Review of Poker Academy (Standard and PRO versions)

[Tom Hurley]

Do you want to improve your play, dominate the competition and annihilate other opponents? If you answered YES, then this software is for you. You could buy a book on poker, however you would still be missing out on a fundamental prerequisite for improved play, actual experience playing hands. Poker is huge, playing well commands great respect and can make you a lot of money. Buying this software won’t guarantee a win at the WSOP, but it will improve your skills to get you to the final table more often.

Poker Academy software is manufactured by Biotools Inc on the web at http://www.poker-academy.com they are serious about making you a great player. The company motto is “Learn to Win at ANY Level” and they mean it. They offer free limited feature trial copies of the programs to download. Poker Academy uses mathematical probability, coupled with advanced computer modeling and sophisticated Artificial Intelligence programming, to provide a challenging poker simulation. So what makes Poker Academy worth the price?

It’s not just another poker game. If you are a novice player, it will help you learn the important concepts of knowing when to hold em and more importantly, when to fold em. A common habit of new and second-rate players is playing too many poor hands, and playing them too long. Think of Poker Academy as your personal poker trainer, it will make you perspire, so be prepared to work your brain. Get lazy and your pixilated opponents will make you suffer. It’s frustrating to get punished for playing defectively and you’ll never get the computer to go on tilt, although it might put you there, but learning to deal effectively with frustration is also part of becoming a great player.

Start by creating your profile to track your personal session and overall statistics. Session statistics are always displayed and updated to instantly check your progress. Session statistics include number of hands played, Win/Loss percentages, and Win rate calculated as the percentage of small blinds per hand and percentage of flops seen. You’re overall statistics tracked include a bar graph showing your bankroll as small bets won vs. number of hands played. Also tracked are the percentages and totals (number of hands played, wins and win rate), folding (pre-flop, flop, turn, river or no fold) and action percentages for (folding, calling, checking, betting, and raising).

Do you usually fold, while only playing strong opening hands? Do you check more often than raising? Poker Academy will tell you. The advisor feature makes recommendations for suggested play, allowing you to check your decisions and reinforcing strong playing behaviors. Additionally, the hand evaluator shows detailed information about the hand you’re currently playing, including the ever-important pot odds, and the crucial percentage of your chance to win, tie or loose the hand. If all of this sounds too complicated and technical, don’t worry the computer does the math leaving you free to learn to play a stronger game. The PRO version has even stronger algorithms, provides more information, and more features. So how else does it help strengthen your play?

It allows you to create and edit your opponent profiles. Imagine being able re-create a table of opponents that play like your poker buddies/nemesis? All competitors know that to improve you must practice and continually push your limits. Constantly practicing against stronger opponents will definitely improve your play and make you a winner. Want a real challenge build a table of opponents who play a tight/aggressive style in a limit hold-em game and see how long you can keep your money. As for how it can help even a professional play better, the PRO version has an enhanced AI and some very challenging computer opponents that learn your preferred style of play and reacts to exploit any weaknesses. The more hands you play, the better it gets a read on you, forcing you to continually adapt and change gears which is what the great players do. Most players develop habits and detectable habits are costly at a poker table, being able to quickly change styles of play without being thrown off your game is highly advantageous. If you happen to have programming skills there is a plug-in API allowing you to build your own completely specialized computer opponents. The web site has the details, anybody want to try and program a Gus Hansen bot?

I know that it works. A little over two weeks ago while competing in a local tournament I made the final table for the first time and actually won the whole thing. I was very excited; especially when I learned my opponent has a number finishes and more experience than I do. Heads-up play lasted over an hour. My opponent was just about to go on tilt when I won the final hand. Additionally, my 13 year-old son started playing poker about 5 weeks ago; he played for a couple of hours every other day with the software. Last Friday at his first tournament, he didn’t win but he made the final table. What I find so amazing is that in just a few short weeks, he had the confidence to expect to win the tournament. Was it luck? I don’t think so. You can treat this software as just another poker game but it would be your loss.

[jimymat]

This program is a piece of [censored]. I got it in the mail free and tried it. It suggested in its advice window to fold my pocket 9's on the river when I was getting 504-1 odds to call. Playing NL version obviously. I decided not to follow the advice and call. I won the hand and ejected the disc out of the computer. It makes a nice coaster now. Do not use this program especially if your new to the game, to many quirks. My 2 cents.

[TransientR]

The advisor is poor in the NL version, but then the programmers acknowledge that and say the advisor is just for novice players (actually, not even them since it often gives bad advice). So I don't use the advisor, but the other aspects of the program make it worthwhile, IMO. And the developers are working on improving the program and the strength of the bots. I don't know if that is true for Wilson or AceSpade.

NL poker is a tough nut for programmers to crack, but so was backgammon, and now Gnu and Snowie are acknowledged to be as good or better than any human player. So I don't doubt that the future will see a poker program that will challenge even the best humans.

Frank

[Huxley]

Tom, you obviously really like Poker Academy.

I also am a big fan of PAPro and know without a shadow of a doubt that the strongest bots can provide an excellent challenge to good players in Limit and HU.

The No Limit AI is not as good yet - it is a very tough computational nut to crack - but the developers have demonstrated constant improvement over the life of the product.

How come this lengthy, well-written and extremely complimentary review was your first post?

[Stu Pidasso]

Vexbot or Sparbot, I forgot which, will fold when all five board cards make the nuts(i.e. board is A K Q J T w/no flush possible) if you checkraise him on the river.

Stu

[Crispy86]

[ QUOTE ]
Vexbot or Sparbot, I forgot which, will fold when all five board cards make the nuts(i.e. board is A K Q J T w/no flush possible) if you checkraise him on the river.

Stu

[/ QUOTE ]

You should consider upgrading to the latest patch/version:

Build 75: April 6th, 2005
------------------------
* Fixed retrograde bug in Sparbot which caused it to always call pre-flop

Build 74: April 1st, 2005
------------------------
* Fixed display glitch in Hand Evaluator histogram
* Fixed bug with tournaments where blinds never increased
* Improved XenBot logic to detect and punish rampant pre-flop aggression
* Fixed minor bug in advisor
* Added missing position filter menu item
* Fixed bug in Sparbot's logic for playing when the board is the nuts
* Fixed problems launching web browser on Win98/ME

[Trantor]

[ QUOTE ]

NL poker is a tough nut for programmers to crack, but so was backgammon, and now Gnu and Snowie are acknowledged to be as good or better than any human player. So I don't doubt that the future will see a poker program that will challenge even the best humans.

Frank

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm especially looking forward to the release of Snowie poker. They've been working at it for 2 years now so I would hope there is not much of a longer wait. I expect it will be a premium price if it plays a good game. Their BG Snowie is not cheap but as good as you can get at the moment.

[raisins]

Poker Academy Pro is great, no question.

One great improvement that does not seem to be in the works is the ability to get the hand histories into Poker Tracker. Apparently the next major update is going to have more statistics, but I think it would be great to have the hands in the same database with your other internet hands. Unfortunately there does not seem to be enough demand on the PT side for Pat to do this.

regards,

raisins

[excession]

They could just generate HH in the same format as any of the PT compatible sites surely?

[raisins]

No doubt, they could. Unfortunately they don't. They do have hand histories in a text file but some sort of converter is needed to transform the current format into a PT compatible stlye. If I had a clue how to do this I would. Surprisingly, no one else is interested either.

regards,

raisins