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Texas Hold 'em

EMAIL PRINTxbox360

7.1 User Score:

Mixed or average reviews

Based on 20 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 13 votes
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Game Info

Publisher: TikGames

Developer: TikGames

Genre(s): Card Games

Players: 8

ESRB Rating: T (Teen)

Release Date: August 23, 2006

Summary

[Xbox Live Arcade] Whether you're a beginner or a pro, enjoy the thrill of the perfect hand or the perfect bluff. Test your skills in ring games and tournaments, or fine-tune your skills playing the scenario you always wanted to be in. Customize the game however you want. The comprehensive help provides details on each aspect of the game. [Microsoft]

Also On The Web: Official Website

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

X360 Magazine UK

Free poker game with gambling cat picture! Bargain. Poker is free after all. [Issue # 11, p.104]

Xbox Evolved

It certainly ranges from being far too easy, to extremely difficult, especially for the newer Poker players.

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Gaming Target

The presentation leaves something to be desired, but the price tag – either free or for $10 – is totally worth it for those who want some casual fun in their Xbox 360 rotation.

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GameShark

For $10, you can’t go wrong with Texas Hold ‘Em and looking at the Xbox Live most played games, I’m not the only one that thinks so. Give it a shot!

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Operation Sports

Sure, the game comes with some minor quirks, but for such a low price, it’s hard not to recommend this quality title.

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Gamestyle

It feels cheap and tacky, missing things you'd hope for and things you'd expect, and the single player mode is terrible. Still, try as they might, they've not managed to stop poker being great fun, especially with friends.

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GamerFeed

It's a bit tedious at times, and single player isn't really that exciting, but it's still a fun poker game.

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VideoGamer

A weighty Xbox Live Arcade game, even if you have to pay 800 Microsoft points for it. For those of you who downloaded the game in the first two days, you already know you've got yourself a bargain.

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Xboxic

For a first time poker experience it’s quite fun, although I can imagine people who’ve played a million different varieties of the game find it a little underwhelming.

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AtomicGamer

While I like the idea of online play with real voice chat (as opposed to most PC versions of the game), Tikgames' rendition of the game is just too basic and empty to be worth it to most Xbox Live players.

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Deeko

If it remained free, I'd recommend it, but at almost ten dollars, it's a losing bet — single or multiplayer.

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Talk Xbox

If you don’t avidly love poker, I suggest you avoid this rendition on the Xbox Live Arcade. If you love card games, the interface and graphics are mediocre when compared to what the team behind Uno put forth in their title.

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Planet Xbox 360

Even though it will satisfy anyone’s need to play a few good hands of Texas Hold ‘Em poker, its presentation is boring and it’s multi-player mode is bug ridden – leaving you with a half-made game.

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Team Xbox

It won’t push your skills or teach you the finer points of Hold’em, but as a bargain product, it does an okay job.

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GameSpot

Texas Hold 'em does the barest of bare minimums to make a playable game of Xbox Live Arcade poker.

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Digital Entertainment News

If you got Texas Hold 'Em for free, congratulations! Enjoy! If not, the flawed, featureless experience it presents simply isn't worth the price unless you're a serious fan of Texas Hold 'Em.

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PALGN

A solid but basic package of poker.

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Official Xbox Magazine

Texas Hold 'em has plenty of flaws that will justifiably tick off poker junkies, and hardcore players are better off with "Stacked" or one of the original xbox's other poker games. [Nov. 2006, p.77]

Games Radar (in-house)

It's just puzzling that, with so many internet poker rooms to use for inspiration, many of Texas Hold 'em's elements - play speed, AI, graphics - feel cobbled together and bargain bin.

