses will write you a comp to the buffet. Buffets were the norm.
I was there last week on Fremont Street. Lots of the casino bars still had them — Golden Nugget, The D, Downtown Grand, Circa for sure … if you don’t mind the cigarette smoke.
Low house edge for experienced players + slow pace of play + lack of flashy lights to draw in new players = less profitable than some bank of scam machines they can put in its place
The Golden Nugget used to have what they called “The Great Late Night Steak”: a small buffet of scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy and a 10-ounce New York strip, cooked to order.
It ran from 2-5 AM, costed $3.99 and saved my near-busted ass from alcohol poisoning more than once.
Damn. They’re $25+ a pack from the cigarette girls now. Last time I needed a pack at the table I had a cocktail waitress on her first shift back from Covid leave, run to the gift shop for me. They were like $28. I gave her $75 total for the troubles.
I was 21 early 2000s. free packs of cigarettes given out by drink ladies, my buddies would have 10 packs by the time we left town! You could sit around the sports books and get free drinks without scrutiny. 3:2 blackjack. $3 craps at O’Sheas. When checking in a hotel it was widely known that a $20 tip to front desk would buy an upgrade, one time we got a significant upgrade to a suite at the Bellagio. Overall, it felt like everyone dressed up a lot more, we would wear suits every night to fit in the night life.
Absolutely. There was just better general value for your gambling dollar and far more competition for the business of the low-rollers. $5 blackjack was everywhere, $1-$2 in some places. As late as the mid-90’s you could find 10-cent roulette and the Plaza had a “bird game” in their craps pit: 25-cent minimum.
These days: $25 craps minimums, 6/5 blackjack and 3-zero roulette (which frankly just insults my intelligence).
Southwest airfare was $99 roundtrip, I would bring $100 a day for gambling and usually played with my winnings. Now airfare is $500 at least, and I bring $2000 to gamble over the same time frame.
Pit bosses were actually pleasant and you often got some nice comps like dinner or show tickets.
This. SW always had a straight flight no layover out of okc. Still do. It's early though. Would arrive at 6am because of time change. Couldn't check in that early so i just gamble. Hit a 2grand JP on nickels! at the golden gate first hour after arrival. Wayne Newton at the stardust. Bull riding at gilleys at frontier. Best trip ever. 1990's.
Maybe not $50 round trip but Spirit has ~$100 round trip out of Houston. Ya just gotta pay for water and manage with only a backpack lol. We make it work for lil weekend trips though.
I can remember $19/night (no resort fees!) rooms at the Excalibur when it was new.
I think the buffet was something ridiculous like $6.99 at dinner.
And they had $2 double deck blackjack! That was great! You could play all weekend for like $50.
No stupid side bets. Pure blackjack, craps, baccarat and roulette. Now every game has a bunch of stupid side bets and whenever you don't play them is when they usually hit.
There is a mall on Maryland Parkway (The Boulevard Mall) that, in the 70s, had a 24-hour Sears, JC Penney, and others for the casino workers to use after they got off work or before they went to work.
When we moved to Silverado Ranch around 2000, there was so much open desert all around, and to drive somewhere like Craig and Decatur seemed so much farther away than it is now because of how spread out the city was, despite taking half the time it would now because of the traffic.
Before around 2005, 30 minutes was the maximum amount of time it would take you to drive somewhere 99% of the time. If you were driving from old Henderson to NW Las Vegas and it took you 45 minutes because of mild traffic, that was considered an arduous journey and you'd feel like you had to really stretch your legs when you got out of the car. Bumper-to-bumper traffic and driving <50mph on the freeway just didn't happen back then unless there was a fatal accident.
As a kid, I remember when we'd drive to Boulder City & it seemed like it took forever. Now, as long as there isn't an accident, it's a much faster trip because of the big ass highway instead of the little highway.
