Shell's Diamond Casino review (first impressions!)

The new DLC is here. The Diamond casino & resort opened its doors and because you were forcefully teleported there it's hard to ignore. But how good is it? I figured I'd hit F12 (= make screenshot) several times and share my impressions with my fellow Steamers.

Editorial (intro)

Hi gang!

It's finally here, the casino has opened its doors and now we (or... most (?) of us) can enjoy the world of "fast" money and gambling! I went in open minded (although I had some serious hesitations) and figured I'd share my experiences and first impressions with you guys.

At the time of writing I haven't played any story missions just yet, only some VIP work which wasn't all that bad though the payout was plain out "meh", which was to be expected. I was left disappointed that despite me linking my Twitch account to my Social club account I did not get the penthouse for free. I'm sure that will get fixed later but I really didn't feel like contacting R* support over this today.

Honestly though? I think the prices are fair. The penthouse itself is around 600k and you can add optional additions to it which have their own pricetag. Bottom line though: for around one million you can get started with the DLC which I think is fair enough. The other stuff though.... hmm.

But... let's get into the review!

Bugs & fixes

So my really first impressions were plain out bad. I had started the game, the casino intro movie shows and I end up automatically teleported to the casino parking lot. Really R*? This is bad comedy because you know what will happen next: try hards camping around the parking lot to have fun with newbies who got forcefully teleported there also. Way to go R*, such brilliant thinking. It's a sure way to piss off plenty of players.

It also didn't help that my controller didn't work properly. I couldn't move: whenever I used the left analog stick my phone would pop out and I was selecting functions there. Fortunately for me I had the presence of mind to start my game as it always does and I ended up in an empty lobby. But what if you didn't?

Second "restarted game" impressions

They actually fixed stuff!

I sometimes like to roleplay a little bit so I figured I'd head over to the casino dressed sharply. I wasn't going to go all the way back to my house or office (which are in Del Perro, so the other side of the map) so I called out my Terrorbyte, and what do you know? We can select saved outfits from the clothing section again.

A totally unimportant feature for sure, but it does go to show you that R* have also applied bugfixes to the game.

Next I also spotted changes in the context menu: now all property service options are grouped under 1 entry: services. I'm not sure what to make of this. On one hand it makes things easier to find and cleans up the main menu (less clutter). On the other hand it now takes more clicks to call up my Terrorbyte.

Anyway, I dressed up, grabbed my car and... let's check out the casino!

Diamond casino: members only!

No more phonecalls! (sorta...)

After I had restarted my game everything worked out and much to my surprise I didn't got any annoying phonecalls but instead the notification you see above. I can live with that to be honest. So I drove over to the entrance and before I knew I was welcomed into the casino.

Honestly the movies and such are nice. Not too special but I do think R* has a knack for adding a bit of atmosphere to their cut scenes. I liked the welcome, I was wondering why the guy was patting me on the back so many times and all in all it was fun.



I ended up on the casino floor fully free to look around. And this is where I noticed the first major annoyance: why can't I run? It takes ages (a little bit exaggerated but...) to reach some of the goals (look at the icons in my mini-map to get an impression). Honestly? The forced walking makes the missions a lot less appealing to me because... you guessed it: you need to walk across the casino floor to reach those.

But now I'm getting ahead of myself.....



If you're a guest and you just want to try this stuff out: head over to the info section and you can buy a guest pass for 500 GTA$. This allows you to play the regular games in the casino; so slot machines, roulette, etc. This is of course assuming you're allowed access to all this because in some countries gambling has been restricted and R* are definitely taking the easy way out a bit (I'll get back to that comment soon!).

Not much to look out for (yet?)

So I stopped at the shop to see what new stuff we could buy. Now, sure, this is the stuff for female avatars but then again.. even from a roleplay perspective this stuff left me kinda indifferent. It's not bad to have dice earrings, sure, but it's not all that great either. For starters: who will notice these?

I was expecting fancy suits which allowed you to "dress to kill" but none of that. Glasses I don't want to own because they look weird, earrings I don't care for (then again... I don't care for those anyway because if you try to fit a female avatar with a watch, earrings and a wristband then the earrings suddenly disappear).

SO I guess I should cave in and buy myself a new apartment even though I don't really need nor want any.

Getting a new condo (and new bills!)

The penthouse is kind of nice but at the same time also hardly as special as you might think. For starters: there's absolutely nothing new here. All this does is collect all the options that are already (freely!) available to you in Los Santos and add those as (paid) modules to your penthouse.

First you start with the master penthouse which costs you 600k GTA$. In order to add extra modules you need to add a lounge area which adds another 400k to the bill. Then you're free to pick the modules you want. Now: I picked the manual setup, you can also buy an existing preset for a fixed price. This basically gets you the condo with a specific amount of extensions, or modules as I'd like to call them. As with most properties: if you walk towards an area for which you didn't buy the module then you'll get a warning about having to buy the option first. It's not something I like, but considering the relatively low price I also don't think it's unfair either.

