We, too, like the Pioneer. It's an Old West-style low-ceilinged grind joint, with 400 garden rooms in two-story motel buildings, quite a contrast to the rest of the hotel-casinos in Laughlin, all major high-rises. The Pioneer has perhaps the best bargain steakhouse in town (Granny's), along with a good cheap buffet that often has long lines on weekends, a serviceable coffee shop, and a good cheap snack bar with a local-favorite sarsparilla. River Rick, Laughlin's answer to Vegas Vic, towers above the casino, waving with both arms, winking one eye, and puffing on the perfect cigarette.
As far as a Vegas counterpart to the Pioneer, we have a few ideas. On the Strip, the two little hotel-casinos among giants are Casino Royale and Bill's Gambling Hall and Saloon.
Casino Royale's "hotel" is actually an old 150-room Travelodge, so like the Pioneer, it's a low-rise motel, and it's extremely convenient to and within walking distance of just about everything. The casino makes frequent appearances in the LVA Top Ten for its dollar beers and margaritas. It has an Outback Steakhouse on the second level with a good view of the Mirage volcano (they claim it's the busiest Outback in the world) and a Denny's; a new food court is under construction (due to open in the New Year), but for now, there's also pizza, Subway, and Ben & Jerry's. We've never encountered an unfriendly vibe or a discouraging word at Casino Royale and it's always been a "secret" parking play, though without any traffic controls, the ingress and egress can take awhile, waiting for a kind pedestrian or fifty to let you drive past.
All told, we think Casino Royale comes closest to the Pioneer for a small friendly casino with a fantastic location right in the thick of the Strip.
Bill's Gamblin' Hall & Saloon is a close second. It shares the same great center-Strip location as Casino Royale. It has 400 rooms, so its size is closer to the Pioneer's. It has the Steakhouse at Bill's and the Victorian Room coffee shop; Drai's is one of the hotter after-hours clubs in town. Before Harrah's took over the joint, it was the Barbary Coast, one of the Coast casinos (before that was taken over by Boyd Gaming). The Barbary Coast had the reputation of being the worst "sweat shop" in town, where if you dared to win a bet, especially at blackjack, you got the bum's rush out the door, accused of card counting or worse. But now that Harrah's runs the place, that attitude seems to be a thing of the past.
You can read what fellow LVA readers think of both of these joints by looking up the comments and ratings for Casino Royale (4/5 stars) and Bill's Gamblin' Hall & Saloon (4.5/5 stars) in our Hotel and Casino listings.
But to get some real old-fashioned "Cheers"-type friendliness where everyone knows your name, and a y'all-come-back-now-y'hear vibration, you'll need to pick a locals casino to be your Vegas home away from home.
Over many decades of frequenting all the casinos -- new and old, small and large, locals and Strip, good reputation and bad -- in Las Vegas, we've found that the neighborhood joints are consistently much friendlier than those in the tourist corridor. Certainly, most are smaller, which makes them feel less impersonal. But moreover, the locals casinos live and die on the locals' business, repeat business, so their staffs have to provide better service than at the visitor hotels, whose employees have to cope with a Noah's flood of strangers all day every day.
Similarly, the employees at the locals casinos are themselves local, so they get to know the regulars, especially the ones who want to be known, and thus tip well and become friendly with the people who serve them, personally, each visit.
(Jean Scott is a master of befriending employees, from high-level hosts to ashtray-cleaning porters, at the casinos she frequents, and there's great stuff in her Frugal books about how she goes about it.)
There are far too many locals casinos to describe or even list in this space, so you'll just have to do some research, visit the places you think you'll like, and compare the parallels to the Pioneer. For our money, we've always liked Boulder Station, which has 300 rooms, a recommendable buffet and other good eats including lots of fast food, an excellent lounge, a spacious and tasteful casino, a comfortable sports book, a big movie theater right on the property, and friendly employees.
But that's just one opinion. Perhaps we'll run a poll on what your suggestions are...
