Hey, Poker playas!
Poker rooms and houses are re-opening once again. but let us be honest and admit that the virus especially the new variant is growing.
The question now is it still worth going to a poker room or house to play poker?
The answer is quite complicated. One of the biggest complications is that if we do not support them now as well they might be gone for good.
A typical day if you want to play poker.
Let us say you want to play poker now. this is a typical day. First going there will be a drag unless you live near them. For example, Okada is kinda out of the way of anything.
Yes, Shuttles are available now. but we would release the review soon of each poker room.
Reaching the poker room. which is actually almost located not near the entrance. You have to walk quite a few steps. Hopefully, you exercised during the lockdown. (still, it is free exercise).
Now comes the game part. Let us say you want to play for fun. let say 25-50 PHP blinds. The best is you go to the Metro Card Club. because poker rooms are not that friendly to small blinds.
The minimum blind at Resort world is 50/100 PHP. and due to RW having a big jackpot. anything past 4 PM, expect a long wait time.
Live poker tournament in Manila? as of now, it does not exist.
Live poker tournaments could take a long time before it comes back. The best thing about poker is the one thing that could help the virus spread faster.
And no poker organizer might want to take the risk of overlaying after being closed for too long.
Looking at your competition. imagine the difference. it is normal for a buy-in of 500 PHP to have a guarantee of 30k-50k PHP on a live tournament. but online, you can play on a 100k PHP GTD for 100 PHP.
The only advantage in playing live poker is the blinds are not as fast as online and there are still players who want to play live. but the truth is that it has to be approved by the government.
And now we talk about health reasons.
The new variants and safety measures.
the truth is that the new variant has proven to be more infectious and the Philippines vaccine supply is not as big as we want it to be.
And every room has its own safety measures. there is no standard.
Yes, some poker rooms are quite high in their standards. but some poker rooms are questionable at most.
You really have to start thinking about whether or not is it worth it for your health’s sake to play live poker.
Supporting the local industry but should we.
We have a love-hate relationship with poker rooms. As some rooms have questionable practices from time to time.
On one side, local poker rooms struggling to survive right now. They have local staff and without the players returning, they won’t survive.
If all the poker rooms close down. International events like the tournaments we use to have before the pandemic might take longer to return.
There are poker rooms that have permanently close their shops because of the lockdowns. but then there are those who are struggling to survive.
But then you have to also take note. Some staffs are not the that friendly.
As we have said, that we have a love-hate relationship with poker rooms and houses.
Then there is the health issue!
So should you play? well, we live it up to you as we would release the new review on poker rooms tomorrow.
Stay tuned!
