Quite a few people had stated on here that they weren"t particularly enamoured with the Betfair poker client. I agreed with some of the comments, but in the interests of the new APAT/Betfair partnership, elected not to post my thoughts.
However, after my first real tourney last night (just played a few SNGs so far), I"m afraid I have to join those who outwardly dislike the client.
On a positive note though, I actually really like the table layout and screen - it"s uncluttered and easy to see stack sizes etc - I can"t stand sites that focus too much on screen graphics, which imo detract from what really matters. Betfair is just about spot on from that perspective.
On the downside though, there is far too much missing or difficult to use, ie Hand History, Tournament Structure, have to go outside the client for account balance, etc. I know the HH is downloaded to my hard drive, but none of the trackers I have will read it. There is a link within the Preferences page that points at something called "Poker Buddy" to read HH, but when I click that I get taken to the Betfair website and to a 404 Page Not Found error. During the tourney last night, I had no clue what the forthcoming levels were going to be - kind of important when considering dynamics of stack sizes, etc.
Lastly, the time allowed for actions is so restrictive - I had a decision to make in Level 1 last night before I had earned any additional timebank...... the short time allowance actually did me a favour though as I made a bad call that turned out to be the correct call.... more time to think, and I would have folded.
Overall gameplay and stability are fine. Just wish the client carried the features that most other sites sport nowadays. If Betfair intend to compete in this highly competitive market, they need to improve the overall user experience. IMO they are unlikely to draw customers away from Stars and Tilt - their competition is with the local sites such as those on the iPoker and Boss networks - but even those clients are dramatically better.
To end on a positive - despite all that I"ve said above, I will actually play more tourneys on Betfair (not just APAT games) as the standard of play in the SNGs is so bad... I presume it will be the same in the low buy-in MTTs.... there must be some value there (plus smaller fields means bedtime at a reasonable hour!)
Like all change - I guess it just takes time to get used to. I hope Betfair are listening to feedback though as many people are making good and valid points re the client software.
