My wife and I recently took advantage of one of the benefits of our Ocean Prime status and spent a few nights at the Conrad Las Vegas at Resorts World. This was our second stay at Resorts World (last year we tried out both the Conrad and Crockford’s) and I have to say that I really like Resorts World and this specific Ocean Prime benefit. That’s not to say that there aren’t some drawbacks, but now that MGM has partnered with Marriott (and my beloved Delano was left out of the party), I think the Conrad Las Vegas may become my go-to property in Las Vegas.
Resorts World Las Vegas is three properties in one
Resorts World is a fairly new complex, having opened in June of 2021. It is located toward the north end of the strip, just beyond and across the street from Wynn/Encore and just before Circus Circus if you’re heading north on Las Vegas Boulevard (it sits where Stardust once stood for old-time Vegas visitors).
Interestingly, Resorts World includes three separate Hilton Honors-affiliated hotels all connected to the same casino / shopping complex:
- Hilton Las Vegas
- Conrad Las Vegas
- Crockford’s Las Vegas, an LXR (Hilton) property
There are three separate “hotel” entrances at Resorts World, but all three properties are quite close together — you can walk between their lobbies within just a couple of minutes inside the building.
I haven’t yet stayed at the Hilton-branded property, but I have stayed at both the Conrad and Crockford’s properties. My initial impression is that Crockford’s has some classier touches — think more marble in the bathroom, more gold-plating on the fixtures, and some small touches like a movable end table that I could place next to the bed or in front of the couch to use my computer while watching TV if I wanted. Personally, I preferred the Conrad, though I know that Crockford’s will appeal to some because of a slightly more luxurious feel.
I should note that on our stay last year, I used the Hilton Aspire card’s resort credit to pay for a night. This property can be a good fit for that card’s twice-annual credits since weeknights at either the Conrad or Crockford’s can often be had for ~$200 or less.
One important thing I should note is that Resorts World is primarily a Las Vegas casino resort. Don’t come in with “Hilton” expectations as that just doesn’t fit the market. For instance, there’s no free coffee in the room at the Conrad. We had two different “standard” rooms on this stay and only one of them had robes. Although we inquired about an upgrade and plenty of options were available for a fee, somehow none of those rooms were available as a “complimentary upgrade” (which, again, is pretty standard for Las Vegas and in fairness this was a complimentary stay). If you go in with full-service Hilton expectations, you’ll probably be somewhat disappointed. If you instead compare this to the “average” Las Vegas casino resort experience, I think it compares nicely.
Ocean Prime benefit: Free 2-night stay, $100 free play, & $100 dining credit at Resorts World Las Vegas (Conrad or Hilton)
Ocean Casino resort in Atlantic City offers a status match to attract gamblers from other casinos. They don’t directly match status that you can get via a credit card, but with a little effort you can start with the Wyndham Earner business card and its associated Wyndham Diamond status and match first to Caesars and then Hard Rock Icon at Hard Rock Atlantic City and then onward to Ocean Prime. Read more about that in this post about matching in Atlantic City or in this post about using casino status to get free cruises.
The key Ocean Prime benefit that we’ve discussed numerous times is a complimentary cruise anywhere in the world with MSC (up to 10 nights in an ocean view cabin). However, another valuable Ocean Prime benefit that I wrote about last month is a complimentary 2-night stay at Resorts World in Las Vegas (see my post about the booking process for the benefit). I’ve heard that the benefit can be used to stay at either the Hilton or Conrad. The Conrad is of course branded to be slightly more upscale.
Also included in the stay is $100 in free play and $100 in dining credit. For those unfamiliar, free play is sort of like monopoly money for the slot machines — you get $100 in “funny money” to load to a machine, but once you have “played through” that $100 (in other words, have bet $100 on spins), you can keep any profits left over).
I imagine that some dates are blacked out, but we stayed over the weekend (I booked my room for Friday & Saturday and my wife booked a room for Saturday & Sunday, both on Martin Luther King Jr Day weekend). Weekends tend to be very expensive in Las Vegas, so a complimentary weekend had tremendous value (the cheapest flexible cash rate at the time we booked was about $850 total for either sets of two nights).
