Poker tournaments have existed for almost as long as the game itself: it’s not a stretch to go from single games to wanting to figure out who the absolute best player is by creating multiple stages and knockout rounds.
However, in the past, these tournaments existed only as local affairs: you could play against those at your nearby casino, and unless you were travelling for rare national tournaments, you’d be pretty limited in terms of your opponents.
The internet, of course, changed all that. There are now over 5 billion internet users, and this technology has revolutionised a fundamental aspect of the game: who you could test your skills against. Suddenly, it wasn’t just the poker enthusiasts in your local town or region. It was anybody, anywhere, across the globe. Let’s look at the effects of that.
Far More Opponent Opportunities
The most obvious and perhaps impactful effect of staging poker tournaments on an international platform? Opponents become almost limitless. When you play poker tournaments online nowadays, you can be matched against anyone, anywhere.
Most casinos will have stipulations about who can join and criteria to make sure the tournaments are actually fun for all comers, but in many cases, you could theoretically be matched against somebody from any country on the planet.
That has massively increased the enjoyment levels and the challenge for a lot of the best casual poker players. Almost overnight, limitations on who you could test your skills against were eradicated.
The best players in Tanzania could match against the best players in the USA or India or France or Egypt. You could see how your strategies measured up against others, and look at how cultural differences affect things like betting approach, game etiquette, bluffing tactics, and more.
Instead of being limited to a handful of individuals, poker has bloomed, giving you infinite variety and the opportunity to learn from a wealth of approaches and techniques.
Even for the savviest, most skilled poker players, that’s enormously satisfying, taking this game to a whole new level of complexity. And for those new to the game, the ability to absorb lessons from such a variety of different players is infinitely valuable.
Of course, the internet has provided such benefits in many ways that extend beyond tournaments. For newcomers to the game (and even more experienced players), the number of informative videos and “how-to” guides available is staggering.
For example, you can, in just a few minutes, eliminate some of the commonest poker mistakes from your repertoire, just by learning about what you might be doing wrong.
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You can also watch expert players take on this game, observing what moves they make and how they approach different situations. This kind of learning by osmosis approach is super effective and has really only become available in the age of the internet.
Availability Of Tournaments
Again, in the past, tournaments would have been immensely limited, even if you were prepared to travel a bit. Unless you happened to live in a region known for poker or have the funds to head to Las Vegas on a regular basis, poker tournaments were likely to be few and far in between. Today, even the most rural players can tap into poker tournaments at almost any time of the day or night.
The internet has created accessibility in unprecedented ways, and poker tournaments are no exception to that. The international dynamic means that now, you can find tournaments being played even at unsociable hours in your own country, simply by joining one that’s occurring in another part of the world.
You can find all different levels of skill, buy-in, and game variety. The options are almost infinite, which has made this pastime far more available to people than it ever could have been before the internet.
And with faster and stronger connections becoming the norm across the world, that’s only going to become more common. Although many parts of the planet still lack access to the internet, mobile network coverage has expanded to 92% of the world, and with the preference for mobile gaming also rising, this indicates a widespread ability to tap into this kind of game from almost anywhere. As internet access continues to improve, this is only going to get better.
A huge element of this that could potentially be overlooked is the cultural learning that such tournaments could offer. By providing an informal, relaxed space with a shared activity, national and international poker tournaments have the potential to create better links between communities and countries, creating more cultural reference points and goodwill.
Of course, poker tournaments represent only one aspect of the benefits that can be gleaned from this kind of international activity, but poker is a game that enjoys international recognition and glamour, and it stands to reason that these kinds of tournaments are only likely to grow as more and more people seek to test their skills against those from far-flung places.