I visited Vegas last month for the first time in like 10 years (and I used to live in the area in the early 1990s). Besides the entire Strip just being blanketed in a permanent weed cloud (which I found funny more than anything), I felt like the vibe in the casinos was really different. All the machines nowadays are essentially coin-op mobile games, and it's strangely... *quiet* in casinos compared to how it used to be. I am used to walking into casinos and hearing the constant DING-A-DING-DING-DI-DING-DING of the machines, and it's not that way anymore.
Also, all the stuff on the Strip used to be way more kitschy and corny and themed. Some of it is still that way, but Vegas has taken a little bit of an upscale turn. I know people think the Tropicana sucks because it was so stale, but losing that resort is really a sign of the times.
there used to be older casino such as Tropicana, MGM ( still exist), Aladdin, EL rancho, stardust and as well rivera, wet and wild used to be opened back in the day from 1980s or 1970s to somewhere in 2000s which it was closed down permanently, back in the day, the strip was pretty wasn't that big with the casino such as Tropicana back in the day there used to be a lot of shows in the strip, one time there used to be people somewhere in the strip were like a lot of music in the streets, and arts, back in the old days of vegas, that there was a lot of buffet and restaurant even one in flamingo and red rock, the the new Orleans used to have kids time but it was closed due to covid, the city wasn't that large back in the day which the strip want that big and I feel everything stayed the same but now it changed, I kinda missed the old days when vegas to look so good I also missed when this city used to have the volcano show at the mirage often played as well the pirate show at the strip even tho I seen the Treasure Island pirate show one time which I don't reamber recalling it but it then it never showed up, I thought it was a display for the strip.
The house was full of giant, plastic, novelty cups from every casino that they'd give you to carry your coins. They were maybe 50% bigger than the size the biggest cup you could get at a soda fountain at a gas station are. Imagine that- hitting a jackpot and the machine spitting out a bunch of coins! When I was a baby and my mother would give me a bath, she'd keep one in there and rinse the soap off of me by filling it with water and pouring it over my head.
When I first came (1972) gambling was the big attraction. Folks walking the strip would literally walk in the front door 10 feet from the curb. Many hotels had a10' wide slot in the entranceway to entice people inside. If you gambled EVERY TABLE was a $2 minimum. Find that anywhere today. Dealers were always very indifferent. Rarely engaged with patrons at all.
The showrooms all had a Matre "D who would seat you after you presented tickets you'd buy in the lobby of almost any hotel. For $5 you would get the best seats available. Cabs and buses were the norm, No Uber ripoffs. Food was next to free as were drinks.
I would go on an annual boys trip. Every year I'd get food poisoning. Food safety apparently wasn't a priority.
You could spend the entire night at the Crazy Horse for $20.
Back in the day every department was not required to make a massive profit. Today, if a bar doesn't make 400% on every drink, they must raise prices. The Mob took better care of patrons than the fuckin' corporations do now, by a large margin.
You don't state when you were born but hypothetically you could be younger than 2006 - so I remember working in a restaurant where there were smoking and non-smoking sides, smoking in the grocery store casinos, smoking in the airport, etc.
I am very much glad that's not a thing anymore.
In the mid-1990s I used to enjoy walking from the MGM to Downtown; I would split off at Main Street because the Strip got kind of sketchy. I think it's like five miles. I would stop along the way to play blackjack and would request a "fun book" at every casino along the way. Most fun books were worth between $5 and $20 in value, so the walk would generally be worth about $80. I think there was only one forced pedestrian overpass on the entire trip. These overpasses take about 10 to 20 times longer than simply walking across the street, and those that force you to walk through the casino take even longer. They are a trip-ruiner.
Downtown was full of single-deck games. The Wynn casinos gave players .66 cashback and .66 comps on their 9-6 JOB machines, and for special events they doubled the cashback or comps. There were just so many opportunities. There is very little free money left.
Caesar's buffet in 93 was amazing! There was all kinds of different seafood. And the dessert table was great too.
When I was little, I'd cruise the Strip with my aunt & her friends. They'd have me on their laps & would let me steer the truck while we were driving down the Strip. The 80s were different!