Resorts World Las Vegas Location
Resorts World is located toward the north end of the Las Vegas strip. It is diagonally across from Wynn / Encore on the south end and Fontainebleau on the north end (kind of across the street from the Las Vegas convention Center, and just north of the Fashion Show Mall). If you’re a center-strip-action sort of person, the location will be a major downside. You’re going to have to Uber / taxi / rental car or walk far to get to the heart of the strip.
On the flip side, I often rent a car in Las Vegas these days and I like being a short enough walk from Wynn / Encore as I haven’t usually made it that far north on the strip when staying at places like Delano / Mandalay Bay / MGM Grand. Also note that the resort is connected to the Las Vegas Convention Center by the “Las Vegas Loop” (an Elon Musk / “Boring Company” venture). I believe it just takes a couple of minutes to get to/from the convention center, but this is only open during conventions as I understand it.
Amex Platinum cardholders should note that there is a Saks Fifth Avenue in the Fashion Show Mall. To be clear, that’s not the shopping center that is attached to Resorts World but rather it is the next major structure as you continue down the strip (still a 12 or 15 minute walk). When we got to the counter at Saks and asked if they had gift cards, the agent said “Amex Platinum $50 credits?”. He seemed pleasantly surprised when we wanted to split tender over three Platinum cards to buy a single $150 Saks gift card rather than ringing up three separate $50 gift cards. He noted his frustration with “the guy who brings 10 cards in here” and buys 10 separate gift cards”, but nonetheless it was easy to buy Saks gift cards here.
Overall, some will no doubt consider this part of the strip a “dead zone” because there isn’t much around it. That’s a fair criticism. On the flip side, I like it enough and don’t mind the walk to Wynn/Encore if I want something different. I wish I’d have made it over to Fontainebleau on this trip, but there just wasn’t time.
Check-in
The check-in process was smooth enough. There is a dedicated line for Hilton Gold and Diamond members to the left of the main line. Nobody was in either line when we first arrived, so we were able to walk right up to an agent.
We were booked into a base-level 1 King “Premium” room. I inquired about a complimentary upgrade to something with a strip view. The agent told me they couldn’t do a complimentary strip view but could offer me a “city” view. I declined thinking it would be better to just see the most basic “free” room. My wife had the same experience checking in for her reservation the next night.
Check-in agents were friendly enough, it was just more Vegas-y than Hilton-y. Oddly, we weren’t offered complimentary bottled water at check-in, but when we had to stop at the desk to get a new key late one night, we were proactively offered water (though given the later hour, it was reasonable to have expected that we might need the water to hydrate and we appreciated it).
I should note that we did get an upgrade to a suite at both Conrad and Crockford’s last year on paid stays (we used an FHR credit at Crockford’s and the Aspire card’s resort credit at Conrad for paid stays last year).
Conrad Las Vegas: The Room
The room was a fairly standard upscale / hint-of-luxury sort of room with a comfortable bed, a small bench at the end of the bed, a table with chairs, a big TV, and plenty of storage.
The bathroom featured a huge shower with both rainfall and handheld showerheads, but no tub. Toiletries were large bottles attached to the wall in the shower or the sink in the bathroom.
There is no coffee in the room (unfortunately, that’s pretty typical in Las Vegas). One of our rooms had bathrobes, the other didn’t.
On our previous (paid) stay at Conrad Las Vegas, we had gotten upgraded to a suite. For those curious, here are pictures of a 1 bedroom suite with a strip view:
As a point of comparison, these pictures from a 1-bedroom suite at Crockford’s from our stay there last year.
The Free Play
The Free Play was a bit of a rigamarole. At hotel check-in at the Conrad, the front desk agent mentioned that they could add the free play and dining credit if we already had our players card, but if not we could stop at the players club desk and get it done later. If I had it to do again, I would print the players club card first before checking in. We checked in first and printed the cards later and regretted it because both of us spent way longer than it seemed like it should have taken to get it done at the players club desk.
