 The hotel rooms are big and the prices are fair. What's not to love? Well, the fact that it's about half an hour from what most people consider Las Vegas. If you have a car and hankering for driving through suburbs, enjoy!
Coupons Available for Suncoast Casino: Two-for-one breakfast or lunch, five times slot club points. (Click Here For More Info.)
   
Room Quality: Far as we can tell, the only drawback to these rooms is the hotel's location, which is about 20-25 minutes from the Strip or downtown. The rooms themselves are a little slice of heaven at a whopping 550 s.f. That is, coincidentally, almost the exact same size as the rooms next door at the considerably more hoity-toity JW Marriott. Most rooms have a European/Victorian feel with patterned carpets and Frenchy furniture. The beds are either a king or a pair of queens and there is a separate sitting area in all rooms. The furniture is standard hotel fare. No matter, for the price you're paying these are fantastic rooms. The windows are big but you won't see much of the Strip from way out here. Bathrooms are a nice size and well laid out. They are not fancy, just sensible with two sinks and a marble counter outside the room where the can and tub/shower are. Hairdryers and irons are standard for every room. Whee!
Service Quality: Very good. The hotel is very manageable at less than 400 rooms and there are rarely long lines to check in. Room service and housekeeping are prompt and friendly. You may have a long walk to your room if you're at the end of a hall, but otherwise you're just an elevator ride from the action downstairs.
What You Get Bottles of in the Bathroom: We hope you like goop! Shampoo, conditioner, lotion and bath gel. The Coast wants you squeaky clean and fresh by the time you hit the casino.
Clientele: Locals, locals and more locals, along with some conventioneers and an older clientele. This place is really catering to that section of the baby-boomers who will be retiring soon and bankrupting the Social Security system, provided the slots here don't bankrupt them first.
How's the Pool? Since they are't trying to get young hotties or families, it's a functional pool, not a wild one, despite the Mediterranean flairs. No slides, or lagoons or any of that good stuff. There is a hot tub, though.
Resort Fee: (What is this?) $5 per night. You get an airport shuttle (reservation required), Strip shuttle, fitness center access, coffeemaker, safe and fridge in room and USA Today.
Table Games: They've got mostly blackjack, including the awful 6:5 variety, craps, roulette, Let it Ride mini-baccarat and the game from the mystic orient-Pai Gow. We say "Mystic Orient" because we have never figured this game out. This place is serious about Bingo with a 600-seat hall and games going virtually from dawn until the wee hours of the night.
Bet Minimums: Five dollars most of the time at both blackjack and craps, although we've seen craps tables go as low as $3 with 5x odds. The cheapest BJ is from a shoe, but there are a lot more hand dealt double deck games going at most times. Pai Gow and Baccarat can be had for $10 most of the time, and roulette is a $2 minimum with 50-cent chips.
Machines: Slots from a nickel on up to $25. A good selection of video poker, with some full-pay at the quarter and higher level. The mix is mostly quarter VP, and overall there seem to be more VP machines than slots, but that is typical of a place trying to lure the locals in. The slot areas are surprisingly roomy and you'll be hard pressed to find a better mix of brand spanking new games.
Cocktails? Iffy service. Like most locals places, the emphasis is not on getting you so loaded that you end up barfing on their pretty carpets. That type of service is reserved for Downtown. steady tips will keep the cocktail waitresses coming back, though. So if you're determined to drink away your losses, you can.
Who Gets Comps? The $25 and higher bettor at the tables should ask to be comped. A few hours might get you a buffet or coffee shop, and it will probably get you onto their mail list. At the machines, the Suncoast has the same B-Connected club as other Coast casinos.
Cafe Sienna: This is a good and slightly-high-priced coffee shop. It's open 24 hours. The menu is basic coffee shop fare with eggs, steaks, burgers, sandwiches and salads. The best deal is usually the late-night specials designed to lure the local retirees out of their caves.
Oyster Bar: Chowder -- or as Bostonians say, chowdah -- crab cakes, shucked oysters and lots of stews and seafood over pasta. They also have sushi. The prices are pretty good, mostly in the teens. Plus, it really looks like a laid-back Eastern Seaboard oyster bar, except for the lack of ocean nearby. All the seats (except three booths) are surrounding a big old open kitchen, where they slap together your goodies before your eyes.