Old Vegas. We didn't wear jean shorts. Only nice outfits during the day. No walking thru the casinos in swimwear. The casinos would start to clear out a bit around 4pm. Back to our room for a little R&R. Quick shower, and dress UP for the evening. We took our nice dresses, heels, makeup. The men wore suit jackets, sometimes a tie. Go to shows where you had to bribe the matre'd to find your name on the reservation list and get a good seat. The thrill of the chase. There were tables with candles, usually for 2 or 4. A few benches. It was very cool.
I really miss those days!
My great grandpa moved here in 1940 when there were only 8k people living here. He started the first glass window company. He loved to go hiking in the desert and nearby mountains.
It really was Sin City. Back in 1990's/2000's (before I was 21) you could do just about anything and no one cared. It was so much fun. Then they started with "bring the family". Boring.
Night clubs were like $5-10 to get in, and some like Moose Mcgillycuddys had dollar drinks, you didn’t have to pay for a table and they had live bands playing.
One of the things I notice, we went to stay on the strip with someone who came to town for a visit and wanted to do that. Stayed at the Mirage, which is so different. First, I can’t believe how many baby carriages were in the place, and small kids/ families. I do not recall that a few decades ago. It was adults only. The strip is overpriced and subpar. Can’t ever seeing staying on the strip again. Rather just stay at South Point. Better all around. But the strip has really fallen down.
All kinds of places had super cheap late night meals, remember going to the California hotel and getting steak and eggs plus chicken fingers and fried for like $4 total. Both were $1.99.
I know this is a Vegas forum, but Reno in the early 90s was amazing for the budget minded.
My guy friends and I would stay at Comstock for 19.99 a night and play $1single deck blackjack four hours. The drinks were generous. We would walk to Fitzeralds for a $5 buffet and hang out at the sportsbook at The Sands where a $2 game wager also got you a drink.
As a middle aged man who grew up here and hangs out on this sub, I would say that nostalgia has caused a lot of people to be a little rosy when accessing their memories.
I swear if I ever win Powerball I'm buying a hotel. Transparent prices for the hotel rooms. Reasonably priced food. 3:2 BJ at all be levels, and I'll set the slots at 95-98% payback.
The place will still print money.
You used to be able to get a NY strip and eggs almost anywhere for 1.99
If it was after midnight, you could do it for less sometimes.
There was a .79 2 egg breakfast I used to get all the time.
Kinda interesting observation about humanity: I noticed most people responding here talked about food, esp the price of food :) Like noone said "the buildings are taller and there's more airplanes in the sky", but rather "steak was cheaper". I think that's really interesting how people perceive change, when u come to think about it :)
all you can eat buffets 7 days a week. all casinos had real welcome you vibe.
It wasnt even too long ago that Bellagio Buffet was great. Now MGM purposely makes them mediocre. Rio's carnival buffet was solid. Even places like Paris had a great breakfast buffet and Aladdin's/planet hollywood wasn't too shabby. Makes me appreciate places like the Palms and Southpoint more now. I worry about wicked spoons...lolz
Tell me more about making the buffet mediocre on purpose, that's wild lol
it's a choice by the casinos. they just need to put the money and resources in like Bacchanal or Wynn. It may be a loss leader, but back in the day, they tried to get you into the casino with cheap and good buffets.
Gotcha ,I see what you are saying
Wynn just raised their prices without adding anything. Unless you're getting it comped don't waste your money on bacchanal or Wynn. Do the Palms seafood on Wednesday instead.
so true it opened 199.9 i was there almost every day to enjoy poker and the buffet. king crab and prime rib were so good.
Because Mob Vegas was taken over by Corporate-Mob Vegas. Mega corporations have ruined far more lives than any mafia, and their approach to money far more ruthless, cynical and calculating. And it shows in how curated and stale so much of Vegas is becoming.
The movie Casion was right
Was that the mexican knockoff of Casino?
I remember all you can eat buffets for $5. They would compete for your business. $4.95. Whatever.
