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I'm a local and have been numerous times. Food, dealers, and environment are all top notch. Best place to play in Quebec/Ontario...however players from US are likely going to be disappointed.
Comeptiton: Rake is roughly the same as Montreal casino, but because Playground is out in the middle of nowhere, the competition is much stiffer (Playground only had slots and poker so also less recreational players willing to casually give poker a try) so even at 1/2 and 1/3 (the stakes I play) there are very few fish because no casual player is going to drive 30-40 min to play poker.
Promos: recently lowered the payout for any quads from $500 to $200 and it only runs during the night and early morning.
That being said, the waitstaff is the worst I've ever seen! Like genuinely hurting the brand at this point...if you combine Hooters with Poker that's basically Playground.
One waitress gave me the side eye for not tipping them for bringing me a bottle of water after I just tipped them $5 for bringing me food 20 min ago! Ironically the only reason they had to come back and give me a water bottle was because they forgot when I originally asked for it with my meal. Also, it takes forever to get served and when you do there's good chance they'll get your order because who ever does the hiring prioritize girls with fake boobs/lips than actual serving skills.
Won't name anyone specific here - but there are few servers in particular that are so bad that unless the table is REALLY good, I'll try to get a table switch out of their section. One girl had fake nails so long that it touched my pasta, we both stared at each other for a minute that felt like an hour, and she tried to act like nothing was wrong!!! That's disgusting!
Maybe she was just embarrassed, and fair enough, but when I politely asked if she give me a new bowl, she said sure no problem....and I didn't see her again for 40 min. I was starving at this point so when I saw her near the bar I got up out of my seat to ask about my food and she apologized saying that she forgot. I then had to wait another 20-30ish minutes to get served.
I get that this place is full of old men and that they probably tip these women pretty well, but would it kill the owners to hire a few girls that actually worked as servers? It's actually hurting the places reputation at this point and I've started eating before I go.
Maybe that's their 300 IQ plan to make the service so bad that no one orders food and the owners make more money, but if that's the case the Montreal Casino is significantly closer and I've started going there more often.
Tl;dr: the drive to playground is only worth it because of the free food. If you're not going to bother eating because the wait staff is too incompetent to take your order, the Montreal casino is much more convenient to get to.
