Online Poker Reviews

FULL TILT POKER REVIEW

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 WSOP PRIVATE FREEROLLS: By signing up for Full Tilt Poker through any of our links and earning 300 player points, new players are eligible to play in up to 10 of our private $12,500 WSOP freerolls. View our freeroll schedule for more details.

Next Private WSOP Freeroll:

Prize Pool: $12,500

Minimum Deposit: $50

Initial Deposit Bonus: 100% up to $600

Registration Starts: 8 Mar 2008, 21:00

Tournament Date: 23 March 2008, 12:00

Important Notes: Please see our freeroll schedule for eligibility requirements.

Full Tilt Poker Bonus Code for $600 bonus: BEATTHEFISH

  ePassporte is probably the easiest electronic method of depositing at Full Tilt Poker and I recommend the service based on personal experience. ePassporte is also accepted at a number of other poker rooms for easy transfers between sites. Other alternatives include the cash transfer service, which is an electronic way to send cash at tons of locations across the country. Recently, I learned that many 7-11 stores have automated transfer machines. You should e-mail the poker room for exact transfer details. Also accepted are paper methods like cashier's checks and money orders.

Overall:  4.5/5

Full Tilt Poker is exploding lately due to their massive media exposure and continuing to allow US players at the tables. Besides their advertising front, this site is very professional and offers some very nice promotions for new customers while still offering plenty of quality ring games for existing ones. I really like their original software, which is an interesting mix of professional features and cartooney graphics.

As they sponsor so many top professional players, Full Tilt Poker is probably the only site where you can regularly play with the pros. Mike Matusow often plays all night and regulars include Phil Ivey, John Juanda, John D'Agostino, and Erick Lindgren. They've also recently added a native Mac software download to their site, making it the first of its kind. The expansion of this site is good to see as a player as you'll have a greater choice for game variety and tournament attendance.

Overall, I think that Full Tilt Poker provides a good package for the new player with a big deposit bonus while still offering some high stakes games and a professional interface. With their decision to continue accepting US players they've grown to one of the largest sites online as one as one of my personal favorites.

Bonus (100% up to $600) and Promotions:   5/5

For a deposit bonus, Full Tilt Poker actually offers one of the biggest online at 100%, a full matching bonus with our links or bonus code. New players are also eligible for 10 of our private WSOP freerolls at Full Tilt Poker with a prize pool of $12,500 each. You will also automatically be eligible for the full 100% bonus using any of our links, but you can also use bonus promotional code BEATTHEFISH to ensure that you receive it at signup.

For middle-to-high stakes players at Full Tilt Poker, the top amount you can earn is $600. For lower stakes players, you can still get a nice bonus out of your initial deposit as it isn't too difficult to work it off. They release it in $10 increments, but you can check on your bonus progress at any time in the cashier down to the cent. You can also get a 50% reload bonus on future deposits. Their player rewards program is through Full Tilt Points, which can be used for special freerolls or to get free merchandise.

Last year, I was also invited to a WSOP freeroll based on my gameplay. There were a lot of entrants, but it didn't even cost me any of my points to get in. Full Tilt Poker has also added a massive $750,000 guaranteed weekly tournament and a good number of satellites to big live tourneys.

Fish:   2.5/5

I'm not exactly sure why, but the ring games at Full Tilt Poker tend to be fairly tight. Perhaps with all the professional sponsors, they attract more players who think they're serious poker players. Don't worry, most of them just think they are. I also believe that the games have opened up quite a bit from the aggressive offline marketing at Full Tilt Poker.

The flop percentages are typically less than 35% at Full Tilt Poker, even at the lower limits. One point that I stress is the fact that tighter play doesn't necessarily mean better play. These players are a different kind of fish - the ones that you can slowplay and win a big pot from. Normally, I don't advocate slowplaying hands too often, but it's a great way to deceive tighter opponents who are less likely to draw out on you. Of course, there is some inherent risk in slowplaying a vulnerable hand, but you're usually safe on this site within only 1 or 2 opponents and a ragged board.

Don't be scared away by the tighter play at Full Tilt Poker. I do well here and so can you with the right adjustments. I've recently noticed that ring games are increasing in traffic, even during off-peak hours. This is good for game selection, as you have some choice between tables with larger average pots and flop percentages.

Tournaments:   4.5/5

Full Tilt Poker hosts a good amount of tournaments daily with a wide range of buy-ins. We also host a number of exclusive private freerolls for our players with prizes most often in excess of $5,000. This isn't a one-time promotion as signing up through our site makes you eligible for all future freerolls we hold.