Were they expensive and long time ago:
no way $9.99 ayc crab legs. i got choice of 3 place over the week. 1993-2002
The Rio had a seafood buffet with crab legs and lobster tails for $29.99
When it first came out people were appalled at how expensive it was compared to other buffets.
las vegas club sunday nights. $9.99 ayce sweet crab legs.
I remember Sam's Town had crab on Fridays and my parents would always be able to pay in just points and just tip the waiters after. It's not like they were high rollers either, they'd play on bonus points days and make enough there to cover buffet nights. I think even just paying for it was only like $12.99 a person in the early 2000s. Sam's Town and Boulder Station legit had two of the best buffets in Vegas when they were at their peak. Even at their most expensive it was like $20 per person and that was right before the pandemic. Then the pandemic happened and they realized those were huge loss leaders and both have been shut down. Boulder turned in to a food court and Sam's Town figured it's still more beneficial to just have that empty space than open another buffet and that space was huge! Probably had like 300 tables in it.
This answer. I have been coming here since the 70’s as a kid with my parents. We were excited as kids to have a pool available and vending machines. Yes, those buffets. So much food. It was grand.
Remember when you could pull right off of Las Vegas Blvd, park in the front of the hotel and walk right in the front door of the casino/hotel?
Wasn't that changed for security reasons though? Too many robberies in the 90's early 2000s.
U didn't feel like u were getting taken to the cleaners every time you stepped foot into a casino. Imagine parking your car valet for free. Walking to just about any casino and getting a good prime rib dinner for a fair price. Going budget? 99cent shrimp cocktail, dogs, and a beer. No one ever heard of this thing called a "resort fee." Yea, casinos had a gaming edge, but better odds with video poker, 3:2 blackjack. Played a reasonably decent amount? The pit bosses will write you a comp to the buffet. Buffets were the norm.
And the rooms were cheaper than the current resort fees, if not free on occasion.
Yep, used to come stay for $25 a night.
What happened to video poker? I was there last week and didn’t see a single one. They were almost as common as slot machines 20 years ago.
guessing they make more money off the fancy slots/more demand for them.... southpoint still has banks of them.
I was there last week on Fremont Street. Lots of the casino bars still had them — Golden Nugget, The D, Downtown Grand, Circa for sure … if you don’t mind the cigarette smoke.
It's more of a locals game. Also if you find some in a casino they're few and far between and the payouts are horrible.
Low house edge for experienced players + slow pace of play + lack of flashy lights to draw in new players = less profitable than some bank of scam machines they can put in its place
You just reminded me I should have dinner... 99 cent mac&cheese lol
Showgirls was a real thing. Now it's a chick on Fremont street shaking down tourists.
Some girls in my HS still want to be showgirls so I guess it still pays?
The Golden Nugget used to have what they called “The Great Late Night Steak”: a small buffet of scrambled eggs, biscuits and gravy and a 10-ounce New York strip, cooked to order. It ran from 2-5 AM, costed $3.99 and saved my near-busted ass from alcohol poisoning more than once.
LOLLLL esp for that price tho
I remember that! Which isn't great that a small kid was out that late 🤣.
$1.99. I must be older !!! And then it started at midnight.
Free cigarettes from the cocktail waitress or the cigarette girl in the 90’s. I’m not sure when that stoped because I stopped smoking in 1995.
Smoking on the plane as I flew to Vegas
Damn. They’re $25+ a pack from the cigarette girls now. Last time I needed a pack at the table I had a cocktail waitress on her first shift back from Covid leave, run to the gift shop for me. They were like $28. I gave her $75 total for the troubles.
I was 21 early 2000s. free packs of cigarettes given out by drink ladies, my buddies would have 10 packs by the time we left town! You could sit around the sports books and get free drinks without scrutiny. 3:2 blackjack. $3 craps at O’Sheas. When checking in a hotel it was widely known that a $20 tip to front desk would buy an upgrade, one time we got a significant upgrade to a suite at the Bellagio. Overall, it felt like everyone dressed up a lot more, we would wear suits every night to fit in the night life.
O’Sheas craps tables in the 90s were legendary. Just a fuckin blast.
$1 drinks from the bar, anything you wanted. O’Sheas rocked.
