Product Reviews

Online poker is nothing new, but it's the social aspect that many incarnations miss. PKR aims to set this straight by giving you and your opponents an avatar, so you feel more like you're sitting in a poker game and less like you're sat alone in front of your PC.

It's mostly successful, too, with a wide range of options to let you customise the way your player looks. Once you're happy, you just join a game and pick a seat. Once in the game, a range of emotes lets you cheer, jeer, condole or compliment other players, just as you would during a real game.

The in-game screen is intuitive, and there's room for customisation of

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the camera view, your playing preferences (such as whether or not to show your cards) and your mood, all of which add to the enjoyment. There's also the option to play the game in a small window on your desktop, although if you don't pay attention the obvious does happen, and you'll fold on good hands or just lose everything.

There's a good community feel to PKR, and the tables are often bustling with helpful and enjoyable company, happy to tell you that you have a nice hand if and when you deserve it. There's also a wide variety of locations, styles of game and tournaments to enter. Refreshingly, there's little pressure on you to play for real money, with a thriving casual crowd who just play for fun.

The only problem with the free games is that people tend to go all in, or take other hand-ruining steps that they'd never consider, and then simply bring up the menu and request some more free chips to carry on playing.

All told, PKR is a good evolution of online poker. It may require some patience and a little time to get used to, but it's entertaining, engrossing and as social as you can get without playing offline. With no push to take your money, you can enjoy online poker without actually gambling.