Fort McDowell Casino
Address: 10424 North Fort McDowell Road Fountain Hills, AZ 85264
Phone: 800-843-3678
Fort McDowell Casino Casino and entertainment information, restaurants and gift shops, and map and directions.
Reviews
By: David G.- For starters, it is extremely poorly organized. Whenever I go to a new casino,
the first thing I do (before gambling) is sign up for the players club. Usually
at a casino it is very easy to find. Not here. It was hidden in a back room of
the casino, and I had to ask two staff members where it was before I finally
found it. Second, at the main entrance (where I went in) I had to walk through
the bingo room before reaching any slot machines.
Overall staff seemed friendly and helpful and overall provided excellent
customer service. This is important because you will need them if you need to
locate anything (like the players club or a restroom).
The casino is built in a very drab box structure, and I would describe this
casino as "no thrills." The overall atmosphere consists of a very plain and
uninteresting building with not that much to look at. To make matters worse, it
was extremely smokey. Normally casinos have a ventilation system to handle the
smoke problem. Not here. It was by far one of the smokiest casinos I have ever
been to. You could smell the smoke as soon as you entered the building.
The buffet was OK. The food was OK, the service was pretty good, and the menu
options are very limited. The restrooms were pretty clean for the most part, but
again, like everything else in this casino, were quite smokey.
In terms of fairness, I managed to win $10 using the $10 free play bonus I got
for signing up. After playing it back I won another $10 and ended up using that
to pay for my meal at the buffet. I therefore would classify their slots as
relatively fair based on my first time gambling here.
This is the only casino in Arizona I have been to so far where you get 1 point
per dollar spent. Usually it's 1 point per $5. This is much fairer, and matches
the rules at the Vegas casinos. Each point entitles you to a comp of
approximately one cent, so you get 1 cent per dollar played. This is probably
the best thing about this casino.
BY: Alexis R-
Oh. Dear. God.
The people that complained about smoky? They were SERIOUSLY understating the
case. The casino REEKS from about 25 feet from the entrance!! This is the
WORST ventilation system of any casino I've ever stepped foot in. Even a smoker
with a full blown case of emphysema and nicotine stained fingers would choke in
here!
By contrast, the bingo room was really well ventilated--you could actually hear
the giant air handlers moving the stale air out. So much better in fact, that
even though we HATE bingo, we lingered and were chatting with the employees of
the bingo room.
The buffet? We went on a Saturday, and the website for FMC said that it was
brunch until 2:30. We got there right at 12 and I was craving scrambled eggs
and maybe, if I was lucky, a waffle.
HA! No brunch. Beef ribs. Roasted chicken. Breaded fried Tilapia, salad bar.
Pie.
To be fair, the beef ribs and the tilapia (and the blueberry pie) were good.
Everything else had an odd flavor like they had accidentally dripped some Mr.
Clean into a few pots and pans and forgot to rinse them.
Skip this whole experience. It's not going to kill you, but it's not
pleasurable either.
We may go back for Lunar Bingo, but we will park right by the Bingo room and
avoid every other portion of this casino.
I will update my review if warranted.