In this column we deliver you the latest and most interesting online poker industry news from across the world and all platforms.
PLO5 on Natural8
The GGPoker Network has rolled out a new update. The main addition to the game offering is PLO5. As we have seen in the past couple of months, Omaha is becoming a more and more celebrated game throughout the industry. It is a slow process, but events like the recent Omaholic Series do help to spread the word about the “great game”.
PLO5 is a different variant of the classic pot-limit Omaha where instead of four hole cards, the players receive five, so there are even more options to make hands. The GGNetwork introduced PLO5 stakes ranging from $0.01/$0.02 to $200/$400.
Within the hour after the update, five full tables formed, so it looks like this game introduction was a welcomed idea. Another reason for the fast adoption could also have been the addition of a $5,000 PLO5 leaderboard. Happy Hours from 10:00 to 11:00 CET can boost any collected points by 1.5x.
But the introduction of PLO5 was just one of the updates on the network. Other notable changes were the availability of Snapcam on mobile and the reduction of the minimum buy-in from 50BB to 40BB in Rush & Cash games (excluding NL2).
All-in or Fold on KKPoker
The mobile poker apps are more and more adapting to the demand of their players, adding games and features that are known from the big name poker brands. Now the popular poker app KKPoker has added five stakes of All-in or Fold (AoF) games to their lobby.
These All-in or Fold tables are available for NL10, NL40, NL100, NL400 and NL1,000. The buy-in is 8BB and the tables are 4-max. Each hand a player has only one decision to make: All-in or Fold. And after each hand, stacks are reset to the original buy-in.
The tables didn’t stay empty for long and players quickly flocked to the games. The GG Network is leading in this format, but traffic is not looking bad for the much smaller poker app KKPoker. Even a handful of NL1K$ tables can be found running from time to time.
Overlays in PokerStars US markets
PokerStars ran three holiday special events with a combined $1 million in guarantees on 4th April in the markets of Pennsylvania, Michigan and New Jersey. Easter Sunday is usually slow in online poker traffic and this must have been an attempt by the poker giant to increase these numbers a bit.
They didn’t fully succeed as two of the three events fell short of their guarantees. The MI Classic in Michigan and the NJ Classic in New Jersey both overlaid and provided players with some nice extra Easter value. Pennsyl-MANIA was the only one that hit its guarantee in the state of Pennsylvania.
- $300 MI Classic ($500k GTD) drew 1551 players, creating an overlay of $34k
- $300 Pennsyl-MANIA ($400k GTD) drew 1476 players and created a $413,280 prize pool
- $500 NJ Classic ($100k GTD) drew merely 178 players, creating an overlay of $16k
Even though this is obviously not the ideal outcome, setting up events like this is a great way to engage players in these markets and make the news such as this one.
SCOOP stream marathon on PokerStars
The Spring Championship Of Online Poker on the global PokerStars clients started last weekend and we still have a lot of action ahead of us. Doesn’t matter if you are playing yourself or not, if you enjoy watching poker streams PokerStars has set up an extensive live stream schedule of SCOOP events.
You can follow almost daily streams on the PokerStars Twitch account, the international YouTube channel or the UK YouTube channel. The streams are commentated in English by Jamed Hartigan, Joe Stapleton and guests.
So, in addition to many players firing up their own streams, this is a fantastic addition for your entertainment over the next couple of SCOOP weeks.
