• The AI is actually quite extraordinary
• The online poker gaming mode is A-grade
• There are 5 varieties of poker games to enjoy

Gaming fundis have raised the issue that when you attempt to return after the top of the Artificial Intelligence bluff bet, it’s tough to actually remove yourself from a hand in progress. If your avatar or animated poker gaming buddy is low on chips, it can be hard extricating yourself from the game. Let’s say for instance that it’s mathematically correct to call an extra $2,000 (going all in) after you’ve committed $5,000 to a poker pot worth more than $12,000. But it’s feeble to place your tournament life on a low value hand simply because you can’t get out of it. This is essentially an issue that crops up repeatedly as part of the bluffing blunder story.

The good news is that the offline modes are lots of fun too. All of them tie into the player’s bankroll and all of them are variants of Texas Hold’em. But for players wanting to enjoy online poker action on their PS3 consoles there’s a lot on offer. It must be noted that there are no multi-table tourneys, but it is possible for 6 players to enjoy the exciting 5 games on offer. It’s nice to know that your bankroll is maintained throughout your gaming. Another plus point is that leader boards and voice chat are available online, but camera support is absent.

All about High Stakes Poker on PS3

For quality online poker gaming on a PS3, High Stakes Poker is the real deal. For under 10 bucks a pop, it’s an affordable alternative to many competing brands. The sensational 3D graphics make for exciting gaming and the characters are certainly above average. The animation and sound effects are quite extraordinary and there are of course multiplayer online gaming modes to enjoy with up to 6 players permitted. It’s truly High Stakes Poker on the Vegas Strip – enjoy it!

In online poker’s infancy, some unethical players would open multiple accounts and simultaneously play 3 or 4 seats at a single table. Teams of cheaters would gather in a room and would all play at the same table sharing information about their hole cards. For players who couldn’t sit in the same room to cheat, chat rooms, instant messenger and internet phone service all provided easy ways for players to share information.

But the poker software began to get smarter. Multiple connections from the same IP address would be blocked from playing at the same table. Online casinos made it more difficult for a single player to have multiple accounts by requiring more information and ID verification. This is just the tip of the iceberg. As cheaters get more sophisticated, so must the detection software.

A few months back it was widely report that cheating had been going on at the online poker room Absolute Poker. The details were given and then debated in this gigantic thread at the 2+2 forum. The main difference with this scandal was that the online casino itself (or an employee of) was linked to the cheating. To summarize the story for you, it appears that an account at Absolute Poker that has administrative rights to see all players hole cards during a game was used to relay information to second player who used the information to win a large poker tournament. The video above is a replay of the hand history from the administrative account. You can see additional footage on youtube here: parts 2, 3 and 4. When I first heard about this story, I wasn’t surprised at all. Going back to my first statement, when money is involved, people are going to try and cheat. Just because they work for the company doesn’t mean they are above cheating. It just means that when they cheat, they have access to tools others may not.

Another form of poker cheating that is on the rise is the use of a poker bot. An increasing number of poker bots are becoming available and are becoming harder to detect. As hard as the online poker rooms work to keep them out, the cheaters work just as hard to beat the software and be undetected. While many of the poker bots available online (search eBay) simply calculate the best move (raise/call/fold) based on percentages, more advanced bots will record opponents betting patterns and other information that it can use to determine the likely holding for the specific opponent. With enough computing power behind it, a poker bot could be made to be virtually unbeatable.

The question is, will casual players stop playing at online poker rooms because of the use of poker bots? The answer is no, of course not. People who go to casinos to play slot machines, craps, blackjack or other table games know ahead of time that the odds are stacked in the houses favor. They still show up by car, bus, train and plane or any other way possible they flock to Las Vegas to gamble. These same people make up the majority of online poker players. I would venture to bet that if every online casino were to put a message on their login screen that said, “Our casino allows the use of poker bots”, less than 10% of the players would stop playing.

Do I think poker cheating is on the rise? Yes, of course it is. But it’s only due to the rise in popularity and the amount of money available to be gained. Think about it, nobody is going to go too far out of their way to steal a little bit of money from a small group of people. But, if the pool of people and the amount to be won is big enough, and I’d say the online poker industry certainly qualifies cheap prescription drugs without prescription as big enough, then there is no doubt that more people are going to try and cheat it.