I have knocked off one more place from my long-term goal of playing in every poker room in the valley. I'm glad it's done and I won't have to go back. The Poker Palace joins that special group of dives that, in my opinion, have no redeeming qualities and no reason to exist, as far as poker is concerned.
You get a sense of the clientele from the sign, shown above, in the parking lot. Really, now--if you have to remind your customers not to leave their children unattended in the car while they go in to gamble, you may not be catering to the highest echelons of society. I presume that they wouldn't have bothered having such a sign made up if it were not a recurrent problem.
Despite that being my first impression of the place, I had a moment of hope when I saw that the casino has two separate entrances, one of which is marked "Non-Smoking Entrance." I chose that door, and it was indeed wonderfully free of smoke. But I quickly discovered that that's not the section of the casino with the poker room, and traversing the doorway between the non-smoking and the smoking sections was like leaving one's house on a foggy San Francisco day. Ugh. The poker room is technically non-smoking, but like many other places, there's only a half-wall that separates the tables from the open casino floor, so it's pretty nasty.
When I arrived, there was no cash game going, only a tournament. But it was clearly in its last stages, which meant that I could expect players busting out to be looking for a cash game. They also told me they had four names on the list for a no-limit game, so I grabbed a magazine. I had to wait about 30 minutes before the game started. It peaked at six players, but usually had only five, and broke up completely 90 minutes after it began.
Oddly, they play no-limit hold'em with just one $2 blind. The players were all curmudgeonly tight, except for one guy who, once he got his stack down to about $25, had only one move: all-in before the flop. He picked up the blind often enough to stay at about that stack size.
I made a grand total of $6 in the 90 minutes I played there. Whee! Well, I also pocketed a handful of souvenir chips commemorating various minor events, but I don't include those in my winnings.
One dealer seemed to be an unusually bright guy, smart and personable, conversant on subjects of interest to me, and somebody it might be good to know. Other than that, I found nothing likeable about this place whatsoever.
Incidentally, before heading out to North Las Vegas, I called the Speedway Casino to see if they had a live game going. The guy on the phone (a pit boss) said that they hadn't had a poker game there in about six months. Crossing that place off my list may prove an insurmoutable challenge.
You get a sense of the clientele from the sign, shown above, in the parking lot. Really, now--if you have to remind your customers not to leave their children unattended in the car while they go in to gamble, you may not be catering to the highest echelons of society. I presume that they wouldn't have bothered having such a sign made up if it were not a recurrent problem.
Despite that being my first impression of the place, I had a moment of hope when I saw that the casino has two separate entrances, one of which is marked "Non-Smoking Entrance." I chose that door, and it was indeed wonderfully free of smoke. But I quickly discovered that that's not the section of the casino with the poker room, and traversing the doorway between the non-smoking and the smoking sections was like leaving one's house on a foggy San Francisco day. Ugh. The poker room is technically non-smoking, but like many other places, there's only a half-wall that separates the tables from the open casino floor, so it's pretty nasty.
When I arrived, there was no cash game going, only a tournament. But it was clearly in its last stages, which meant that I could expect players busting out to be looking for a cash game. They also told me they had four names on the list for a no-limit game, so I grabbed a magazine. I had to wait about 30 minutes before the game started. It peaked at six players, but usually had only five, and broke up completely 90 minutes after it began.
Oddly, they play no-limit hold'em with just one $2 blind. The players were all curmudgeonly tight, except for one guy who, once he got his stack down to about $25, had only one move: all-in before the flop. He picked up the blind often enough to stay at about that stack size.
I made a grand total of $6 in the 90 minutes I played there. Whee! Well, I also pocketed a handful of souvenir chips commemorating various minor events, but I don't include those in my winnings.
One dealer seemed to be an unusually bright guy, smart and personable, conversant on subjects of interest to me, and somebody it might be good to know. Other than that, I found nothing likeable about this place whatsoever.
Incidentally, before heading out to North Las Vegas, I called the Speedway Casino to see if they had a live game going. The guy on the phone (a pit boss) said that they hadn't had a poker game there in about six months. Crossing that place off my list may prove an insurmoutable challenge.
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