I know it's not advised to play online for money. I know people can cheat and use bots, and all the rest of it. But still, I seek information.

I used to play at a place called TrueMoneyGames which no longer exists. It was ideal for me - I could play friendly 5-point/7-point matches for $3 or $5 or whatever, which was exactly what I wanted.

There must surely be somewhere like this available, in 2016?

But I can't find it ... looks like TMG, and PartyGammon, and Play65 have all gone?

I tried to join BGRoom and got an error message saying they don't accept members from my country. I'm in the UK. I was astonished and emailed "Support" to ask if this can possibly be true, and got a reply saying Yes, they really don't accept UK players.

Getting information through Google is really difficult: so many of the websites are many years out of date.

Is there anywhere I can play low-stake games (I don't mind playing for $0.50 or $1, or whatever), where it's safe to pay in $100 by credit-card or PayPal, and there are large numbers of players and regularly available games, please?

Again - I know that people can cheat and use bots on these sites, and I don't need all the "health warnings". I'm just asking where I can play low-stake games?

Would be very grateful for any up-to-date information relevant to 2016, please - and thanks in advance for any replies.

As far as I know there are no more sites left to play for money.
Nothing in the same quality as TMG or play65.
I heard many horror stories of cashouts at BGroom, so I wouldn't go there if I was you.

Maybe moneygaming.com, I don't know much about them, except for years ago, it was a decent site, but for years they are not accepting players from The Netherlands and some other countries, maybe you can try them.

(I don't feel I should say this, because you already said you know that people cheat, but still I like to say that I wouldn't advise to play online backgammon for money.)

Thanks very much, Popeye. Points taken. I'll look at Moneygaming.

I'm not even that concerned about payouts, to be honest. I'm not in it for the money. I just want to find a decent-quality site that works well, has games available, and some small stake so the opponents are "real players" who don't disappear from the game and get "replaced by a computer" whenever they have a bad position.

The $100 I paid in at TrueMoneyGames lasted me over a year, gave me plenty of good games and I wouldn't have minded losing it.

There is a genuine need for a service/site like that: Microsoft's Internet Backgammon is horrible, and at SafeHarborGames you can't enlarge the board, only the window containing it while leaving the board too small to see properly, which is hopeless. There's no human contact playing GNU backgammon all the time!

I was very surprised that BGRoom takes US players but not UK players, with America being the country with the restrictive online betting laws, not the UK. (Shows you what I know, perhaps?).

The site you want to try is GridGammon. It uses the old Games Grid software, which was the best on the internet for a long time. The interface is great and you'll have no trouble seeing the board.

You can't play there for any stake. However, the players are all serious players of varying strengths who want to improve their games. There is a reasonably accurate rating system so you'll have some idea of the strengths of your opponents. Dropouts are rare and are more likely to be some sort of connection glitch than a fit of pique.

Thanks very much, Bill. This was kind of you.

I went to gridgammon.com and have downloaded and installed the software with no problem, but don't know what to do next. When I click on "Connect" (the only option?) it gives me a pop-up window with a couple of boxes, but when I put a username and password into them as asked, it tells me that that username doesn't exist - so that's clearly a "login window", not a "register window"? How do I actually join, and play there?

Apologies if I've done something stupid and wrong, but I'm baffled: there's no information on the home-page of their site at all, apparently? Just a link to download the software, and I've done that ... (?)

I think gridgammon is by invitation only. I have sometimes wondered how to get one, as I would like to play there as well.

Also, I am surprised by your comment about safe harbor. True, the board size is fixed, but it is plenty big enough even on my 20 inch monitor. Maybe you are playing on a small laptop? Conceivably, you could change your screen resolution while playing, admittedly that is a nuisance though.

I see - thanks. That would certainly make sense of the apparent lack of a way to "just join". That's a shame.


Yes, I do need a bigger screen, admittedly. I'm still surprised that they haven't done anything about this, though. One of their "support volunteers" mentioned to me that it's a well-recognised problem for many people, there. It's strange the way that expanding the window to fill your whole screen doesn't also enlarge the board's size. They do offer a premium, paid membership there but still don't fix things like this? Maybe I'm unreasonably demanding?

Moneygaming (although clearly well regulated/licensed and apparently with a good record for customer support), seems to be terribly quiet: not much chance of getting a reliable low-stake game, there.

Even Yahoo games has gone (not that it was great).

Microsoft's Internet Backgammon is truly horrible: I tried to play there yesterday and five consecutive opponents suddenly "left the game (in bad positions) and were replaced by a computer", and the computer just moves the pieces randomly, it seems. For all I know, it may even have been the same person five times, of course: you don't even see the opponent's username.