I’m not sure why it took so long to get the free play loaded. First, the players club agent had to call the hotel to verify that we were checked in and booked on the Ocean Prime offer and then they asked for our Ocean Prime number (thank goodness for Google Photos and the fact that I had taken a picture of our cards) and then they had to bring it back to a supervisor to get it set up. That process took a looooonnnnng time. I’d estimate I spent at least 20 minutes at the desk when I did it and that was the process going “smoothly”. When my wife did it, we went to the Players Club on Day 1 and waited until the next day to try to use the free play. When we put the card in a slot machine, the free play didn’t show up — so we had to go back to the players club desk. That second agent could see that the first agent had added the free play to my wife’s card and mistakenly set it to expire 1 minute later, so she had to get a supervisor approval to re-issue the free play — and that took forever. Then we took it to a machine and it still didn’t work and they had to do something again. I was surprised at how inefficient this part was.
However, once it was done, it was easy enough to use the free play: you insert your players card in any slot machine, touch the green stack of money icon, click somewhere on the screen to load your $100 in free play and enter your PIN. Then it’s a matter of playing through $100 worth of spins. Once you’ve played through $100 in spins, you can keep whatever is left on the card.
So, for instance, if you’re playing a machine that uses $1 per spin, you need to spin it 100 times and then you keep what’s left.
One thing I thought was awesome about the free play at Resorts World (as compared to free play I’ve done elsewhere) is that there was a line at the bottom of the screen that showed the remaining “promotional value”. That made it really easy to watch that number decline until you knew that you had done $100 in spins and could cash out. I’ve had a really hard time keeping track of free play at other casinos, so this was awesome.
We each played $0.25 ten-handed video poker, so that’s $2.50 per spin. After $100 in spins, I had $65 left and my wife had $49 left, so we cashed out and walked away with $113.
The Dining Credit
This turned out better than expected. Rather than being a credit on your hotel folio, you are issued a comp voucher on your players card. The restaurant needs to swipe your players card and deduct the rewards from it.
One cool thing about the way this works is that it doesn’t need to be used all at once. For instance, Resorts World has a somewhat unique food court called “Famous Foods Street Eats”. Rather than a collection of chain restaurants, Famous Foods is made up of various international food counters — one that serves Vietnamese Pho station, another that specializes in Filipino Lechon, and others focused on sushi, dumplings, BBQ, Peking duck burritos, fish & chips, burgers, and more.
In the food court, you simply order at a kiosk and then pick up at the counter of your choice. My wife and I added dishes from a couple of different food court restaurants to our cart and when we went to check out, one of the payment method options was “Genting Comp Voucher”.
We swiped our players card and then our voucher popped up. As the instructions say, you have to touch the voucher on the screen to select it (that’s why you’ll notice that line of text is highlighted in blue — you had to “select” it before hitting OK).
Interestingly, after selecting to use the voucher, the taxes came off of our total (presumably you don’t pay tax if the food cost is $0?). We therefore used $75.25 of our $100 eating dinner (and I should note that we could have eaten for far less — we had only eaten breakfast the day we used this, so we each ordered an entrée and a couple of side dishes and soft drinks).
That left us with $24.75 to use on that particular food voucher. We decided to use that up on donuts to bring home from Randy’s Donuts. My kids were happy with that decision.
As noted above, my wife and I both booked rooms, so we used one food voucher as described in this section. We used the other $100 food voucher on breakfast one morning…..
Breakfast at Crossroads Kitchen
Crossroads Kitchen is “the first fully “plant-based” inspired Italian/Mediterranean fine-dining restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip” according to the Resorts World website. We were in Las Vegas for a friend’s wedding and several attendees are vegan (and several had $100 dining credits to use thanks to the same deal we were using), so we had a large party for brunch on Sunday morning.
I’m not vegan, but I enjoy vegan food (for the most part) nonetheless. My wife and I both thought that the brunch at Crossroads was very good. There were things you would expect to find on a breakfast buffet like waffles and pancakes, but there was also a pesto station (Get. The. Pesto. It was delicious.) and of course there were various fruits, salad options, and breakfast breads. I didn’t love the vegan cream cheese for the bagels, but that wasn’t surprising to me as I’ve not found a vegan cheese alternative that works for me (my wife was pleasantly surprised by the cream cheese for what it’s worth).