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netjak

A rather horrible game. Something this simple being so poorly designed is asinine.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this game is 7.1 (out of 10) based on 13 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Jeroen J. gave it a1:
I've been playing this game for a long time now, but this is were it ends. On the one hand, it is great to talk to people from all over the world, to play with free money and just to enjoy the pokergame. As for the game itself, the design is really not that great. There are three different playing options; the single player mode, play against 'not so hard to beat computer opponents, and two online modes on xbox360 live arcade: the player match where everybody can throw in playing money at will and your bank account can go below zero. The second online mode is the competitive match, 8player tournaments with buy in's that are limited to the bank account. This is the mode I prefer to play, because it is usually with good and serious players, except of course on the 500$ starter's table where people go 'all in' often before the flop, because there is nothing to lose; the bank account is not affected. Anyhow, to get to the point of my review, the biggest problem with this game is that it has a lot of 'bugs'. At the beginning of 2007 Microsoft updated the game, resetting all the players back to zero. Besides, the only thing that changed was a 'away mode', and the fact of getting kicked off the table after 3 'automatic folds'. As for the 'bugs', nothing changed: The game lags out every once in a while, meaning that the screen freezes up, and there is nothing els to do then to manually turn off the xbox and restart it again. Another 'bugger' is that regularly everybody disappears all of a sudden and you are told that you ended up 8th place, even when you were left with only 3 players and being chip-leader... One more: Someone wins an all-in bet and the other player leaves the table right after he saw that he lost, the winner ends up with no money (sometimes the player next to the winner gets it) and leaves the table as well. As for a part some of these problems might be due to the connection and server-host-controllers of the game, the freezing up of the screen, or lagging out, is a error in the game itself and really annoying when it happens on a table with high buy-in. It happened to me one time to many and ofcourse you might say that it is only free money and just a game... still i find it frustrating that this game is so badly tested and has all these errors. In the 'credits' of the game a lot of russian or polish sounding names appear... I wonder why Microsoft chooses undeveloped crap to like this to present to people that spend a lot of money on games and console. Even though the game is apparently for free, my advice is: don't waste your time with it. If you like poker, there must be better designed games out there.

Rob B. gave it a10:
Been happily playing this game for a while now, pretty much every night. When World Series of Poker came out , I ran to the store expecting something better. WRONG! WSOP is brutal by comparison, despite the 3D environment. Is going back to the store, without question. The arcade version is clearly focused on play, not graphics. The essentials have been implemented almost perfectly. A must for any hold-em fan.

Geogina S. gave it a9:
OK so the graphics are hardly dazzling etc. etc.. However, two major things going for it. 1. It's Internet Poker through your TV. 2. You can speak to each other. This makes its it a totally addictive, social activity. Outwitting your opponents and then hearing their cries is a great laugh. Also there's lots of people just chewing the fat. Far more social than a FPS. OK the system is a bit clunky and the options are a bit limited, but ultimately the Poker is just as addictive. For the time being this'll be consuming hours of my free time.

Mandable M. gave it a10:
oh come on people, alright it may be a little lacklustre in its appearence but for goodness sake IT WAS FREE!! personaly I have spent every waking moment playing this on live and it is superb. Its even worth the 800 points they charge now aswell. If you have any friends online at all then this is a must!

Moloko P. gave it an8:
Good fun. Tons of competition. And I haven't run accross any annoying kids! If you missed the free download it is still worth your microsoft points to get into the game.

Mat C. gave it a3:
I'm going to rate this as if I paid $10, since anyone from tomorrow on will... The game itself plays correctly. The cards are relatively readable, and the betting controls are decent enough. Also, the money in your account is attached to your Live login; very good! But there is one major problem with this game. It's SLOW! Very slow. You cannot preprogram folds. You cannot advance hands until all players press to continue. No auto-fold. Slow deals. The table view moves before and after every deal. Why? Why take all of this time? All I want is to play poker - not watch cruddy animations or wait for the guy who folded and isn't paying attention. Overall, I can only hope that you didn't pay for it. It moves just barely faster than a home game, doesn't connect often enough, only has 8 players at a table, not 10... Be prepared to be extra-patient when playing.

Andyman gave it a9:
Best poker game on any platform, period. Enough said.

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