Electronic Poker is a beloved game that is able to be played in casinos all over the world, or alternatively at home on your PC, using a web account. The rules are very straightforward and involve the player attempting to achieve the highest mixture of cards achievable in order to win money. In this respect it’s much the same as a regular game of poker, without the involvement with other players. Of course, tactics used in a physical game of poker, like tricking, will be irrelevant here.
The game of Electronic Poker begins when the gambler inserts credits (either tokens, credit slips or money) into the machine and presses the draw button. A 5 card hand will be electronically ‘dealt’ on the video screen.
The Video Poker machine also has buttons with ‘hold’ printed on them, and gamblers should now decide which cards to hold and which to discard. For the cards the bettor wishes to keep, the ‘hold’ buttons need to be pressed so that they light up. The player can decide to keep any amount of cards they wish, from all to none.
After the bettor has chosen which cards she would like to keep, they should press ‘draw’, which will mean that any fresh cards are given out if desired. The hand is now completed, with the Video Poker machine analyzing the cards to see if it matches any of the winning hands listed in the payout schedule.
Typically, the minimum winning hand on a Video Poker machine is a pair of jacks with the award money getting larger for each better hand. A list of common winning hands starts with jacks or better, and moves on to 2 pairs, three of a kinds, straights, flushes, full houses, four of a kinds, straight flushes and last but not least royal flushes. It is obvious that the payout schedule can change from game to game, so that experienced gamblers are agile enough to pick the most beneficial machine every time.
As soon as the first round has played out, the player can either choose to stay on and try to to maximize their winnings, or press the ‘collect’ button to cash out any credits that they may have won. Additionally, several versions of the game give the player a chance to double their wins, in which case another game is played. There are also variations between individual machines, with some decks of cards having wild cards and other varying elements to enhance playability.