Salvatores: A decent, although not exciting, Italian restaurant with nice low prices. There is a lot of steak and seafood on the menu, and it's where the real values can be found, with most prices half or less what they'd be on the Strip. Of course, it's not on the Strip, and not as gourmet or fancy. Still, it's a solid value.
SC Prime: Suncoast has a serviceable steak house, perched way up atop the hotel tower, with wonderful views of the Strip and the rest of the Vegas valley. The prices are surprisingly high, and the meats are all a la carte. So, if you want the potato or the beans, you pay extra.
Senor Miguel's: Lots of good Mexican lunch and dinners for under $10-$15. Is it great Mexican? No, but it's good Mexican and the room is quite pleasant. Be prepared for very large meals. Dinners only.
St. Tropez Buffet: Unless the people on the coast of France are stuffing their faces with very standard buffet fare, there is very little here to make you think of St. tropez. It's a decent buffet with the now-standard service islands. Mexican, Mongolian (a good thing), Seafood, Italian and American are what we recall. The seafood was mostly deep-fried denizens of the deep plucked before their prime. The rest was just okay, with the desserts being notably disappointing.
TGI Fridays: Yay! Now you can eat exactly the same thing you can eat at home while you're on vacation. If you need a refresher on what TGI Fridays serves, watch Tv for a half hour. They serve lunch and dinner out here.
There are also a Kate's Ice Cream Parlor, the bowling alley snack bar and a Seattle's Best Coffee. Hey, if Seattle's Best is in Las Vegas, what are they drinking up in Washington? Also, look for deli sandwiches and bagels in the Bagel Corner.
Bowling: 64 lanes of state-of-the-art bowling equipment. You know what we're talking about. It's the stuff that keeps score for you so you can't cheat anymore. That's not necessarily a good thing. There are lots of leagues, so check before you wander out here to play.
Century 16: Stadium seating for 16 screens upon which they cough up the latest bombs from Hollywood. To be fair, it isn't the Suncoast's fault that Hollywood forgot how to make good movies. This is truly a fabulous theater in which to see movies.
Showroom: This 500-seat showroom has traditional Las Vegas table and booth seating, which we find annoying. The acts here are geared toward the older clientele and feature such blasts from the long-long-past as the Lettermen, Bowser from Shanana and ballroom dancing. When they're eager to draw a younger set, they go with the Smothers Brothers. That should give you an idea of the target age group.
Number of TVs: Thirty-three of 'em. 32 of those are decent-sized, and one of them is a monster. The adjacent bar has additional TVs.
Number of Seats: One-hundred-fifty seats for racing and sports combined. They're covered in vinyl and average in comfort. Only twenty of them for the sports bettor. The race ones have individual monitors.
How Many Betting Windows? Seventeen. Most are for race bettors, though. The boards for race results are white slate jobs, but sports fans see their scores in fancy electric lights. Oo la la!
Free Drinks? If you can flag down a cocktail waitress.
Snack Bar? No, but the Bagel Corner is nearby, and there are always plenty of bar drinks for the gulping. Plus, there is often a cheap hot dog cart in the sports book.
Minimum Wager: $5 for the sports fan, $2 for the race fan.
Other Notes: This is a pretty average off-strip sports and race book. Really not much to speak of, except the great Coast property teasers.
Number of Tables: Ten tables to serve you, and take a rake.
Comfort of Chairs: The chairs are the basic poker room chairs, meaning not much cushion on a metal frame.
Closed Room or Open to Casino? The room is a little cove off the casino, but it is not closed off. It looks like they could clear out the poker rooms and make a nickel slot area out of it in a few hours time.
Game Spreads and Limits: Welcome to Texas Hold'em world, where they deal it in $2-$4, $4-$8 limit and $1-$2 to $2-$5 no limit varieties. They say they also deal Omaha, but don't come out here expecting it.
How Crowded is the Room? This room is not crowded and doesn't get crowded, except maybe if a tournament is going on. Otherwise, only about three to five tables are going.
Comps? Coast seems to have created the most confusing comp policy in town. $1.25 an hour for four hours, 50 cents an hour after that, with a $9 cap.
How Good Are the Players? There are no tourists, just locals in the room. They aren't exactly tight, but they are passive and tend to just play along with bets.
What Else Do I Need to Know? This is an uninspired and noisy room, and not worth coming out here for. One nice thing about the room is the $4 max rake. They have a couple low-stakes tourneys most days and a high-hand jackpot.
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