Full Tilt Poker has begun hosting a $750,000 guaranteed tournament every week for a $216 buy-in, which is a reasonable cost for one of the largest weekly online tournaments. I've also been impressed with the massive improvement of standard tournament events. Since the traffic has skyrocketed, you can find 4 or more events every hour with buy-ins from $5 to $100. Their popular $24 events often guarantee up to a $24,000 prize pool and take place several times daily.

Also, they now have Sit and Go multi-table tournaments for buy-ins up to $50. This allows you to play at your comfort level without having to wait for your preferred buy-in to come up on the schedule. Freeroll players should also appreciate the events at Full Tilt Poker because instead of a small prize pool they give top finishers an entry into a larger real money tournament. Plus, they require that you actually play real money games at the site thus reducing the competition from the crapshoot freebie hunters. Overall, Full Tilt Poker has become an excellent site for tournaments with their massive increase in traffic and promotions.

Software:   5/5

The software is one of my favorite aspects of this site and really adds to the game for me. The cartoon-like graphics just seem fun in an industry where simplistic software is the norm. I like the fact that the programmers at Full Tilt Poker spent some time to create original-looking graphics, and you're able to choose your own avatar from a list of characters. At the table, you're able to right-click your avatar and express a few different emotions, which actually animate your character. It's of no consequence to the game unless you're under the impression that you can bluff with pixels, but I like little quirks like this.

I also give Full Tilt Poker points for giving you the choice of deck colors and high-resolution backgrounds. It's fun, and sometimes necessary, to mix up the visuals if you're getting tired of looking at the same graphics all the time. Backgrounds include space, jungle, beach, lodge, and Vegas.

Another positive is the hand history feature, which displays the entire table graphic instead of making you wade through lines of text. Game speed is also very fast, and I appreciate fast action. As I mentioned in the overview, they've also now made their software available for the Mac not as a Java popup but as a standalone program.

US Payouts:   5/5

Full Tilt Poker is a very professional site, and their cashouts are handled in the same manner. In my opinion, the easiest payout method is ePassporte. You can link your ePassporte account with your player account by making any deposit with ePassporte. After that, you should receive withdrawals in under 24 hours. At times, I've received them in less than 30 minutes. You can also request paper checks and the processing time has supposedly been reduced. After about a week, you can expect it to arrive in the mail. 

Customer Service:  4.5/5

Poker sites that only offer e-mail customer service usually do a good job because that's their only contact with you. I have been impressed with their support system, which has responded to e-mails within 10-20 minutes.

Player Traffic

Not too long ago, I still would have considered Full Tilt Poker a niche poker site with relatively low traffic. However, the traffic has really expanded lately by continuing to allow US players. During peak hours, you can usually find at least 9 or 10 middle-stakes no-limit ring games going on and the tournament traffic has improved dramatically to reach at least several hundred players for every event.

Best Features

Big deposit bonus. Even smaller players can earn this bonus, making it a realistic and honest promotion.

Good software. This software is just plain fun (to me, at least).

Private Beat The Fish member freerolls. By signing up through our site, you're eligible for our WSOP freerolls. Read our private freerolls page for event schedule.

Tight competition. Some players might not think of this as a good feature, but others might appreciate the consistent play. If you want to lessen your bad beats, this is one approach.

Player loyalty program. Even if it's only to play in the occasional freeroll or get a jersey after playing for 3 months, at least they give you some rewards for frequenting their site.

Games Selection: Hold'em, Omaha, 7 card stud, Razz, HORSE, HA.

Limits: 5c/10c up to $1,000/$2,000   No-Limit: 5c/10c up to $500/$1,000

Deposit Methods: ePassporte, major credit cards, MyWebATM, Money Transfer, and Click2Pay. For US players, the ePassporte options is probably the easiest and most seamless method.

Minimum Deposit: $50

Tips: As I mentioned earlier, Full Tilt Poker tends to be tighter and more consistent than most. You'll find the occasional maniac, but they are fewer and farther between. How do you make money at a tight site? Easy! Change gears. Get to know who likes to see a cheap flop and who gives up their blinds. Then pick up lots of small pots with a pot-sized raise from late position.

Also, don't be so eager to bet out your strong hands. Most of the time, you'll end up winning a small pot. If there are no obvious draws out, you may consider checking on the flop or turn (or both if you have a real monster) to give your opponent an opportunity to catch up and then snap him off for all his money on the river. Also, take of note of the pot size preflop, as you may not be getting the correct odds to stay in with your drawing hands.

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