I unfortunately didn’t even think to take pictures of the food or venue, but I wanted to mention it as a surprisingly good breakfast option on a Sunday (note that brunch is only served on Sundays). The piano player in the restaurant waiting area was excellent and the ambiance was nice for brunch.
Casino
I’m not as big of a gambler as my various casino status cards would suggest, but I wanted to share a couple of quick notes on the casino. First of all, the casino area is brightly lit and feels airy / spacious. It is a stark contrast to the sort of trendy dimly-lit casino with super bright machines (like Aria in Las Vegas or Ocean Casino & Resort in Atlantic City). While the casino floor is not smoke-free, I don’t know that I actually saw anyone smoking while we were there and I didn’t notice the smell. The air wasn’t quite as fresh as at ParkMGM (which operates a completely smoke-free casino), but it has a clean and fresh sort of vibe anyway.
Resorts World is clearly going for an upscale sort of vibe and seems to attract a smartly-dressed crowd. The table limits are in line with what you’d expect at a strip casino: in walking around on a Sunday morning around 9am, the cheapest Blackjack tables I saw were $25 (and some were $50). There are far fewer tables here than large strip casinos like Bellagio and The Venetian, but the tables were rarely crowded to the brink.
The casino has a very small sportsbook inside the Dawg House restaurant (that didn’t seem to accept NFL futures bets on who would win the Superbowl, which seemed odd). Speaking of the Dawg House, that’s also where you would use your Hilton Gold or Diamond food & beverage credit if you were on a non-comped stay (several readers reported being told that they were not eligible for that credit on the Ocean offer, so I didn’t push it despite knowing someone who did get it honored on a previous stay).
There is additionally a poker room that seems larger than the demand for poker at Resorts World, though there were quite a few tables and games going each time we passed it. On my previous stay last year, I played a little $1-$3 No Limit and it was some of the wildest poker I’d ever seen. The maximum buy-in was $400 and when I sat down there were several people at the table with more than $2,000 in front of them (I had to double check that I was at the right game!). I soon found out that was because there were some weak players dumping money into the game. I don’t know if that’s a norm — this time around, I didn’t get time or opportunity to play until the night before departure. I played the nightly tournament and unfortunately got knocked out two spots before the money.
There is a bar on the casino floor called the Gatsby Bar. On our previous stay, the place had seemed clam and quiet — it is a bit raised and closed-off by barriers yet without walls so otherwise open to the casino floor and features sofas and high-top tables. After our friend’s wedding on Saturday night, we decided to grab a drink at Gatsby’s with a couple of other friends who had attended the wedding. We ended up spending hours dancing at this bar because the DJ clearly had us figured out. It was a surprisingly great time. Drinks were Las Vegas-priced (i.e. in the $20’s for cocktails), but nobody gave us a hard time about not ordering many.
Overall thoughts
This stay at the Conrad Las Vegas at Resorts World was a phenomenal value thanks to the Ocean Prime match in Atlantic City. We paid $0 for the two rooms we booked, we ate two meals for free, brought some donuts home, and cashed out $114 from our Free Play. When we matched to Ocean Prime, we weren’t sure that we would have occasion to use the free nights in Las Vegas, but this deal really came in handy as a friend decided to get married in Las Vegas and this benefit saved us a bunch of money since it worked for free nights on a weekend (which otherwise would have cost a bundle). Furthermore, I like Resorts World. Over the years, I had grown an irrational loyalty to MGM thanks to its partnership with Hyatt. Unfortunately, we reported yesterday that Marriott has essentially killed the value there entirely with the details of their new partnership with MGM. I’m disappointed about that, but this stay came at a good time as I think it cemented Resorts World as my new preferred place to stay when we return to Las Vegas.
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When I went to use my free play, I noticed that roulette slot machines do not allow free play usage. There is a sticker placed on the machine stating so. The “game king” slots with multiple games such as roulette, blackjack etc will not allow you to bet both black and red. Your best bet will be video blackjack or video poker.
