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Visit
Gaming Club Poker
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Overall:
3/5
Bonus and Promotions:
4/5
Fish Rating:
 
3.5/5
(flakey stations)
Tournaments:
4/5
Software:
4/5
Payouts:
4/5
Customer Service:
4/5
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Overall:
3/5
Gaming
Club Poker is part of the Prima Network that hosts several
online poker sites. Because of the
shared player network, there are always lots of players and
tournaments available. A bulk of the players on
Gaming Club are from
northern Europe and the theme that defines most of your competition
on this site is weak.
If you're a tight-aggressive player (or
even a loose-aggressive player), the no-limit games shouldn't be a
big challenge for you. This is a timid network to play
no-limit ring games on as your opponents usually play poorly in
general. In terms of promotions, their Rookie Freeroll is nice and they
hold a lot of new giveaways. This site has also chosen to continue
to allow US citizens to play at the site - earning a higher overall
score.
Bonus (100%
up to $50) and Promotions:
4/5
I give
Gaming
Club Poker a decent score because
it seems like I'm looking at a new promotion from them every week in
my e-mail. For a deposit bonus, it isn't a huge amount, but it's
easy to earn and a good amount if you don't deposit much.
Use this
link to make sure that you receive the full $50 bonus. You only have to play 350 raked hands in the first month,
which should only take a few sessions to reach.
Beyond that, I
like the Rookie Freeroll that you get to enter at
Gaming
Club Poker when you sign
up your account. Hey, let them think I'm a rookie for a $5,000 prize
pool. It's a substantion prize pool for a freeroll, and they structure it
so the top 40 or 50 places get a nice chunk of it. When I played in
this event, only 350 players showed up so you had a fair shot at
reaching the money.
I made $100 playing in the Rookie
Freeroll and I think I finished 11th or
10th. If you do sign up here, this event is well worth playing.
Right now, they're giving away a seat to a WPT event at the end of
the year to every who earns enough player points. Also, they're
offering a Happy Hour bonus to random ring game players as well as a
"Pimp Your PC" tournament for a nice-looking new machine.
Fish:
3.5/5
Mainly, I describe these players as weak.
They aren't overly loose or aggressive, but tend to play a pretty
predictable game. Most of your opponents at
Gaming
Club Poker can easily
be dominated by aggressive play, but I recommend having a pretty
good hand before you try to shove them around. You'll find a large
number of calling stations who like to draw often on this site.
Thus, I recommend bluffing less often, and playing less continuation
bets on a flop that hasn't improved your hand. The best solution is
to raise your vulnerable hands, and raise them even more with more
than 2 or 3 opponents in the pot.
The flop percentages are fairly
low for full no-limit ring games at 30-35% but I wouldn't call these
players tight. Most of them are just too timid to call much of a
raise preflop. The flop percentage seems to decrease as the stakes
increase, so I recommend opening up your game a bit to seize control
of the larger tables. You'll run into mainly inexperienced opponents
at the lower-to-middle limits.
Tournaments:
4/5
Because of the shared player network,
Gaming
Club Poker is able to hold a fair amount of daily tournaments. What I
like about their tournaments is the large amount of $1 and $3 buy-in
events for fun or for players on a limited bankroll. They usually
host at least 4 or 5 of each daily, and they're fairly popular. I
also like the fact that they regularly receive traffic on their $25
and $30 buy-in events, which are held throughout the day. You'll
typically be up against 100-200 players in $20 guaranteed events.
Users also
have the ability to easily create private freerolls, ring games, and
multi-table tournaments through a simple process in their software.
This is a neat perk if you have a community of friends or a forum
that you want to invite. The freerolls are a little more worthwhile
here as they are $1,000
events and they force you to play some raked hands over the past 24
hours to qualify. Overall, the tournament traffic and events deserve
a decent score.
Software:
4/5
The software at
Gaming
Club Poker is straightforward, but it
does have some unique features and runs smoothly. The graphics are
pretty standard at Prima sites, and the visuals speak for
themselves. They aren't extremely detailed, but I find them pleasant
enough to play comfortably.
Some unique aspects of their software
include the table options. You're able to choose the table size, but
more importantly you're able to have the pot size displayed along
with a color-code for who's in the hand or not. A green box around a
player means they're still active, while a red box means they're out
of the hand. This is a handy feature to quickly see who you're up
against.
The software also allows to click on a player and see all
of their past actions in the current hand. Finally, for
Gaming
Club Poker multi-table players, each table window has an icon that
allows you to switch between tables. Game speed, mostly because of
the dealing of the cards, is very quick.
Payouts:
4/5
The cashout feature of the software can
sometimes take a couple of minutes to process, but other than that
banking transactions have been very quick with them. Overall, I've
had my NETeller cashout within 24-48 hours. This site is run by
Belle Rock Gaming, a very financially stable online casino brand.
Customer Service:
4/5
Gaming
Club Poker seems to take customer
service seriously, which is why they offer a direct telephone number
to reach them at with any questions. Generally, the support
representatives are very helpful. They also offer e-mail support,
which is handled well.
Player Traffic
Because
Gaming
Club Poker is part of the Prima shared network, comprised of a number
of poker skins the traffic is usually pretty good. Limit games are
popular up to the $5/10 level and they have event higher no-limit
tables that occasionally fill up. Many European players are on this
network, so it doesn't usually make a difference what time of day it
is. Tournament traffic is also good for guaranteed events and small
stakes tournaments.
Best Features
 Soft competition. I find the players to
be very weak here, especially at no-limit ring games. Show down good
cards and you'll make them weak in the knees.
Earnable deposit bonus. The $50 maximum
isn't huge, but you don't have to play a ridiculous amount of hands
to earn it.
Stability. This network has a strong
financial backing and handles logistics professionally.
Good customer service. This includes
telephone support, which is often lacking at other sites.
Game Selection: Hold 'em,
Omaha, 7 card stud, 5 card stud
Limits: Limit: 5c/10c up
to $100/$200 No-Limit: 5c/$10c up to
$10/$20
Deposit Methods:
NETeller, Firepay,
Instadebit, Click2Pay, UseMyBank, MoneyBookers, Delta, ECO, and
major credit cards.
Tips:
I mentioned during the review that the players are mostly weak at
Gaming
Club Poker, creating soft games. While this can be an excellent type
of player to push around or pay off your nut hand, they can also be
the easiest to cause you trouble on the turn and river? Why? These
players stick around with hands that they should release. You bet
out when you see an obvious draw on the board because you want to
make players pay to make that draw. The problem is that these
players will go against the odds all too often. Of course, this is
what you want in the long run, but it can often cost you a big pot
when you had the best hand on the flop.
For example, I've lost some
pretty big pots with A-K and the perfect card (an Ace) came on the
flop. If I'm out of position, I'll bet about the pot if I only have
the one pair. Often, these plays will weakly just call in this
situation with middle or bottom pair. Because this type of player
inherently sees the flop with inferior hands, you won't put him on
anything that could hit the flop better than it hit you. When he
catches that 4 or 3 to make two pair on the turn, you're going to be
in a tough situation when he raises you and you've got top pair with
the top kicker. As I recommend on other sites with weak competition,
you should always pay attention to a raise or a big bet from a
weak-tight player.
Visit Gaming Club Poker
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