Nothing new but extra daily bills...

All these modules are not really bad and it looks decent enough but my main gripe is that it doesn't add anything new, except for new daily bills. The main penthouse costs you 500 GTA$ per day in service costs and every module you add will increase this by 100 GTA$, as shown above. It's not really expensive, but it does annoy me because this makes it obvious that we're dealing with another money sink, not something that can help us make easier money.

I decided to add a bar and personal spa to see what it was all about, also because the spa was said to have your personal stylist. Well...



This hot tub is basically the same thing you'd find on a yacht as well as on the penthouse roof. The main exception, as shown above, is that this one has a barber looking over whatever you do. Voyeurism much? And like I said: it's basically a barber, the same you'd find in Los Santos, only those can be visited for free. This one needs you to pay around 400k and then a daily charge of 100 GTA$ per day. And like I mentioned too many times now: it adds absolutely nothing new to the game.

Anyway, other than adding modules you can chose between 3 different color schemes and 9 wall patterns (which all cost money of course). Then it happens: you're the new owner of the penthouse!

Silly (but fun) cut scenes

Ey, hands off ;)

As soon as you enter the penthouse for the first time you'll get a cutscene where the manager (Ms. Baker, I now call her Ma Baker) shows you around. It doesn't take long before Mr. Cheng shows up and he's basically completely stoned. This isn't really expanded on, its obvious that the manager doesn't want to risk scaring you away, but something isn't right either.

The story was played out quite well I think. From the moment you enter the casino and get welcomed they're hinting at something not being right and as you go along this only builds up. It eventually gets pieced together when Ma Baker calls you to tell you that despite all the glamour on the outside, things aren't going well on the inside.

One problem being Mr. Cheng but the other is a Texan investor who's trying to take over the casino. If you could help them out then it might be very profitable for you....

It's not bad, but it's not great either....

The whole penthouse itself isn't too bad. But I don't enjoy how everything I build up is now easily forgotten. Take the example above: I can call in for a Frogger helicopter and it'll cost me 200 GTA$. But why can't I have my own personal helicopter flown in?

Or worse... if I'm on the penthouse roof and call up my personal helicopter using the interaction menu then it gets placed in the casino parking lot to the north (near the tracks). Not the helipad I'm close to. It's not a big issue but annoying nonetheless because you'll have to go through plenty of loading screens before you'll get to your chopper. Speaking of which... why doesn't the elevator door close properly? It's no big deal but makes this thing look sloppy.

And they even try to rip you off....

If you go to your personal bar you can buy a bottle of champagne (silver, gold or diamond) for 30k, 50k or 150k. If you walk to the front of your penthouse and use the phone service option as shown above you can use the free champagne service instead. This delivers a bottle of champagne that gets added to your inventory so that you can drink it at any time you'd like.

Interior decorating!

I think this is pretty cool... If you open the interaction menu while in your penthouse and check out the penthouse entry then you'll find an option to decorate your penthouse completely to your own taste, you can see an example above. This is kinda nice I think; you can use chips to buy props that can be added to all parts of your penthouse, including all the optional extra modules you added.

There are 2 types to chose from: props and paintings. Props can be placed in several areas around your penthouse, while paintings go on the wall (duh!).

This looks like something I'll be adding to my penthouse bedroom soon ;)

Keep one thing in mind though: the more props you add, the longer your loading times will become. So you might want to keep your spending spree's in check.

The casino floor...

So now that I'm a VIP I decided to check the casino out. It's fun, and it heavily reminded me of Test Drive Unlimited 2 which also added a casino resort to their online game. The only difference is that their games are a lot more sophisticated than these making it also more fun I think.

But first things first: there are a few important places to keep in mind here. First the wheel of fortune, shown above, which you can spin for free once per day. This gives you the option to win some interesting stuff, including a new car. So far I won 20k worth of chips, which is fun because of the second place of interest: the cashier where you can buy and exchange ('sell') chips. Provided that gambling is allowed in your country of course.

Next you have several casino games: slot machines, roulette, card games, etc. So far I only tried a slot machine from which I got 500 chips, fun. Of course I used 300 to play so basically the payout is a bit meh. But then again; the house always wins, right?

Finally there's also the management area from which you can start the story missions. I'm happy to report that the required player amount is 2 - 4. So you only need one extra player to get through these missions.

The downside to all this is that you can't run on the casino floors, so it takes quite a while to get from one place to the other, and that kind of annoys me.

Playing a slot machine...