You did mention it in the article, but I of course I forgot…..BRING YOUR OCEANS CARD! When going to the cashier to load the free play and dining they asked for it, luckily I found it in an email from OCEANS, but not sure what we’ll do for my wife’s stay in two days. Called Ocean and they were no help at all. Hoping I can get the front desk to load the offer, otherwise it sounds like we might miss out on the $200 in credits.
Just an update on my wife’s stay. We did NOT have her Oceans number with us and the Rewards desk was very adamant that we needed it. I put up a VERY big stink and asked to speak to a manager. After about 10 minutes the agent came back out and said she could add the credits, and in my opinion basically explained that its too much work for them to figure out if they should add it or not but could do it this time. Save yourself the headache and bring your Oceans card.
currently at conrad and $25/person/day was not given to me. reason given was “I am not eligible as it is comp-booking!”
Just returned from my 2 night stay, was very happy overall. I took your advice and printed my players card first before checking in and then walked back to the front desk where after checking in the agent said he had loaded the free play and dining credit onto it. That night we went to the Dawg House and the waitress came back with my players card and informed me she didn’t see any comp credit. I confirmed this at one of the rewards machines (it showed $0 of free play) so I went to the cashier counter. After explaining that I was there on an offer from Atlantic City she immediately said “those credits never load correctly” and had her manager add it manually. After 5 minutes it worked no problem and I was able to use the $100 free play as well. Interestingly, the next morning I noticed I had another $100 of free play loaded onto my card which I was able to play through as well. The morning after that (although it may have loaded the day before like the free play) a waiter told me I had another full $100 dining credit ready to use… Not sure how replicable this is, but at least I never had to wait 20 minutes at the front desk…
The smoke from cigs and weed was overcoming on our last trip… It was everywhere..lobbies/streets/hallways very unpleasant..
Hilton resort world is one of the worst in special the casino the cocktail waitress take like 30 minutes or more to bring the drinks and the casino is no busy very bad service and always try to charge for the mini bar even if you don’t touch anything
Do you stay downtown at all? My wife and I started off staying at the strip and gradually drifted more and more towards the Fremont area. Not only is it a little less Disneyfied (if that’s even a word) but if you want a change of scenery it’s so easy tho just walk 100 yards to be someplace completely different.
Also, $1-$3 No Limit poker seems like a contradiction in terms.
We went the weekend before you, I wanted to add a couple comments:
We too asked for upgrade and was offered ability to pay for Strip view at $50/night. Ironically in the Hilton app earlier that day I saw they offered online checkin but I figured it wouldn’t work due to the casino promo. A few of the rooms offered seemed to face the Southern Strip, someone could give it a shot
The Asian Street Food Court had half the outlets closed at 7pm on a Sunday night, including the Malaysian noodle place I had wanted. The clay pot dishes at another stand were good though. When a concert let out it was packed but generally the casino was pretty empty for a Sat/Sun
I asked for tier match and my MGM gold (expiring Jan 2024) got me Genting Monarch level which still didn’t offer any tangible benefit for non-gambler patrons. My wife matched her Caesars Diamond to the next lower level. FYI for any interested
**They’ll see the quarterly and annual returns on their Ocean relationship and see all the Prime “elites” who only stay/eat/cash out their $65……I’m betting on this and most casino match deals drying up so use sooner than later!
Also of note, at least one pool and the hot tub stays open in the winter, weather permitting. They were open during my visit January 6th & 7th and it was comfortable in the water even when the temperature outside was in the high 40s. It did close Jan 8th due to wind.
It sucks that you ran bad on Video Poker, it’s a 97-99% game. I always check vpfree2.com to see which machine in a casino has the best pay tables. I recommend Wizard of Odds to learn the optimal strategies. Good luck and reach out if you’re ever heading back to Vegas!
Do you ever get comped nights from Caesars due to your status? I get some, but I earned status with play.
So i have to go to A.C. first?
Nice write up, Nick. I just used my two nights (Jan 14-15). When I made the reservation I had them add my Hilton #. I got an email from Hilton stating that I had $25 credit per person per night, but when checking in was told it was only for the first night. Also, when I called to reserve, I was told the only choice for the casino match was the Conrad. Later I got an email that I had been changed to Crockfords, which is where we ended up with a strip view room. Our room did have a Nespresso machine and complimentary pods, which was surprising for Vegas. We are vegetarians so it was great to be able to use our $100 credit at Crossroads. We really enjoyed it.
