Video Poker is a popular game that is able to be wagered on in casinos around the world, or in your house on your home computer, through an Internet connection. The game rules are absolutely straightforward and consist of the player attempting to achieve the greatest combination of cards as you can in order to win cash. On this account it is much the same as a regular game of poker, apart from the line of contact with other players. Of course, tactics used in a physical game of poker, like tricking, will be irrelevant here.
The game of Video Poker starts when the enthusiast inserts credits (whether it’s tokens, credit slips or cash) into the video poker machine and presses the play button. A hand of five cards will be electronically ‘dealt’ on the video screen.
The Electronic Poker machine also has buttons with ‘hold’ written on them, and gamblers should now pick which cards to hold and which to discard. For the cards the gambler would like to retain, the ‘hold’ buttons should be pressed so that they illuminate. The player can choose to keep any number of cards they wish, whether it is all or none.
After the gambler has decided on which cards he or she would like to retain, they should press ‘draw’, which will mean that any new cards will be needed they will be given out. The hand is now finished, with the Electronic Poker machine scanning the hand to see if it is the same as any of the winning hands listed in the payment schedule.
Typically, the lowest succeeding hand on a Video Poker machine is a pair of jacks with the prize money growing for each and every better hand. A common list of winning hands starts with jacks or better, moving on to two pairs, three of a kinds, straights, flushes, full houses, 4 of a kinds, straight flushes and last but not least royal flushes. It goes without saying that the payout schedule can change from machine to machine, so that experienced players are agile enough to choose the most beneficial machine every time.
As soon as the first round has finished, the player can either choose to continue on and try to to increase their winnings, or press the ‘collect’ button to retrieve any cash that they may have won. Further, some versions of the game give the gambler an opportunity to increase their profits, in which instance a further hand is played. There are also differences among specific games, with some virtual decks having wild cards and other varying aspects to increase playability.