Remote Reels At Caesars Proves Innovation Isn’t Always Improvement

What’s a word for “I applaud the concept, I like the idea of thinking outside the box, but uh, yeah, hard pass”?

Sadly, there isn’t a word. I looked. I may have to make one up.

But that’s exactly the feeling I had when playing the newly-launched “Remote Reels” on Caesars Palace Online Casino in New Jersey.

What is Remote Reels? Put simply, it’s the ability to play actual brick-and-mortar slot machines from my phone.

There’s a literal walled-off area at a studio inside Tropicana Atlantic City, featuring about two dozen slot titles. The set-up is through a partnership with Awager, which also has what amounts to basically the same set-up via the FanDuel Casino app.

But FanDuel, at least to my eyes, has launched its product with zero fanfare. Emails to FanDuel (and Awager) were not immediately returned.

Caesars put out a big release about it:

“We’re proud to be the first online casino operator to have premier titles such as Huff N’ Even More Puff, Mo’ Mummy Valley of Riches, Mo’ Mummy Mighty Pyramid and Buffalo Triple Boost in a remote-to-cabinet play format,” said Matthew Sunderland, senior vice president and chief iGaming officer at Caesars Digital. “The debut of our state-of-the-art Remote Reels studio inside Tropicana Atlantic City is the latest example of the innovation we aim to deliver to our online casino players and represents the perfect blend of the familiar feeling of slot play on a casino floor at one of our Caesars Rewards destinations with a fully mobile experience.”

He’s not wrong. 

But it kinda-sorta is low-key … not fun.

‘Live’ to fight another day

You know what else also isn’t that much fun? Live dealer casino on my phone.

I mean, I get it. For one thing, it slows gameplay down a bit, so it feels more like regular ol’ gambling instead of tap-tap-tap-tap-tilt.

And yes, playing blackjack and having a 20 and getting beat by a live dealer with a 6-6-4-5 draw feels … well, still terrible, but at least there’s no nagging sensation — despite all evidence to the contrary — that the electronic version that pulls the same cards is somehow cheating.

So, sure. I get live dealer games. There’s something more sedate about them. And there is a difference in gameplay. Playing blackjack or roulette “live” is a markedly different experience than the purely digital iCasino version.

But this product? It’s slots. Anyway you cut it. Still slots.

And while I will grant Caesars and FanDuel and Awager grace here, the live product is actually worse than the iCasino version.

It’s the same as regular slots, except the colors feel washed out, I couldn’t find a game where you could wager less than 80 cents a spin (remember, I’m a low roller), the sounds are muffled, and the gameplay feels slightly slower.

To my eyes, there’s not one aspect of it that’s at all better in any way.

Offer me a higher RTP? Well that’d be a reason to play. Does it offer a higher RTP? Who knows, I couldn’t figure out how to find out.

Offer me another human I can interact with while playing? Well, not moving the needle for me, but maybe for others.

Do … anything that makes it feel, in any way, better? Sure, I’ll come back.

But as is? I don’t see it.

I give Awager credit for the idea, I give Caesars and FanDuel credit for giving it a spin, hardy-har-har, but my $10 could’ve lasted me longer in the app, and the colors and sounds would’ve been brighter, and the experience, overall, would have been better.

I’m not closing the book on this — after all, this is brand-new — but let’s see some improvements. Give me a reason to come back.

Hey! I got the word. “Mehnovative.”