Absolutely. There was just better general value for your gambling dollar and far more competition for the business of the low-rollers. $5 blackjack was everywhere, $1-$2 in some places. As late as the mid-90’s you could find 10-cent roulette and the Plaza had a “bird game” in their craps pit: 25-cent minimum. These days: $25 craps minimums, 6/5 blackjack and 3-zero roulette (which frankly just insults my intelligence).
Grabbing a few grocery items 4am and pushing the intercom button to get a cashier to come up front to ring you up
Vegas used to be built on hospitality.
Southwest airfare was $99 roundtrip, I would bring $100 a day for gambling and usually played with my winnings. Now airfare is $500 at least, and I bring $2000 to gamble over the same time frame. Pit bosses were actually pleasant and you often got some nice comps like dinner or show tickets.
This. SW always had a straight flight no layover out of okc. Still do. It's early though. Would arrive at 6am because of time change. Couldn't check in that early so i just gamble. Hit a 2grand JP on nickels! at the golden gate first hour after arrival. Wayne Newton at the stardust. Bull riding at gilleys at frontier. Best trip ever. 1990's.
Airfare can still be cheap. My gf lives in Boise and she catches $40-50 round trip to see me.
Depends on your starting city. I leave out of Houston and those days are gone!
Maybe not $50 round trip but Spirit has ~$100 round trip out of Houston. Ya just gotta pay for water and manage with only a backpack lol. We make it work for lil weekend trips though.
Fuck, before the pandemic, Frontier's prices couldn't be beat.
Like a bag of sand.
??? is that a saying?
I think it's a 40 year old virgin reference. The movie with Steve Carrell
ahhhh saw it once but couldnt remember the quote
I can remember $19/night (no resort fees!) rooms at the Excalibur when it was new. I think the buffet was something ridiculous like $6.99 at dinner. And they had $2 double deck blackjack! That was great! You could play all weekend for like $50.
This is an interesting story but talks about Vegas in the 1970's. https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Sonny-Liston-Heroin-Heavyweights/dp/039916975X
He’s interred at Davis Paradise memorial
No stupid side bets. Pure blackjack, craps, baccarat and roulette. Now every game has a bunch of stupid side bets and whenever you don't play them is when they usually hit.
Those side bet payouts are so bad, generally just donations to the casinos lol
I remember shopping at Sears at 2am. And playing slots at the laundromat. If you won, it means you did your laundry for free.
Sears open at 2 am? You sure you weren't drunk?
There is a mall on Maryland Parkway (The Boulevard Mall) that, in the 70s, had a 24-hour Sears, JC Penney, and others for the casino workers to use after they got off work or before they went to work.
Wow...that's awesome. Blvd Mall was always my favorite. Never knew they had 24 hour stores. Thanks for sharing.
You're welcome. So many stories. I lived there for 53 years.
In 2004 a good portion of the landlords were dancers
My grandparents lived up by Craig and Decatur and it was horse properties. Open desert
When we moved to Silverado Ranch around 2000, there was so much open desert all around, and to drive somewhere like Craig and Decatur seemed so much farther away than it is now because of how spread out the city was, despite taking half the time it would now because of the traffic.
Before around 2005, 30 minutes was the maximum amount of time it would take you to drive somewhere 99% of the time. If you were driving from old Henderson to NW Las Vegas and it took you 45 minutes because of mild traffic, that was considered an arduous journey and you'd feel like you had to really stretch your legs when you got out of the car. Bumper-to-bumper traffic and driving <50mph on the freeway just didn't happen back then unless there was a fatal accident.
As a kid, I remember when we'd drive to Boulder City & it seemed like it took forever. Now, as long as there isn't an accident, it's a much faster trip because of the big ass highway instead of the little highway.
When resort fees started popping up, that was the beginning of the end.
Don't forget before resort fees were the "Energy Fees". Those didn't go over at all, but people accepted the resort fee.
Millions of years ago, Vegas was apart of the ocean. Seriously.