The games themselves are fun, but in my opinion also not that special. Take the slot machine above: you hit play, pay 100 chips and what gets shown on the middle row accounts for any winnings. "Another" casino resort I played with (in the previously mentioned 'TDU2' game) expanded on this and also allowed you to raise your bets by adding more lines which could contain winnings. It added a bit more to a "simple" slot machine which also made it more fun I think.

The missions

There are 2 types of "casino missions" which you can play. First are the story missions, the start screen of the first is shown above, and these get you through the story behind the Diamond casino. Keep in mind that in order to progress you need to host a mission, not just participate in playing one. So: you'll need to enter the casino floor, walk over to the management section, step in the corona and then start the mission.

Next to 'story missions' you also get access to VIP work: if you're a VIP, CEO or even MC president (?) you can call Ma Baker and ask for work. She'll give you a variety of jobs and some are quite good I think. So far I only played 2: I had to pick up a high roller in a limo from the airport, and I had to go out and find a missing van which ended up under attack from the Lost.

The only problem is that the payment is plain out bad: even though I stalled the rescue mission a bit (where I had to fight the Lost) my eventual payment was 9k. Which isn't that exciting considering that a mission like Sight seer bags you a quick 20k.



But although the payment may be somewhat bad: the (VIP) free roam missions which I played so far were actually quite good. In the mission shown above I killed the Lost, grabbed the car and then drove it back to the casino. Only to pass the Lost clubhouse and sure enough: they all turned hostile on me. That's a small detail that was quite cool and really helped to create a good atmosphere.

... if only the payouts were a bit better.

In conclusion...

Keep in mind that these are my first impressions only, so there could be things that I'm overlooking and I could also be wrong about a few things as well. If you spot any mistakes or have additions then please leave a comment below.

But all in all I think the Casino DLC is decent. It's definitely not the best and I can well imagine that die-hard grinders won't really enjoy this because it doesn't add any new (and reliable!) options to make more money. This may sound unfair but honestly... it's R* who put so much emphasis on GTA$'s that it's only normal to check what a new feature can pay out.

Beware the bugs though! I noticed some arcade machines in my private bar but when I started playing I couldn't stop. Not because I didn't want to, but because the game didn't recognize the quit button; it simply ignored it. So I had to forcefully close my game and restart. "fun".

Pro's

• A new property which you can fully customize ('interior decorating').
  
• An extra 10 car (private) garage, but also an option to park your car in a public garage.
  
• New missions, both story missions as well as 'VIP contact' missions.
  
• New stuff to collect (jewelry, clothing, etc.).
  
• A daily chance to win something cool, including a new car.
  
• Many new gambling mini-games like slot machines, roulette, etc.
  
• You can exchange chips to and from GTA$.
  
• Fast travel, for free! You can use the telephone service in your penthouse and request to be taken to a specific area, meaning that you'll be teleported there (after a small cut scene). Unfortunately all destinations are static, you can't ask a limo driver to take you home for example (which kind of defeats the purpose I think).
  
• Many added bugfixes in general.

Cons

• No running on the casino floor: it's going to take you some time to get to places.
  
• The penthouse doesn't really add anything new to the game: all the expansion options simple add stuff which is already available elsewhere in Los Santos. Some of it is pretty useless too: how many times do you plan to change your hair or face make-up?
  
• Because everything is happening in one location you can expect camping try-hards and griefers around the casino.
  
• Even though you may own your private airforce none of that is recognized. You can't ask people to fly in your private helicopter for example.
  
• Owning a penthouse adds a daily charge of 500 GTA$, and adds 100 GTA$ for every extension you buy.
  
• You won't get called to persuade you to buy into a penthouse, but you will get called every time to take on the mission(s) once you bought one.

Concluding

All in all I think the DLC isn't too bad. You get a new property which can be (somewhat) fun, and it's reasonably affordable too. Next you get access to new missions which, although not very rewarding money wise, can be fun to do. And you can try and wage your money to try and earn more.

And don't forget about the daily option to win a prize.

On the down side though you're basically buying into stuff that's already available, there's nothing really new here. It also won't help you pay the bills either, more like the exact opposite.

So yeah... there you have it. I think it's a somewhat fun DLC, but also not that special. Hardly as exciting as I hoped it would be. Which is a shame because I see myself back to grinding money soon enough. Which is slowly starting to get boring too, and this DLC doesn't really change any of that. Quite the contrary because if you do want to buy into all this you'll probably need to do even more grinding than before.

I honestly don't think that this DLC's appeal is going to last for very long.

[iMoveFasterAlone]

I sat the penthouse as spawn point - so easy access to the daily wheel of fortune - and buying chips (to spend on clothes and art). Then I change spawn point and swap lobby. I'm still on first impression level, but I like this dlc so far. Relax > grind

[DukeHazard]

Don't forget the car you get at the end of doing all the missions