More American, to be precise. There is not much old European gambling (left?) in Macau; I am partial to the MO because it reminds me of some fading Passée-les-Bains.

We stayed at the Starworld and Crown last week, and I liked the latter very much. The view is spectacular, and the rooms are well furnished and generous in size. The entire place feels very stylish and luxurious. In my view, it currently is the best Macau property -- except for the location, of course.

The Starworld was fun, the rooms are also pretty nice, but I think we were the only Westerners there. Language skills are a bit lacking, which in our case resulted in somewhat lowered service levels. If you can excuse that, the Starworld is great value.

Finally we stayed what may well have been a last night at the MO. I still love the resort, and the rooms are OK, but the bathrooms are in desperate need of repairs. For those who aren't bothered by this, the MO (esp. at the club level) is still a nice place, but it certainly is not the best value in Macau. I was very sad to see the casino deserted, while other places were super busy.

For a player of "Western" games, of course, the new places are highly undesirable. (There is no difference for Baccarat players). While the Sands still offers a single-zero roulette wheel (albeit with numbers in a strange order) and dealer stands on all 17s Blackjack, the Wynn has started the trend toward 0/00 and dealers hitting on soft 17s. The best deals can be found at the old SGM casinos with their oddly slow and bureaucratic games (and an inordinate number of burned Blackjack cards); the MO features late surrender without the usual restrictions that come with this very player-friendly rule. When watching the Asian games, I am always stunned by some of the spectacularly poor odds associated with some bets. But Western sucker bets are now available as well, thanks to "Casino War."