Poker Offline App Types

Types of Poker Offline Software Explained

Poker, as a game, has been around for a few centuries now. The game has changed overtime, keeping up with the trends and adjusting to players' tendencies. With the development of computer technologies, poker has found its way into the virtual world as well. These days there are two large groups of poker software: online and offline poker software. This article will focus on explaining the main groups of offline poker apps and programs and try to explain differences between these two categories.

For-fun Poker Offline Apps

By far the largest group in the offline poker category are so-called for-fun poker apps and games. As the name suggest, these are apps geared towards casual players who love poker but aren’t particularly concerned with more advanced aspects of the game. What we mean by this is that the underlying engine, or the poker artificial intelligence (if we can call it that), in these apps is fairly basic. Players are pitched against computer opponents whose level of poker is very basic at best. For anyone actually knowledgeable about the game, beating these players will be very easy and the playing aspect itself can quickly become boring. The reason for this is twofold. First and foremost, creating a serious poker app that actually plays well is a very complicated task that not even some of the best AI scientists have been able to solve completely just yet. Hence, implementing such an engine would hardly be feasible. Secondly, the majority of players interested in these for-fun offline poker apps simply want to have a good time, similar to that they have when playing online poker for play money. An engine that plays too well, for the lack of a better word, would spoil the experience for these players and would actually make the games not fun.

Serious Poker Offline Apps with Actual AI

The second poker offline category, albeit a much smaller one, contains serious apps that actually try to challenge players. This type of software is based on engines that contain a real poker playing artificial intelligence and are capable of playing the game on a level that’s close to that of experienced human players. As already mentioned, No Limit Texas Hold’em is a highly complex game, which makes creating quality software of this type a very challenging task. That’s the main reason you won’t find too many quality poker AI apps out there, especially not for free. Additional problems are created by the fact that these offline poker apps need to perform all these complex calculations locally, using only the machine they are installed on, be it a desktop computer or a mobile device. Unlike some online poker AI software, they don’t have the luxury of using powerful online servers to do the math for them. With all these challenges, offline poker AI apps such as Poker Alfie still manage to pose a serious challenge to experienced players. They are also a great learning resource for those making their first steps into the world of Texas Hold’em. Unlike for-fun software, these poker playing bots will not make erratic plays but will force you to actually think about your decisions and figure out your odds. So, if your goal is to learn the game and improve before trying to play for real money, then you should definitely spend some time with serious poker AI engines.   Playing on the for-fun apps can be entertaining, but it will not do anything positive for your game or help you grow as a player.