I rode it in June after dark and the city lights were great.
The design and engineering were equaly impressive.

Since I happened to be around when they did the "soft opening", i got to ride it for free and for that it was definitely worth it. I was there right about dusk, so I got a little day time and a little night time and based on that I'd say most people are going to prefer night time, since you get to see a lot more of the city's lights -- Ceasar's obviously thinks this too because night time rides are more expensive.

I have to say overall, my impression was "big deal". I actually prefer the view from the Stratosphere tower to anything I got on the High Roller. About half the ride on the High Roller gives you a view of mostly the back of Flamingo and IP/Quad/soon to be Linq Casino. Plus, at Strat you can spend as much or as little time as you like, while the big wheel keeps on turning people every 40 or so minutes. I do think the changing vantage point you get was interesting -- going up, it looked like you were behind IP and moving towards Harrah's, while on the way down it looked like you were going to land in the habitat behind Flamingo and those changing visuals were impressive. That said, even that was more being impressed by the design, engineering and building of that big beast, more than being truly impressed with the views. I do agree that the design and engineering work were really impressive -- I think I'm more impressed looking at the thing than I was riding it.

One other thing, since it doesn't stop to let people on or off, I still suspect that there has to be some sort of line on the number of drunk idiots who wind up in the netting below the thing in its first year of operation. Something I need to spend more time in a sports book to find, just haven't bothered to do it.