Plaza Casino

Microstakes game ($3 buy-in, $5 rebuys for the first hour, guaranteed $100, goes up from there) at 10:00 every morning is a blast. Two tables always fill, I imagine sometimes all three fill up. Fun mix (about 60/40) of colorful characters and local oddballs who play every morning along with random tourists (like I was). Room host was Dave, who was funny and good-natured and remembers everyone's name and knows the regulars well - I'd only played once the day before and when I came back the next he greeted me by name. He doesn't have an easy job riding herd on the sometimes rowdy tables, because there's a lot of coffeehousing and a couple of surly locals who probably have untreated hemorrhoids based on their general temperaments. The guys with distemper are way outnumbered by the warmth and good humor and general camaraderie of the other guys. In all honesty, I'd sit there rebuying until the hour ran out (I'm not a great player) just so I could sit there and listen to them razz each other and carry on. It was so much more fun than the deadly quiet higher stake tournaments where people act like they're at their own mother's funeral. You'll pay a lot more to be a lot less entertained in Vegas. The scene is BEAT - the casino is definitely on the low end as far as glamour goes, but somehow the grimy and sort of decrepit surroundings just make the whole thing more fun (if you're a tourist like me) because it's off the radar. I laughed so much over the course of the two hours I played that I had to keep wiping tears out of my eyes. I would have paid $30 just to watch that show, so getting to sit at the table and enjoy the company of interesting, fun people made it one of the best deals in town. Video poker might not be popular with everyone, but I wished I'd been going up the street for it (was staying on the strip at Bally's) every morning. If other PokerPro rooms had hosts as welcoming and friendly as David, and had a stable of locals who would come and jazz up the table and provide exciting gameplay in exchange for comps as well as shots at the pot... I don't think those rooms would have busted. Better signage indicating the game and times, maybe - if you don't know that the tables are video dealer but everything else is normal (down to how you cup the hand to peek in your pocket, that's what trips the screen), you might take it for some kind of version of the video poker draw slot machine kind of things which are NO fun. This was my first time in Vegas, second time playing poker in a casino (played the $65 Bally's evening sit and go, and was a nervous wreck the whole time, especially after winning a couple of big pots - that actually freaked me out more than being short-stacked). So take this review as what it is - I enjoy poker but enjoyed the coffeehousing as much (well, more) than the play. Hopefully the regulars won't mind if more people like me show up to feed the pot, learn some stuff, and soak up the fun atmosphere that Dave and the congenial locals generate. 5 stars to Dave as the host, the dealer rating is pointless given that it's a bot.