Can you imagine walking into a well known Las Vegas, Nevada hotel and seeing no dealers, chips, or cards? Well if this seems difficult to believe, you may be in for a big shock. The Las Vegas based casino Excalibur is now testing with this new revolutionary idea of automating everything from the dealers, to the actual poker tables. Owners from the casino hotel are going to equip the rooms with 12 electronic machines for a six-month trial period.
The North-Carolina based business PokerTek is in charge of the computer machines, which are redoing the way poker will be played in Vegas. The business already has 230 machines around the world, with the largest located in Casino du Montreal (a total of 25 machines were installed in this Canadian casino hotel).
So what are the downsides of this alteration? For starters, about 40 Excalibur poker dealers will be searching for new employment. Some of these dealers have been functioning at the casino since its opening in 1990. Todd DeRemer, Excalibur’s Vice President of Casino Operations, says that the poker dealers will be offered other dealer careers in the same casino hotel.
According to DeRemer, the renovation is being made to give rookie players a chance to play this popular game without feeling intimidated. He had already played these new machines before deciding upon the makeover. “It’s not intimidating”, he says, “We think that feature will bring back the players”.
The better machines will allow the poker players to play Texas hold’em, seven card stud and Omaha. 40-inch flat screen tv’s, which are located in the center of the table, will show each table’s community cards, poker player’s stakes and the pot.

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