This is the new game type Pokerstars has in the works. From what we can tell, it seems to combine elements of modern card games (like Hearthstone and Magic) with poker.

Personally, I'm excited for new games like this. I think there's a gap in the market for new real money competitive games, and that Pokerstars is in the right position to start capitalizing on this gap. Moving forward as traditional poker variants become more and more solved and infested with centaurs/bots, these games have the potential to revitalize the dream and attract more fish.

On a more general note, Pokerstars seems to be off to a good start in 2017. With the recent proactive bans (locks/investigations?) of Oborra and 40and7, and now this, they appear to be focused on the future in a way that is finally more mutually beneficial to the players and their company.

Sounds awesome. I'm sure I'll be able to pay the rent with that one.

from mediarex/GPI over a year ago

http://www.holdemx.com/

looks awful

Bring MSN poker and 6 card omaha.

Proven to be good

Just read the article you posted. What a load of ****e. It's nothing to do with helping recreational players, it's about finding ways to take money from the players pockets to line their own.

inb4 Alex Dreyfus sues, this seems like a pretty straightforward ripoff of holdemx

also, from the intro in the blog "more level playing field" that they are aiming for in a non-rake-free envoirment = unbeatable games, in case anybody didn't get that

What's on the agenda this week boss? Same thing we do every week Paulie. Find new ways to **** the pros.

Since the armies of bush league "pros" are nothing but a cancer on poker I'm not sure why u think that's a bad thing


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dear pokerstars,

if i wanted to play hearthstone i would open battlenet
if i wanted to play magic the gathering i would open my drawer get my deck out and call some friends

so please stop increasing my rake in order to develop crap that no one asked or gonna play

Coz people want a game were you can win money bumpnrun. Winning stuff is fun. We have Pokerstars, fun players and pros at the table with twelve biscuits. Pokerstars take eleven and say to the fun play 'watch it boys those rakebackpros are after your biscuit'

"More projects are in development with one common objective - to bring sustainable growth to PokerStars through exciting new products that people will discover and re-engage with. And this will mean that more people will continue to enjoy the great game of poker."

I think it's time PokerStars considered a name change!

In all seriousness, so sad to see it continue to go this way.

I can see it now, Them selling card packs or boosts or some other micro transaction and advertise it in the pokerstars client, allow people to spend their money or starscoins on their game to suck more $$$ out of the poker economy

To be fair though I highly doubt this game will be successful / popular to have any big impact besides pokerstars wasting money on developing it

we need more gimmicks like spin n goes and now pokerstars power up in order to draw the fun players away from the predatory professional poker players

Passive aggressive legal strat or he likes it ? dunno

Let's hope so bro.

near the end of the "season" pokerstars started sponsoring dreyfus' dumpsterfire GPL so I wouldn't be surprised if he convinced them to try making a version of holdemx with a bigger brand name/ more advertising and that he is a part of it

this is a bad sign of the future of poker stars.

HoldemX seems a bit too complicated, but I think having power up abilities is a nice touch and is worth exploring.

I don't understand why everyone is talking about killing profit. Rake and skill are the two primary components to being able to make a living off of poker and adding wild card/power ups could have an impact in either direction, depending on the details.

I predict that there will be a huge lack of balance for awhile and the potential to increase edge if you use these power ups in the right situations, so long as the waiting time for decisions doesn't go up tremendously.

Odds are that any single new variant/promotion isn't very successful, but they should keep trying, it's how you innovate and discover new games that might be popular with new crowds and/or reinvigorate existing players.

Great post; testing out new games is the only way to eventually find something that'll take off.

Plus one great post .....good to see someone around here can see further than maintaining their own rake backing existence right up to the point the games are completely dead


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I would stake money that he has a stake in it.

Otherwise A) I can't see him being so jovial about it and B) I can't see it not being a real legal issue

whos organising the boycott then?

I was on the design and balance team of this game and helped develop this game for about 6 months, and in my opinion this game is awesome, and I'm not saying that just because I helped in the process (and FYI I'm not affiliated with stars in anyway anymore).

Our team wasn't lacking in experience either, I used to be a highstakes MTT reg(don't play for a living anymore really) and we had other experienced players on the team.

The game was genuinely very interesting, and created a ton of strategic depth. In fact we had to work hard to make sure it wasn't too complicated or unbalanced, and I think we ended up in a good spot.

Also just one more point, we started developing this in 2015 when I came on board and at this point no one had ever heard of HoldemX so this was definitely not any kind of ripoff. I've also played HoldemX and with all due respect I think this game is 10x times better.

Anyways, I really hope this game succeeds. I do also believe there's a market for it. I'm not sure how much I can really talk about it because the NDA but all I can say is that people should give it a shot before dismissing it.