Mforma's World Poker Tour: Texas Hold 'Em is exactly what it advertises. Here, you'll find offline and cell network versions of the game of Hold 'Em, with varying types of bet limits (including no limit). That's pretty much it, but that's not a knock against the game in any way. World Poker Tour is just about as solid of a poker package as you're going to find on mobile phones, and it is well worth downloading for any serious poker fan.
When playing single-player, you'll find yourself at a table against five artificial intelligence-controlled players. The interface is modeled after a real-life card table, with a top-down view of all the players and a camera that pans back and forth from one end of the table to the other, depending on whose turn it is. Before you start a game, you can go into the options menu and select "details," which includes customizations for your personal avatar, whether you want players to be eliminated or not, and what you want the bet limits and blinds to be. The game itself plays briskly, without moving too quickly for those who might not be super familiar with it. If you're new to Texas Hold 'Em, you can get tips from the main menu screen, and the game will also let you in on the poker lingo for all of the different pocket combinations ("pocket rockets" and so forth). However, the challenge in the offline game isn't really that stiff. AI players will often play a little too aggressively with decent but unremarkable hands, so once you get an adequate chip stack going it's not too hard to bully them around.
However, World Poker Tour's network play is considerably better. Once you log on, you can either join a standard game for up to six total players, or join in an elimination tournament, where you can actually win World Poker Tour-brand prizes. The online play is just as smooth as the offline, and you get the added bonus of playing against other people who may or may not be smarter than the AI players. We experienced playing against people offline as well as online. If you feel like talking trash, World Poker Tour also features a nice set of chat macros that can be customized.
World Poker Tour presents itself well on the LG VX7000. It has a well-designed and attractive-looking interface. It might have been nice if the designers had actually set it up to automatically move player positions to just one side of the table after enough players had been eliminated. This would have done away with some of the unnecessary camera movement late in the game (but that's really a minor complaint). There isn't much audio, save for a forgettable opening theme song and a few little sound effects here and there. It's all decent, but nothing special.
If you're a fan of poker and want to play it on your cell phone, then World Poker Tour is a fine choice. The network play can be quite addicting, and even the offline play can be enjoyable, despite the somewhat lacking AI. World Poker Tour isn't going to blow hardcore players away, but it's probably your best mobile option at the moment.
