It depends. There are 3 different onsite Loews hotels. The least expensive of the 3 is the Royal Pacific. It has a "Pacific Island" theme. The pool there has a "shipwreck" water interactive play area for the kids. It has a nice fitness center that was just recently renovated. I would say that if you have smaller kids, this is the resort most geared for them.

The "middle of the road" hotel is the Hard Rock hotel. Per its name, the theme is Rock and Roll music. I do believe the pool there has a nice slide and they pipe music into it that you can hear when under the water. My kids like this resort the best because the last time we stayed here, we were upgraded to a Kid's suite room which was very large. (Note that this is not a normal Loews First Plat upgrade and my kids were 12 and 13 at the time.)

The Portofino Bay hotel tends to be the most expensive and is billed by Loews (and Universal) as one of the top 50 resorts in the world. The rooms are a little bigger with some more plush items. There are 3 pools at this resort with the largest including a sand beach into the pool. I do believe it has a water slide as well. As the name implies it has an "Italian" theme and has more of a romantic feel to it. My wife really likes this hotel.

I would say that I have stayed more at the Royal Pacific than the other two. This was probably more due to the expense than anything. I stayed only one time at the Portofino and that was when my wife and I went without the kids. There were a few more restaurants there to choose from (though the Royal Pacific now has Emeril's Tchoup Chop restaurant which is a little pricey but the food tastes good. )

You can walk from the hotels to Universal's Citywalk or the parks if you want. The Hard Rock was the first of the onsite hotels and is the closest. The Royal Pacific is the farthest away, but still isn't too far to walk. There are complementary water taxis that run continuously throughout the day that will pick you up the hotel or Citywalk and drop you off at the other. When we stay at the Hard Rock we tend not to use the water taxis as much because we can usually walk more quickly than ride. But when staying at the other 2 we will make much more use of the water taxis.

So the real question is who are you going with and is price an issue? Just yourself and your spouse/significant other? If so, the Portofino Bay hotel, as I mentioned is a little more romantic than the others. If your kids are really into music, the Hard Rock hotel is a neat place to visit. If your kids are younger, I think the Royal Pacific's pool's interactive play area may be what they remember the most. (Mine did when they were a little younger.) And as cost goes, the Royal Pacific tends to be the least expensive. The Hard Rock in the middle, and the Portofino Bay tends to be the most expensive of the three. All three have Club level rooms where you have access to the Club Lounge with breakfast and other snacks throughout the day. While the lounge is nice, it is a bit pricey to get onto the Club level and your Loews Plat status won't help with that. With all the food options in the parks, at the hotels, and Citywalk, it just isn't worth the extra expense for us.

Note that if you can get Loews First Plat, it comes with a few very nice benefits. First, and this may also affect which resort you choose, you can get a suite upgrade at the time you make the reservation. (Note that this is at the time of reservation, NOT at the time you check-in.) The suite is their base King suite that can accomodate 3 adults (though when the kids were younger I have stayed there with my wife and both of them. But they both fit on the pull-out sofa bed when we did that.) A new benefit to Plat is that you will get a $100 credit to your hotel bill for food, beverages and spa treatments. Note that I was at the Royal Pacific just last week. I was told when I checked in that the credit was good for food at any of the restarants in Citywalk or the Parks if you charge them to your room. But when I was checking out, they didn't give me the $100 credit. They told me that only charges made from the hotel restaurants counted (and some of them don't either like the Tchoup Chop restaurant at Royal Pacific.) Since the person that checked me in was incorrect in what she told me, the manager did relent and give me the $100 credit, but it took a little bit of talking before he did that. So ask upfront exactly what charges the $100 can come out of and you should be fine. You will also get free internet access. So you won't have to pay to get your FT fix every night. There are other benefits, but those are the two biggies.

To help with the price, if one person in your party has a Universal Preferred Annual Pass, then you might be able to get a discount on your hotel stay. If you are checking prices online, try the code "APH" and if the rate is available you might be able to save some money. But realize that technically, the "APH" rate is not supposed to come with your Plat benefits as it isn't a publicly available rate. So if you want that suite upgrade or the $100 room credit, then you might have to for go the possibly cheaper APH rate.

I love staying onsite at Universal. The room key FastPass is something that really makes the extra expense worth it. Being able to ride the Hulk rollercoaster with only a 1 minute wait rather than the 1 hr+ everyone else has makes it all worthwhile. And you can ride the Hulk ride over and over and over all day long if you choose and never wait more than a minute or two.

If you have more questions you ask here or PM me.