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Nice to have for OS X

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 9
Date: September 25, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This is a great addition to your game software collection for Mac OS X. To begin with, there is not a lot to choose from as far as casino-style suites for the new Mac OS, especially since Hoyle (Sierra) has abandoned us loyal Mac users starting with the 2004 editions. I say good riddance, Sierra! Anyway, this is probably the only replacement for Hoyle, but you won't miss Hoyle. You get over 10 games and their variations, but I do have a few minor complaints. First, to have included the game "War" is a bit cheesy and unnecessary. Second, the load time between games is longer than usual, and tests one's patience. Third, the player depictions for the Poker game are also a bit cheesy, and you can't choose different players as you could in Hoyle, but like I said, it's a minor inconvenience. Lastly, the installer doesn't work like most, you get the spinning barber pole but not the progress bar, so you don't know at first if it is actually installing, or just hanging, but eventually it DOES install and you get the "finished" alert. All in all, this is a must-have collection of games that is very reasonably-priced and I thank Phantomefx for creating this suite of games for OS X. Looking forward to future editions!

Fun, but not too instructional

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: February 14, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I cannot recommend this software for people, like myself, who want to become better gamblers. I was hoping for some automatic tutorial that would caution me when I was making a foolish play. Instead what I had to do was constantly open a pop up window, press "By The Books" for their advice, close the window, and continue my play. Needless to say, that gets a little monotonous. So, while good play advice is there, it's just not automatically given as I hoped.

Would that real casinos were like this game

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: March 10, 2006
Author: Amazon User

My player currently has $999,999,999 in this game and can go no higher. I racked up this total in one evening. Would that real casinos were like this game, but then none could stay in business! And things would start to resemble that Twilight Zone episode where the two-bit crook dies and goes to what seems like heaven. Every throw he makes at craps is a winner! After the excitement of winning every time wears off, he says that heaven is too boring, he wants to go to the other place. "Who ever said this is heaven," he is told, "this is the other place."

Some of the games have flaws that pretty much guarantee you never lose. One such game is sic-bo. Sic-bo is a dice game played with three dice, and you bet on which numbers come up on individual die or the total. I like craps, so sic-bo looked like an interesting alternative dice game. The booklet says the house edge on this game is pretty severe, but in Reel Deal Casino Quest, winning is a sure thing. For every session, one of the numbers will always come up the same. It's a simple matter to bet 3 units on that number, which will always come up and win, 1 unit on that number coming up two dice, and 1 unit on that number coming up on all three dice. You can't lose, as the number will always come up once, covering the other two bets. And pretty soon the number will come up on two, paying 8-1, and before long on 3, paying 150 to 1. Doesn't take long through the miracle of compound interest to roll the odometer over!

Okay, so never mind sic-bo and a few of the slots (spellbound, grave robber) which are never-losers. What I really bought this game for was to get an acquaintance with those casino games I always walk by because I have no idea what they are. I now have a passing familiarity with Pai Gow, Let It Ride and Caribbean Stud. I don't know if I'll stop at one of those tables now, but at least I know what is going on. There's several poker games as well. The Texas Hold Em is pretty brain dead--again, would that I played against people so dumb, but after a while, what's the fun in that?

So for $20, it's not a bad investment before going to Vegas or AC and getting a feel for the games. Just don't expect the payoffs to be the same.

Oh, every now and then it likes to freeze up, and as it's a full screen application, there isn't anything you can do but reboot.

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