The macosxhints Rating:

[Score: 9 out of 10]

• Developer: Scenario Software / Product Page
• Price: Free

As some of you may know, I enjoy the occasional game of Texas Hold'em poker. That doesn't mean I'm good at it, but I do enjoy it. So I've been sort of keeping my eye open for a good Mac version of Hold'em. Scenario Software makes the amazing iPoker, but it's a bit of overkill for my simple needs. Then a couple weeks ago, Scenario released a free Dashboard Widget called Scenario Poker. The widget offers just one game, but that one game is Texas Hold'em.

I installed the original release, and it was fun, but had some issues (primarily that the widget was so small that it was hard to see everything). Then last week, they released an update to the widget, and this new version is basically perfect. The widget is now quite large (840x640), and there are numerous options for card design and table color. You play against nine opponents per round, and you start round one with $1,000. Survive (win) round one, and progress to round two, where you start with $10,000, and the players are all a bit better. Admitting my poker incompetence, that's as far as I've currently progressed, so I'm not sure where it goes from there.

As each hand is played out, you get a readout of the odds of completing certain things -- "Straight Draw: 16%" or "Flush Draw: 20%." As a relative beginner, I find this quite helpful to learning the game. You can also see some cumulative stats on the back of the widget (I'm presently winning a whopping 16% of the hands I play, which is just slightly better than the random odds (10%) of being the winner of any given hand). Gameplay is pretty fast, though I'd like to see an option for a 'finish hand immediately' when you fold. The speed does increase when you bow out, but I'd love to have the option to just jump to the end of the hand when I'm merely spectacting.

I love the fact that this is a widget that can be called up and dismissed whenever I want to play a quick hand or two. The computer players all seem to be pretty decent, and my only complaints are minor. First, you can't just declare "all in" at any point (you have to basically bet all your money away progressively). Second, it's not possible to bluff everyone out of a hand, ever -- at least one computer opponent will stay in, even if they're only holding seven-high junk. In any real game I've ever played, there have been at least a few hands where someone walked off with a pot simply because everyone else bailed. But these are minor flaws; if you enjoy Texas Hold'em, Scenario Poker is a fun, easy-to-play, and addictive 'widgetized' version of the game.