Texas Hold 'Em is a good poker game that odds are won't disappoint poker fans.
The graphics of this game aren't the best graphics, but they get the job done. Besides does a poker game need good graphics anyway? Everything looks decent enough, and the colors of everything provide the right feel of a poker game. I've never had any issues with the framerate or anything which is great.
The sound effects are good. The sounds of shuffling cards and poker chips being sent to the middle of the table sound like you'd probably expect. The music can get a little annoying after awhile as its a blues shuffle type thing, but I don't mind it really as my favorite song has a similar blues shuffle thing in it as well. When someone goes all in guitar sounds off with a higher pitched vibrato thing and sounds pretty cool, but if you're in a game where people always go all in it can get a little annoying.
There is a pretty good amount of value in Texas Hold 'Em. For people who love poker will probably play this game all the time. The achievements will probably require a lot of playing time and if you want them you'll probably have to play a bit of singleplayer. The multiplayer is what makes this a good game though as its fun to play with friends and is a good game for conversation. Its also free for the first forty-eight hours and will then become ten bucks after two days which probably won't be worth it to a lot of people as you may play over the internet for free. Basically if you got it for free you shouldn't be complaining, because it was free, but if you didn't and don't absolutely love poker you're probably going to say something like this "WHAT THE F***, I payed for this, this is the worst friggin' poker game ever." Still it can be fun with people who play poker the way it is supposed to be played.
The gameplay is simple to understand. You just have to get the best five card poker hand or bluff your way to victory. Texas Hold 'Em requires a lot of skill and thought to make the right bet at the right time. It also requires a lot of luck on getting the best hand to win. You get two cards dealt to you then a round of betting occurs. This is followed by the flop which turns up three community cards for everyone to use, this is followed by another round of betting. Then another community card will be turned up followed by another round of betting. Finally comes the river which is the last community card to be flipped and then the last round of betting occurs. There is also a dealer button which rotates around the table and keeps track of who is assigned the blinds. Blinds are a set amount of money that someone has to pay for that hand. You may fold at any time, but blinds are implace to prevent you from folding. The singleplayer game modes are much easier to win than the multiplayer as the computer AI is easily intimidated. Real people however aren't easy to intimidate with big bets. You are given a bank roll for everything in this game and may lose money or gain money depentding on how you perform in poker games. You may leave the table at any time to keep the money you've gained unless you're in a competitive tournament which basically a ranked tournament. Building up your bank rolls will probably take a lot of time and let you play in more competitive and higher staked games. Playing with higher stakes is more fun than playing for a few thousand bucks as there is more risk involved which provides more interest. The gameplay gets a little repetitive and may become boring quickly, but if you're playing with your buddies it will make Texas Hold 'Em more enjoyable. The singleplayer is just really boring though. The AI is just stupid and it's practically impossible to even play singleplayer. The multiplayer makes up for it, but even that gets rather old rather quickly.
Texas Hold 'Em is a game for texas hold 'em fans and really not a game for people who don't enjoy poker, but it is a good place for newbies to start. Its a simple game to understand and will probably be worth it to most unless you paid for it.