World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions

by ACTIVISION

Product Features

• Check your amateur status at the door and head out on the Circuit as a poker pro
• Learn the personal tricks and strategies that have made him one of the world's foremost poker players
• Face down more poker pros than ever before, including Joseph Hachem, the 2006 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion and Jennifer Tilly
• Unlock winning tools - With successful wins, unlock valuable tools that help you bring a better game to the table, like checking the odds of hitting various hands at every stage of the deal, checking the rank of your hand, and even check statistics and percentages of the hands your opponents are fishing for
• Put yourself in the game with the proprietary DigiMask technology -- use your Xbox 360 camera to map your likeness on your own in-game character

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000GACKQ6
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches ; 5.1 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: September 19, 2006
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #24,331 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #7 in Video Games > PlayStation 2 > Cards
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Platform: PlayStation2

Building on 2005's successful poker title World Series of Poker: Tournament of Champions takes a story-based approach putting players on the Pro Circuit as a new pro and protege of Chris "Jesus" Ferguson. Players test their skills at the premier Circuit Events in hopes of qualifying for the winner-take-all invitation-only Tournament of Champions at the Rio Resort in Las Vegas. Along the way they face-off against more top pros than ever before including Joseph Hachem the 2006 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion and Jennifer Tilly the Academy Award-nominated actress and World Series of Poker bracelet holder among others in hopes of bringing home the Tournament of Champions trophy.Format: PS2 Genre: SPORTS/GAMES/GAMES AND PUZZLES Rating: RP UPC: 047875752658 Manufacturer No: 75265

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I'm now updating my overall rating, to only 3 stars for this game!!!, September 23, 2006

By 

Poker Face (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions (Video Game)

Last UPDATED On: September 22, 2007

My new scores: FUN= 4 stars; OVERALL= 3 stars;

After so many enjoyable months of playing this game, I just played a No-Limit Texas Hold' em tournament hand, against a Cpu player, in which she checked the guaranteed best hand (stone cold nuts) on the river, when she was LAST to act (on the highest difficulty level of Professional). In my opinion, this is the kiss of death for a poker game! Anytime I come across this MAJOR FLAW in a poker game, I quickly try to unlock everything and then I sell it. However, in this game, since the Cpu only seems to check winning STRAIGHTS, it's not as terrible because straights don't occur too often anyway. So, surprisingly, I still enjoy playing it and can't seem to stop. I will also still play Omaha and the Heads-Up tournament mode to see if the Cpu players also sometimes check the absolute best hand on the river, when they're last to act. So far they haven't, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Anyway, I still think the game deserves a 4 star rating for FUN, but now, only a 3 star OVERALL rating (Amazon doesn't let you actually change the scores). Even though this major flaw seems to be rare (so far it's only happened with STRAIGHTS), and it even sometimes happens to real-life poker pros, if they misread the board, or their hand, it still annoys me!

Also, because the new 2008 WSOP PS2 game, is due out sometime in September or October of 2007, I would suggest you wait for that one to come out, instead of buying this flawed game. Hopefully, the new version, will be improved. I will certainly review it, and keep watching carefully for any rare bugs as I continually play it!

Just in case you're curious, here's the actual flawed betting hand, I just witnessed today. From previous hands in the tournament, I knew that the Cpu player (Tina Westbrook) I was up against, would often fold to even small bets on the Flop or Turn, if she had nothing, so that's how I bet this hand. I also kept the hand on the screen for a long time after it was over, to make sure I didn't misread the board somehow.

The Flawed Hand:
Career Mode: Professional difficulty.
Harrah's Rincon San Diego...$2500 No-Limit Texas Hold 'em tournament (324 players).

I had about $8500 in chips. Cpu player (Tina Westbrook) had about $25,000 in chips and was the chip leader. Blinds were $160/ $320 and there were about 140 players left in the tournament.
I had: 4 of Clubs and 4 of Hearts. Cpu (Tina) had: Queen of Hearts and 4 of Spades.

Preflop, I bet $640 (2 times the BB), and only one Cpu player called (Tina Westbrook- not a real poker pro). Pot= $1760

Flop was: 6 of Hearts-Jack of Spades-10 of Hearts. I bet $320 and she called. Pot= $2400

The Turn was the King of Clubs. I bet $720 and she called. Pot= $3840

The River was the Ace of Spades (giving the Cpu the nut straight). I checked. And then she CHECKED, when she was LAST to act, with the absolute BEST hand possible! DUMB BETTING ERROR! She had an Ace high straight and she should have at least bet the minimum of $320. Even if I also had a Queen, it would just be a tie when I called, and the pot would have been split between us. But since she didn't know what I had, she had to bet for value. I would have folded to any bet, but she couldn't know that. Oh well, at least I had fun playing this game for many months, until I noticed this major CPU betting flaw.

