Pacific Poker: Almost the Greatest
Pacific Poker isn’t one of the oldest online poker rooms out in cyberspace, but the number of players who hang out there has grown exponentially over the past two years. That’s good news and bad news.
A laid back place to catch a quick game at anytime of the day or night, Pacific Poker has developed a reputation for drawing some of the most inexperienced players on the net. That’s good news if you’re a decent player looking to make some relatively easy cash. If you don’t find this to be the case, however, the bad news is that you’re probably one of those inexperienced players.
Another widely criticized drawback is the fact that Pacific Poker has one of the highest rake structures anywhere on the Internet. Instead of the industry standard of taking five percent off the top of each pot, the house at Pacific Poker helps itself to anywhere from $4 for low limit games to as much as $60 for no limit tables. On the other hand, Pacific Poker’s low limit games are very low limit, and a casual player won’t have to risk much to find a decent game.
The downloadable software has also taken some criticism from players thanks to several recurring bugs, but to the site’s credit, the interface has improved dramatically in recent months. Still, the website is easy to navigate and the software looks sharp. It can be played on both a PC and a Mac without an emulator, one of the few online poker rooms with this feature.
Pacific Poker offers a variety of tournament games, from 7-card stud to Omaha Hi, but the vast majority of players are found at the site’s numerous Texas Hold’em tables. Both single table and multi-table tournaments are online. The minimum deposit for real money players is $20 with tournament buy-ins ranging from $2.50 to $100. The sign-on bonus isn’t too shabby, with 25 percent offered up to $100. The tournaments are varied, and Pacific Poker has been raising the stakes with occasional prize pools as large as $1 million.
The site gives itself a five-day turnaround time for cash outs, a little slow by most online standards. Regardless, it’s likely just to cover their own bets as most players report getting their money faster than that.
Pacific Poker keeps a full-time customer support staff online 24 hours a day.
Pacific Poker isn’t the greatest online poker room out there, but all in all, it can be a great place to make a buck.
Rick “Stone Face” Ellers started playing poker while he was a paratrooper stationed in Fort Bragg, NC. He currently writes part time for PokerListings.com where you can learn about the exciting World Series of Poker and find great information about Online Poker Rooms.
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