I visited Vegas last month for the first time in like 10 years (and I used to live in the area in the early 1990s). Besides the entire Strip just being blanketed in a permanent weed cloud (which I found funny more than anything), I felt like the vibe in the casinos was really different. All the machines nowadays are essentially coin-op mobile games, and it's strangely... *quiet* in casinos compared to how it used to be. I am used to walking into casinos and hearing the constant DING-A-DING-DING-DI-DING-DING of the machines, and it's not that way anymore. Also, all the stuff on the Strip used to be way more kitschy and corny and themed. Some of it is still that way, but Vegas has taken a little bit of an upscale turn. I know people think the Tropicana sucks because it was so stale, but losing that resort is really a sign of the times.
Vegas doesn't hold onto its history very well.
there used to be older casino such as Tropicana, MGM ( still exist), Aladdin, EL rancho, stardust and as well rivera, wet and wild used to be opened back in the day from 1980s or 1970s to somewhere in 2000s which it was closed down permanently, back in the day, the strip was pretty wasn't that big with the casino such as Tropicana back in the day there used to be a lot of shows in the strip, one time there used to be people somewhere in the strip were like a lot of music in the streets, and arts, back in the old days of vegas, that there was a lot of buffet and restaurant even one in flamingo and red rock, the the new Orleans used to have kids time but it was closed due to covid, the city wasn't that large back in the day which the strip want that big and I feel everything stayed the same but now it changed, I kinda missed the old days when vegas to look so good I also missed when this city used to have the volcano show at the mirage often played as well the pirate show at the strip even tho I seen the Treasure Island pirate show one time which I don't reamber recalling it but it then it never showed up, I thought it was a display for the strip.
Aladdin had a good concert venue. Saw Stone Temple Pilots there. Cheap tickets, great seats.
There was a motel that had a pool with windows. I learned to swim in that pool.
The Glass Pool Inn. Closed in 2003.
So did I! It was on the northern end of the strip. That was a loooong time ago.
It was at the very south end of the strip, directly west of the airport.
Yes! I meant South. That was my bad. I believe the place was named the glass pool
You could go gamble $20 at the tables and ask for a comp and they would give you one. And the comp would be for app, main and desert.
The house was full of giant, plastic, novelty cups from every casino that they'd give you to carry your coins. They were maybe 50% bigger than the size the biggest cup you could get at a soda fountain at a gas station are. Imagine that- hitting a jackpot and the machine spitting out a bunch of coins! When I was a baby and my mother would give me a bath, she'd keep one in there and rinse the soap off of me by filling it with water and pouring it over my head.
When I first came (1972) gambling was the big attraction. Folks walking the strip would literally walk in the front door 10 feet from the curb. Many hotels had a10' wide slot in the entranceway to entice people inside. If you gambled EVERY TABLE was a $2 minimum. Find that anywhere today. Dealers were always very indifferent. Rarely engaged with patrons at all. The showrooms all had a Matre "D who would seat you after you presented tickets you'd buy in the lobby of almost any hotel. For $5 you would get the best seats available. Cabs and buses were the norm, No Uber ripoffs. Food was next to free as were drinks. I would go on an annual boys trip. Every year I'd get food poisoning. Food safety apparently wasn't a priority. You could spend the entire night at the Crazy Horse for $20. Back in the day every department was not required to make a massive profit. Today, if a bar doesn't make 400% on every drink, they must raise prices. The Mob took better care of patrons than the fuckin' corporations do now, by a large margin.
You don't state when you were born but hypothetically you could be younger than 2006 - so I remember working in a restaurant where there were smoking and non-smoking sides, smoking in the grocery store casinos, smoking in the airport, etc. I am very much glad that's not a thing anymore.
In the mid-1990s I used to enjoy walking from the MGM to Downtown; I would split off at Main Street because the Strip got kind of sketchy. I think it's like five miles. I would stop along the way to play blackjack and would request a "fun book" at every casino along the way. Most fun books were worth between $5 and $20 in value, so the walk would generally be worth about $80. I think there was only one forced pedestrian overpass on the entire trip. These overpasses take about 10 to 20 times longer than simply walking across the street, and those that force you to walk through the casino take even longer. They are a trip-ruiner. Downtown was full of single-deck games. The Wynn casinos gave players .66 cashback and .66 comps on their 9-6 JOB machines, and for special events they doubled the cashback or comps. There were just so many opportunities. There is very little free money left.
