Poker: Tables or Machines?
by Keara22HI, HSM team writer
Interview the experts. The Casino leaderboard crowd: older than the average Home user, decidely larger percentage of females than is typical in a lot of other games in Home, and dedicated to being in Home most of their free time. If anyone would have great suggestions, that’s the group.
Plus, having played poker in there, I can tell you that these are some of the nicest people in Home. And the funniest – you cannot spend more than an hour in there without cracking up over the antics, comments, and overall quirkiness of this crowd. It’s like being in the Cheers Bar, “where everyone knows your name.”
They prefer the table play. Not one said they liked the video poker machines a lot. And it is easy to see why: they like the social aspects of table play. It is not a contest between table play versus machine play poker. It is about the fun people have playing a game with folks they like. In the video, you will also find comments about the low payout from the machines and other reasons they prefer table play, but overall, the consensus is: “we will stay right where we are, thank you!”
Meanwhile, Digital Leisure made a very clever move by putting the video poker machines where the slot machines had previously been, as a method of increasing the game’s visibility. The VIP Room folks did have some interesting suggestions on how to make those machines more fun, however, from adding a wild card/joker or having a higher stakes/higher payout machine for those who want to bet more and win more, to having a video poker leaderboard or just offering a wider range of poker games in the machines. To get the exact quotes, you’ll need to watch this video on the full-screen option.
My own personal suggestion? Put a machine in the hallway by the elevator so that anyone going to/from their hotel room will see it and be tempted to try it.
For the VIP Room enhancements, the suggestions were also very astute. The best one I saw was to add at least one high-stakes table with a minimum 10,000 chip buy-in. This will not appeal to the newbie “all-in” kids, but it will give high-rollers an incentive to play for even more chips (and glory). Several players also suggested a 100-chip jukebox or other music source. Just do not make it one song played on a loop constantly for hours, please. Also, several times when I have been there, all the tables are full and people are standing around waiting. At least one more table would be appreciated in the VIP Room. A queue system like the Bowling Alley would also help for those waiting.
And for the downstairs poker section? The repeated suggestion I saw was to create a barrier at the entrance into the poker space: that the user must be holding the minimum table buy-in amount in chips to gain entrance to the room. This might deter the freezers who run in and out of there, gleefully trying to ruin the game for everyone else.
Latest wrinkle: I heard a rumor that some of the top players in the VIP Room are so fed up with all the freezing and poofing going on in there that they are starting a VIP Poker Club using a clubhouse space. This way, they can escape there to play at times when all the tables are full in the VIP Room, or the malicious freezing situation is out of hand, or a game disrupter is creating chaos. Maybe Digital Leisure would like to create a place like that inside the Casino itself: a VIP Club Room with a capacity of 32 players. Eligibility would hinge on Penthouse ownership. It would give an additional incentive to reach the magic million mark and get the penthouse reward.
So, without further ado: here’s the poker interview video.
August 25th, 2012 by keara22hi | 2 comments
Keara is also known in Home as DarthGranny. She is a wicked little old lady with a wild sense of humor.
Me personally, prefer the poker tables. Not only does it involve interaction with other players and socialization, but there is a SKILL, yes SKILL… to playing poker. I use to work in a card room and learned very quickly. It is a time consuming skill to determin how the other players are playing then determin how you will play your next hand. You cannot exercise your skill in a poker vending machine. Those are a rip off and destroy the whole experince of playing a REAL poker game. Just my opinion of course.
I think the machine are mostly a variation of the traditional slot machine. They’re good to keep the already addicted gamer spending. Poker is a totally different thing than pushing buttons.