I have GNU anyway, and am gradually improving against it - I use "tutor mode" - but would just like to play a person, sometimes.

I'm really very surprised how difficult it is, to get a decent game, these days, for money or not. And slightly surprised not to see others also commenting on this.

The availability is more important to me than the money, within reason, to be honest: I'd happily pay a reasonable monthly/annual subscription to a decent, reliable site which had the sort of games I'd like against non-disappearing opponents, but I just can't find one.

Amy

SHG isn't really a business. They are a just a smallish group of hobbyists without much revenue or technical know how. Considering that, they have done fairly well, I think. Personally I would pay money for an SHG mobile app, but they don't have one. Same for gridgammon (if I could join).

Hi Amy, You might try ACE Backgammon because you get to play for $$$. Well kind of. They start you with $3000 of virtual money and each game you play is for $500 or more. You are matched up with random players and you can soon build up a big pile if you're quite good. If you run out of money you can purchase more to play with quite cheaply. You can download it to play on Apple iPhone or Android from their stores. I find it fun and it has a lively interface. You can't cash out your winnings but you can enjoy seeing them grow.

I found a broad range of players there from novice to expert. I created a ladder to complement it so that you can challenge people around your level and have more social interaction with your opponents. You are very welcome to join us. The details can be found here https://sites.google.com/site/acebackgammonladder/

I will sponsor you for gridgammon.

send me a PM

That's really very kind of you - many thanks. I'll certainly send you a p.m. as soon as I've made enough posts here to be allowed to. (I'm hoping that requirement is only 5 or 10 posts? Does anyone know?).

Meanwhile ... I'm making absolutely no progress, here.

Gridgammon is unjoinable (there are pages of "me too" posts in forums saying that they simply don't respond to enquiries, including loads of complaints from people who have joined the US Backgammon Federation expecting that doing so would get them in to Gridgammon, which apparently it doesn't at all). Moneygaming has no games for me. On SafeHarborGames the board's too small to see, and the site keeps having technical problems, too.

Loads of sites have just disappeared.

Surely there must be somewhere, where one can get a decent game of backgammon online?

Sorry to trouble you again, Bill, but do you have any further suggestions? Or does anyone else?

Seriously, I'm baffled: has the whole online backgammon scene disappeared?!

check you messages amy

Try "Backgammon For Money" by Gamytech. You can download from the iPhone app store. They accept PayPal. Don´t know how trustworthy they are when it comes to cashing out, though.
Oh, and quite a few warnings: there are only 1-point matches, no cubes involved, it allows a player play a double as the opening roll... + some other bugs.

So... how does one go about getting a gridgammon membership? It seems so hard to find any reasonable place to play.

I finally got safeharbour to work, then the last time I tried to play there I had to download an update... but it never downloads... so it doesn't work anymore.

Backgammon players seem crazy - why are memberships so "exclusive".

FIBS would be a good back-up if you can't get an account on GridGammon. Seriously starting to wonder how I magically landed an account on Grid out of nowhere.

A mate of mine used to play online for $$$ at Ladbrokes, but I have no idea if they still offer the service. They are reasonably reputable AFAIK, but I have no more info than that unfortunately.

1. There is obviously an unmet demand for a good, usable gammon server.
2. It is now a mobile world.

Ergo, I would think someone would develop an iOS and/or Android based server.

Perhaps eXtreme Gammon would be well positioned for this? A mobile app already exists. Plus the coding know how is there, and most important, a revenue stream (not sure how much though).

Maybe a kickstarter for XG Mobile Server? I would back it.

How about it Xavier?

100%

I play on NJ, but lately it has been very quiet, and AFAIK is mobile only. there is also the additional hassle of then importing the games for analysis, although NJ has recently introduced an analysis add-on.

There really is a need for a busy and fun bg server for both mobile and pc.

Ergo

So is Gridgammon not a real money site ?

I would think this game would THRIVE in a real money environment, presuming a legit site/host.

I'm still just a BG Newbie playing on Facebook, but the game is fun.

As a newbie wanting to learn more about BG, I have run into the same questions/conclusions......

GridGammon is not a real money site, though I don't think online backgammon sites for real money are really a good idea... it's so, so easy to cheat and would be very difficult to defend against

and because it seems to be unclear in this thread, GridGammon accounts are made by invite only. These invites can be made by any current member

i was coming on here to ask what are the best sites and mobile apps to improve ones game. I couldnt find any helpful in this thread. Could someone be kind enough to PM me or reply thanks

Correct, Gridgammon is not a site where you can play for money.

The best site for improving your game is GridGammon.

The best mobile apps are XG Mobile and Backgammon NJ. Neither, however, compares to the best desktop/laptop software, which is Extreme Gammon.