Online Video Poker Rules

How to Play
The objective of Video Poker is to receive the highest ranked five card poker hand possible.

Your account sum is automatically transferred into credits in the machine when the machine is selected and removed when you exit the game. You select the denomination in the slot. The selected denomination will be displayed on the machine.

Next, choose the total amount that you wish to wager. Your cards will be dealt automatically. If you use the BET ONE button to select the number of wagered coins, you must press the DEAL button to receive your cards. You may draw up to five new cards to improve your hand. To keep individual cards, click on the cards or on the HOLD button. Then when you press DEAL, you will receive new cards in the positions of the cards that were not held.

Your account sum is automatically removed when you exit the game and your money will be returned to your total credit balance. You may also cash out to receive your credits in the machine by clicking on your casino balance card to the right of the machine. To exit the game room and return to the main menu click on the EXIT button.

The main attraction of video poker is that the player's wits are pitted against the machine in fast action with a chance at a big jackpot.

To the skilled player, however, the attraction is that some games offer an opportunity for a long term profit. Just as in a live poker game, there is a considerable amount of risk and luck involved in the short term, but it is a player's skill that will make the difference between a winner and a loser in the long run.
Video poker machines resemble the traditional slot machine in several ways, being housed in a similar metal cabinet with similar locks, most have a coin slot to accept your bet and a coin hopper that pays out your winnings. The most obvious difference is that on a reel slot the player wins when the symbols stop with a particular combination, such as three bars, while a video poker player wins when the final five cards form a recognizable poker hand, such as a straight..

The most important difference, however, is that the video poker player has an opportunity to select which cards to hold and then draw in an attempt to improve the hand. A certain degree of skill is required in this selection process to achieve the game's rated payback.

As in live table poker, the cards are dealt from a standard 52 card deck (53 in Joker Wild games) that is well shuffled before each hand. After being dealt your initial five cards, you must decide which cards to hold and which to discard in an attempt to effect a winning poker hand (or to improve an existing winner) just as you would do in a live draw poker game. But there the similarity ends

In video poker the house is banking the game, yet the machine is not trying to beat your hand. It's more a like a game of solitaire. Attempting to bluff or to "read" your opponent is pointless since there are no opponents.

You can't get a "bad beat" in video poker. Your straight can't lose to that flush on another player's machine. It will always win according to the payoff schedule. Some plays that may sometimes be correct in table poker become costly mistakes in video poker. One of the most common errors is holding onto cards that would be useful in straight poker but are in fact not particularly useful in video poker.

Conversely, many plays that are correct in video poker would be wrong in live table poker. In some cases, for example, it's correct to draw to an inside straight. It is primarily these characteristics that lure most players into making bad plays, thus making video poker a big winner for the casino, even on games that offer over 100% potential payback.