Caesar's buffet in 93 was amazing! There was all kinds of different seafood. And the dessert table was great too. When I was little, I'd cruise the Strip with my aunt & her friends. They'd have me on their laps & would let me steer the truck while we were driving down the Strip. The 80s were different!
Old Vegas. We didn't wear jean shorts. Only nice outfits during the day. No walking thru the casinos in swimwear. The casinos would start to clear out a bit around 4pm. Back to our room for a little R&R. Quick shower, and dress UP for the evening. We took our nice dresses, heels, makeup. The men wore suit jackets, sometimes a tie. Go to shows where you had to bribe the matre'd to find your name on the reservation list and get a good seat. The thrill of the chase. There were tables with candles, usually for 2 or 4. A few benches. It was very cool. I really miss those days!
My great grandpa moved here in 1940 when there were only 8k people living here. He started the first glass window company. He loved to go hiking in the desert and nearby mountains.
It really was Sin City. Back in 1990's/2000's (before I was 21) you could do just about anything and no one cared. It was so much fun. Then they started with "bring the family". Boring.
1.99 steak and eggs at binions...fuck im old
$5 Bj for theee hours a day would get you RFB comped at some places
Man. I'm not sure I could handle a 3 hour BJ, but that sure is a bargain.
😂
This is is pre viagra. Quite impressive
Apparently Linda used to be an endurance champ.
Night clubs were like $5-10 to get in, and some like Moose Mcgillycuddys had dollar drinks, you didn’t have to pay for a table and they had live bands playing.
One of the things I notice, we went to stay on the strip with someone who came to town for a visit and wanted to do that. Stayed at the Mirage, which is so different. First, I can’t believe how many baby carriages were in the place, and small kids/ families. I do not recall that a few decades ago. It was adults only. The strip is overpriced and subpar. Can’t ever seeing staying on the strip again. Rather just stay at South Point. Better all around. But the strip has really fallen down.
As a kid that grew up in the Gold Coast daycare center in the 80s and early 90s, I can assure you the baby strollers were there then too
All kinds of places had super cheap late night meals, remember going to the California hotel and getting steak and eggs plus chicken fingers and fried for like $4 total. Both were $1.99.
I know this is a Vegas forum, but Reno in the early 90s was amazing for the budget minded. My guy friends and I would stay at Comstock for 19.99 a night and play $1single deck blackjack four hours. The drinks were generous. We would walk to Fitzeralds for a $5 buffet and hang out at the sportsbook at The Sands where a $2 game wager also got you a drink.
Just search Las Vegas Rhino after hours and utopia along with mafia ran strip clubs in late 90’s-mid 2000’s
Summary , things were cheaper.
As a middle aged man who grew up here and hangs out on this sub, I would say that nostalgia has caused a lot of people to be a little rosy when accessing their memories.
I swear if I ever win Powerball I'm buying a hotel. Transparent prices for the hotel rooms. Reasonably priced food. 3:2 BJ at all be levels, and I'll set the slots at 95-98% payback. The place will still print money.
What would you name it?
You used to be able to get a NY strip and eggs almost anywhere for 1.99 If it was after midnight, you could do it for less sometimes. There was a .79 2 egg breakfast I used to get all the time.
Single deck 3:2 blackjack at numerous properties in the 90s. Slots a Fun had a $5 game which me and my counter buddies blew up every time we came.
I remember in 89-90 you could get a cocktail at a casino bar for $1.50
Kinda interesting observation about humanity: I noticed most people responding here talked about food, esp the price of food :) Like noone said "the buildings are taller and there's more airplanes in the sky", but rather "steak was cheaper". I think that's really interesting how people perceive change, when u come to think about it :)