I stayed at the Conrad RWLV in November thanks to all of your strategies! Also loved it a lot! The gym was my favorite part with the wall of Theraguns available for use.
Sorry we missed you, Nick, as we checked in on Saturday morning. Happened to catch the World Championship bagel eating contest (at Bagelmania) about a half a block down from Tacos El Gordo on Saturday. Man, the pastrami sando there was among the best I’ve ever had! Walked over and checked out the new Fontainebleau hotel, too. That place has zero vibe, zero decor and honestly felt like a prison or a mausoleum. Very unwelcoming. You’ll want to pass on that visit, brother.
Two tips:
First, Tacos El Gordo (across Las Vegas Blvd) has EXCELLENT cheap eats. I go out of my way for a meal there even when I’m staying elsewhere on the strip. Be warned though that it gets intensely busy late at night.
Second, if you’re not interested in slots and want to cash out as much of the free play as you can, stay away from the reel slots and look for games with less variance. Video blackjack is an okay option, since you’re likely to win enough hands to preserve most of your stake. A more complicated but more reliable option is video roulette: bet both black and red, with a smaller amount on 0/00.
I drove past that place several times and I was very curious! Actually had brunch at Toca Madera (“modern Mexican”) in the shops at Aria on Saturday and vegan tacos and burritos at the wedding, otherwise, I’d have been very tempted to wander over there late at night. Good to know for next time!
For free play, I usually stick with video poker under the understanding that it is also quite low variance. Usually I play the single hand Jacks or Better game, but I saw the 10-handed game and figured I could run through the money faster (and it was a busy weekend, so I was looking to get it done quickly). Never considered video roulette, but interesting strategy!
How was Toca Madera? I have $150 of free money to spend from an old Amex in kind offer, and it is an option.
It was delicious. We got the brunch on Saturday (like you, we have a bunch of InKind money to use and since we have no restaurants on InKind in our immediate vicinity, Vegas seemed like a good opportunity to check something out). Reviews of the restaurant were good, but only 4 out of 5 stars on Google I think (I’m usually looking for 4.5). Still, the brunch menu looked good, so I figured we may as well try it. I am SO glad we did.
We got the Mayan coffee to start and I can not tell you how much I regret having already had a coffee before brunch because I wish I could have done another coffee. That’s not an alcoholic drink FYI — it was just that good.
We got guacamole and street corn as appetizers. The guac was very good. The street corn was fine, but it was the one thing where we thought “meh, it’s just fine”.
I got the Tres Leches French Toast, which was to die for if you like eating dessert for breakfast. It probably took two years off of my life, but I’d sacrifice two more to have it one more time.
My wife got a breakfast burrito. I don’t like eggs (can’t do the texture at all – yuck!), so I don’t eat breakfast burritos, but I tried a bite and it was so delicious that I could have eaten it despite the egg.
My wife had a mimosa and a margarita and reported that both were very tasty (couldn’t tell you the last time she had two cocktails in a sitting no less at brunch, but we were looking to use up chunk of the InKind credit anyway). I had a non-alcoholic Aye Mami, which was very sweet (it’s essentially watermelon juice with a scoop of pineapple sorbet). I don’t really like watermelon (I know, I’m like the only person who doesn’t — it just tastes like water to me and I’d rather not have a slightly red-flavored water), but the combination with the sorbet made it really refreshing to me.
If that sounds like we overdid it, all I can say is that it was far more than it sounds like it was — “overdid” is an understatement. We were absolutely stuffed when we left, but it was terrific. The bill came to a total of $166.92. Keep in mind that you can’t use InKind credit for the gratuity — we had to put that on a card.
There are other places in Vegas that are on InKind. I don’t know that there isn’t a better option, but I do know that I’d happily go back.
Landon, on a $100 free play, could one place $47 on red, $47 on black, and $6 on 0/00 for a guaranteed $94 and possibly $108? Effectively meeting the playthrough requirement in one spin?