If third-tier cable television is to be believed, the latest fascination to sweep the homeland of apple pie and the inflatable fast-lane dummy is televised, high-stakes poker. And naturally, as with any fast-rising star of the public eye based on a ludicrously simple set of rules, countless computer-entertainment versions of Texas Hold 'Em and its ilk have been produced just in time for Christmas giving to your favorite aficionado of The Deuce or Bravo's unusually popular broadcasts. Crave's foray into the world of big blinds and all-ins turns out to be quite a decent hand, even if it's not a full house.
The game features twelve styles of play, including the ubiquitous five-card draw, seven-card stud, and Texas Hold 'Em. Each of these games can be played in either an "ehxibition" game or a single-player ladder, as well as online against real people. Getting started is fairly well streamlined-- customize your avatar, select your environment and game rules, and start playing. In exhibition matches (called "Sit and Go"), you typically face up to five other computer opponents in an effort to clean them out of their loot. The tournament mode offers you a career-style event mode, where you start with a fixed amount of cash and enter big-ticket events (some with over two hundred opponents) in an effort to see your name at the top of the bracket. All in all, the game's modes are pretty much what you'd expect from a poker title.
For the most part, the games-- including Omaha Hold 'Em, Billabong Poker, and Shanghai Poker-- all play similarly, and the artificial intelligence for the computer opponents is adequate-- if not too bright. A skilled and lucky player can probably easily clean out the opponents on the first difficulty levels. If you can take it to the end of the road, a long and rewarding single-player campaign awaits you. Players have easy access to rules and hand rankings at the touch of the R2 button, too.
The game's online mode is surprisingly well-done for being a budget title, as well. While it requires a broadband connection, the online play is smooth and without too many hiccups. The requirement of broadband for poker might seem a bit unorthodox until you notice that World Championship Poker supports voice chat via the USB headset as well as allowing you to get a good look at your opponents via the EyeToy camera. Both of these elements are largely superfluous in a title where the core mechanic is simply a display of cards and a menu of options, but adding in the ability to see and hear your opponents' reactions changes the game dynamic and makes the play feel like more of a community affair.
This is good, because you'll need a partner to help you stomach the simply awful visuals that WCP has to offer. Now I'm not saying that the Renderware-created backgrounds aren't pretty, as they are, or that the character customization is poor, which it isn't. What I am saying is that every one of the characters, regardless of gender or facial structure, looks like they've been assaulted repeatedly with the business end of a shovel. Which is understandable, as poker can be a pretty violent game. ("Three aces? Well, I'll beat that with my... uh... I'm going to hit you with this gardening implement now!") In all fairness you won't be looking at the rendered avatars all that much (thank God), as the card display is simply an overlay of sprites on the left side of the screen. Myself, I would have preferred a first-person perspective capability with 3-D cards (as in, you actually see the cards being turned over), but I guess that Renderware wasn't up to it. For the money it's not bad, but it could and should have been better.
The music is bad. You can turn it off. I did thirty seconds into it. That's all I can say about the music without getting really nasty. The sound effects, on the other hand, are serviceable. A particularly stuffy dealer announces the action; her voice isn't obnoxious, but the delivery of the lines is somewhat flat and she really does sound like she has a cold. Your computer-controlled opponents offer the occasional remark or whoop, but for the most part it's a very quiet game. My advice is to put on the soundtrack from "Maverick" or any country CD you may have on hand for background music, as there's little else to listen to.
There is one major flaw to the game, and that is a lack of offline multiplayer. Admittedly, this is probably a result of the difficulty in making sure players don't cheat by looking at their buddies' hands, but it's not like it would have killed them to make an effort. Crave could probably have made a killing had they included at least some kind of multiplayer game-- even if it wasn't poker, maybe basic blackjack, for example. But they didn't. As it stands, the game's best for the poker pro in your life who tends to watch the tournaments alone.
As a matter of fact, the game seems oddly limited in its scope. There are literally hundreds of card games which could have been done with ease for the title. I don't see why Crave decided to just stick with twelve variants of poker and not include other variations which could have added weeks of replay value to the game. I myself could sit and play blackjack or euchre for hours at a time. Still, there are free alternatives for those games available online, and unfortunately I'd probably be more inclined to play those on a keyboard and mouse (or, assuming I can con my buddies into doing it, a deck of cards and box of poker chips