The rest of this review has only been slightly altered to include the fact about the new Cpu betting flaw mentioned above. As well, I removed a few things from my older review, to save space.


IMPORTANT NOTES:
-I used to love this game (until I saw the Cpu check the nuts on the river, when it was last to act), so I included more about it in the Amazon Forum section, located near the bottom of this web page,just after the customer reviews. Just click on, 'more' from my various WSOP:Tournament of Champions, Extended review posts.

-Because it looks less confusing in print, I call this game WSOP 2, instead of WSOP:TOC.

- I haven't played this game online, so this is an OFFLINE review only.

-Although I still enjoy the Cpu A.I. in this game, I prefer the A.I. of "Hard Rock Casino" (PS2), because of Hard Rock's more varied betting that's found in it's No-Limit Texas Hold'em game (although pre-flop suited hole cards are still over valued in it as well). In Hard Rock Casino, the Cpu players will often limp in (Call) pre-flop (even if they're first to act), and they also will vary the amount of their pre-flop raises much more than just the 2 or 3 times the big blind raises, or all-ins, that the WSOP 2 Cpu players usually make. Plus, in Texas Hold'em, the WSOP 2 Cpu players NEVER limp in, pre-flop, if they're first to act.

-On rare occasions, WSOP 2 will freeze, and you'll have to reset the PS2. Luckily, because it has an auto-save after every hand, you'll very rarely lose any hand result, unless the freeze occurs before the auto-save is activated.


INTRO:
I'm a big poker fan, so when I play almost any poker video game for the first hour or so, I will enjoy it. However, if you can't save during a tournament, or if the Cpu players occasionally just check or call when they have the absolute best hand, and they're last to act; only then, will I sell it. (Aug. 27th Update: Speak of the devil...I just discovered the Cpu players will sometimes check on the river when they're last to act, with the absolute best hand.)

Last year's WSOP (PS2 game), had washed out colors, no voices from any of the 12 pros,and it had both annoying and repetitive phrases utterred so often by the regular Cpu players,that it made me want to strangle them! It did however, at times, play a good game of poker,maniac style, but with way too many weak all-in calls, at any time, with absolute garbage hands! Even during the all-ins, there was no suspense because the cards were turned over at super speed. Also, the above-the-table view it mostly used, wasn't very interesting to look at, even though it was always easy to see where the dealer button or blinds were(even if they folded). For more on this topic, see my Amazon forum post after the customer reviews at bottom of this web page.

But this year, the programmers of WSOP 2, have outdone themselves! Almost all of last year's major problems seem to have been fixed, with the exceptions of the still too cluttered playing view and the mouths of the players, moving much too fast, especially during closeups. Yes, the announcers still look hideous, but this time they included Norman Chad as Lon's partner, and many of the 30 pros actually look close enough to their real life counterparts. It's a much better looking game than last year's, by leaps and bounds, and thus takes a long 30 seconds to load. Thankfully, there's an instant auto save after each hand.

WSOP 2,actually looks like a finished product.Though similar in setup and features to last year's game,it has so many extras that the first game didn't have. Yes, you'll still see the Cpu players make some long-shot calls, or bluffs at weird times, but even real life pros do the same thing! It helps keep everyone honest, so you can't get away with either bluffing too often or always being able to correctly guess what the Cpu players have. All this is necessary, if a poker game is to provide enough of a challenge. However, just like all the other console poker games, these Cpu players also tend to over value their suited hole cards pre-flop, and will often call all-ins or go all-in with hands like 8-2 suited. This makes it much tougher to decide if you should call a Cpu's pre-flop all-in bet with your Ace-5 offsuit but I still enjoy the challenge.


FEATURES and IMPROVEMENTS:
Wow!!! This new game has the option of enabling Auto-Save after EVERY hand! It's so convenient,and you can keep on playing, even while it's making the 3 second save. Last year's game took about 45 seconds to save and then reload to the same spot where you exited. Thank you Activision for improving this! It's pure poker heaven, especially since occasionally the game will unfortunately freeze and you'll have to reset the PS2 and resume from the last auto-save! Although,when you first put in the game, because it doesn't auto-load from your memory card, you must first choose 'Career', then 'Create New Career' (or 'Load Career'-if you already have saved games), which will eventually enable the auto-save, once you finish choosing the Career difficulty level (only when first Starting your career) and the file name.

Yes, you can also still speed up the Cpu player betting, by choosing normal, medium or fast speeds (or by sometimes pressing the X button). Luckily, there's no more long waits during Omaha games for the Cpu players to bet, like in the first WSOP game.

Thankfully, it's great that they finally slowed down the dealing of the turn and river cards, so it's now much easier to follow what's going on (you can even press X to speed that up,if you want to), and even your name is highlighted in yellow with nice win %'s, that are still shown for all-ins (even pre-flop). Also, after a hand ends, you can still take your time seeing who had what, since you have to press the X button to deal the next hand anyway (yes, you can skip watching the deal too).

WSOP 2's Career Circuit mode, only has 4 circuit rounds (with 4 tournaments each) and then the Tournament of Champions round, for a total of 17 Texas Hold'Em circuit tournaments that can increase your bankroll and circuit points total. But at least in the 4th round there's the Main Event ($10,000 buy-in), which has 2592 players and a winner's payday... Read more ›

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Will ruin your poker skills, November 27, 2007

By 

Avid Reader (Oklahoma) - See all my reviews

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions (Video Game)

Like many reviewers have stated the cpu play is horrible, only to be saved by running cards. I can give hundreds of examples, but here's the one that made me write this review. I raised 10 times the blind (you have to do these huge raises to get ANYONE to fold), I had AJs. I was called by a player with 7 / 2 offsuit. The ABSOLUTE worst starting hand in poker. I go all in when the board pairs my Jack the cpu calls and gets a 2 and a 7 on the turn and river. Notice that the all in call (virtually all his chips) was made with nothing. This is one of several examples. I started to keep track of the flushes, straights and full houses and the percentage is remarkable for the cpu.

Conversely, I found that when I had the nuts, the cpu would rarely ever call any amount of a bet. So you can't bluff, because you'll get called with ANYTHING and then lose, and you can't bet your nut hands because no one will call.

Thus, this game will RUIN your poker skills if you're trying to get better at poker. Try Poker Academy instead. Much more realistic cpu play.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Damn Good Game .. for Fun or Learning, January 10, 2007

By 

Stoopidboiy (CT, USA) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions (Video Game)

Ok, so Im not at all one of those people whose like "OMG THIS GAME IS A 15 OUT of 10!!" Im mean lets be reasonable. However, I will say I would seriously have liked to give this game that 6th star.

As the title implies, this is definately a damn good game, whether your looking to learn the game of Poker(spefically No-Limit Hold-Em and the likes)or you think yourself a seasoned "pro" and are looking to hone your skills then this is a great game. Even if you are a "poker pro" you will definately pick up some tips and learn different strategies here, and as they say: practice makes perfect! Also, for anyone who falls in between the two this is still a wonderfully delightful buy (and at 19.99 right now you cant really go wrong)!

Now, personally as a poker player I would rate myself somewhere around amateur(I wouldnt say Im horrible by any means and Im no novice, but Im not exactly wearing any bracelets around my wrist heh) level. Also, I own more than a few other Poker and Hold-Em titles on both the PC and PS2. Ive got to say, in all honesty, this kind gave me some renewed faith if you will. I mean, no offense to any of the devs or whatever, but alot of poker games out there just suck(no matter what you're looking for out of it). I offer this as an opinion, and I mainly look to these sort of games to hone my skills and yet more so for the fun factor. This game delivers on both levels adequately.

Also, as far as just the gameplay itself, I was also pretty satisfied. I've played previous poker games with claims of "animorphic face gestures" or "player facial animations" and the such. Ill admit, you cant get picture perfect reads but you can definately spot players reactions around the table and pick up on there negative and positive reactions QUITE well.
Also, the player AI is pretty damn good as well. I have to say, that of course if you've got a poker all-star seated at the table, he wont necessarily possess his real-life talents but their AI is definately a suitable representation in my opinion.

Career Mode in this game is alot of fun and gives you keen sense of learning the ropes and working your way up through various casinos. Also, its kinda neat unlocking items and what not for your My Poker Room.

Graphics - 5/5
Gameplay - 5/5
Re-Playability - 5/5
Over-all 5/5

2115|R8A3JVSUE5547;2115|R3JDMDHPSBT7OP;2115|R2V1HN7Y51KY60;