Ourgame Poker

[HowQuaint]

There's a new US-friendly poker site that opened up recently. Thing is, I'm not sure if they are legit or not. Here's a link to the 2+2 discussion:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/28...eeded-1605345/

2+2 started accepting banner advertisement for them < 2 weeks ago. And then they began editing their URL into user posts in the forum, including mine. I raised hell and had it removed when I found out the site is not what I thought it was.

You see, there is a company called OurGame International that recently purchased the WPT. They have a Chinese online poker room. This new site, called Ourgame.Poker, is not the same company! We wrote a bit about it in the article below:

http://professionalrakeback.com/who-is-ourgame-poker


There are number of warning signs. I'm not convinced that they are a scam, but there is the potential that they are. I think anyone who is wanting to play there should be cautious and take a risk-averse approach (i.e. don't deposit anything you aren't readily willing to lose).



I know how DD likes to look into these sorts of things. Dan, if you are interested in looking into these people further, I have some more information I can share with you via PM.

[Dan Druff]

Great writeup.

LOL @ this:

Why will Ourgame Poker necessarily become your choice?

Ourgame Poker is a major advance in the world of poker. Innovative software, most attractive special offers and the highest extent of service customizing ensure that you’ll get an ultimate pleasure of playing at our site.

Immediately after making a deposit with an indication of the Bonus code, you will see six face-down cards from which you may choose one. At the chosen card you will see the prize you have won which will be immediately credited to your account.

And that was supposedly written by a company based in London?



As you pointed out, clearly they are lying about that. I agree with you that it's based in Asia somewhere. The bad English looks very Asian, and the Asian imagery on the site also points that it's based there.


This whole thing looks very shady, and I wouldn't trust them for a second. In general, it's never a good idea to play on a site which lies from the get go.

Also, as you mentioned in your article, they don't even understand US payment processing, as evidenced by their ignorance to Skrill and Neteller not being in the American markets.


One question, though: Do you really have an affiliate link to them? I see at the bottom of your review (which, to be fair, seems honest and unbiased), you still give people the chance to sign up there. Are you getting a commission for this? If not, why give your readers an easy link to start playing on a possible scam site?

[HowQuaint]

Great writeup.

LOL @ this:

Why will Ourgame Poker necessarily become your choice?

Ourgame Poker is a major advance in the world of poker. Innovative software, most attractive special offers and the highest extent of service customizing ensure that you’ll get an ultimate pleasure of playing at our site.

Immediately after making a deposit with an indication of the Bonus code, you will see six face-down cards from which you may choose one. At the chosen card you will see the prize you have won which will be immediately credited to your account.

And that was supposedly written by a company based in London?



As you pointed out, clearly they are lying about that. I agree with you that it's based in Asia somewhere. The bad English looks very Asian, and the Asian imagery on the site also points that it's based there.


This whole thing looks very shady, and I wouldn't trust them for a second. In general, it's never a good idea to play on a site which lies from the get go.

Also, as you mentioned in your article, they don't even understand US payment processing, as evidenced by their ignorance to Skrill and Neteller not being in the American markets.


One question, though: Do you really have an affiliate link to them? I see at the bottom of your review (which, to be fair, seems honest and unbiased), you still give people the chance to sign up there. Are you getting a commission for this? If not, why give your readers an easy link to start playing on a possible scam site?

In answer to your question, yes.

Well, our general practice with new sites is to test them privately in house for a few months to see if we're comfortable offering them to other people. If we aren't comfortable with our own money on there (mainly mine and that of my horses) then we don't offer it to other people. However, I'm working 80-100 hours a week, getting married, have multiple travel plans etc.

This new site gave me the perfect opportunity to do some testing. Firstly, we don't KNOW that it is a scam. In fact, tonight, someone on 2+2 posted that they got a cashout. Whether it's true or not we'll have to wait and see from others, but it could simply be that this company is ignorant of the US market and needs help. I'm not betting heavily on it being legit, but I could be wrong.

Back to that opportunity. I wish to see if people will still go to a website if you give them a negative review. Back when Lock was being ridiculous I wanted to stick a Lock affiliate link our large anti-Lock pieces just to see if people would use them, regardless of how vitriolic our articles were. I always suspected that people would still go to the sites. In good conscience however, I could not do so. I knew Lock was a scam before the public was on board. The business model was just FUBAR. This Ourgame site however, is brand new and TBD on its scamminess. So, with an open and honest warning and a big red button of discouragement, I'm tracking the analytics of how many people click A or B. I think it will be a fun little experiment quite frankly. Any money we earn will be paltry I'm sure, assuming it is ever paid.

Quite frankly, I'd rather know one way or the other if they are a scam. But I don't feel bad for anyone who plays on the site, if in fact it turns out to be a scam, with the type of "review" we gave them. Caveat Emptor...

[Sanlmar]

Caveat Emptor on PFA? How quaint.

Government knows best & light regulation. Get with the program.

[Dan Druff]

Great writeup.

LOL @ this:



And that was supposedly written by a company based in London?



As you pointed out, clearly they are lying about that. I agree with you that it's based in Asia somewhere. The bad English looks very Asian, and the Asian imagery on the site also points that it's based there.


This whole thing looks very shady, and I wouldn't trust them for a second. In general, it's never a good idea to play on a site which lies from the get go.

Also, as you mentioned in your article, they don't even understand US payment processing, as evidenced by their ignorance to Skrill and Neteller not being in the American markets.


One question, though: Do you really have an affiliate link to them? I see at the bottom of your review (which, to be fair, seems honest and unbiased), you still give people the chance to sign up there. Are you getting a commission for this? If not, why give your readers an easy link to start playing on a possible scam site?

In answer to your question, yes.

Well, our general practice with new sites is to test them privately in house for a few months to see if we're comfortable offering them to other people. If we aren't comfortable with our own money on there (mainly mine and that of my horses) then we don't offer it to other people. However, I'm working 80-100 hours a week, getting married, have multiple travel plans etc.

This new site gave me the perfect opportunity to do some testing. Firstly, we don't KNOW that it is a scam. In fact, tonight, someone on 2+2 posted that they got a cashout. Whether it's true or not we'll have to wait and see from others, but it could simply be that this company is ignorant of the US market and needs help. I'm not betting heavily on it being legit, but I could be wrong.

Back to that opportunity. I wish to see if people will still go to a website if you give them a negative review. Back when Lock was being ridiculous I wanted to stick a Lock affiliate link our large anti-Lock pieces just to see if people would use them, regardless of how vitriolic our articles were. I always suspected that people would still go to the sites. In good conscience however, I could not do so. I knew Lock was a scam before the public was on board. The business model was just FUBAR. This Ourgame site however, is brand new and TBD on its scamminess. So, with an open and honest warning and a big red button of discouragement, I'm tracking the analytics of how many people click A or B. I think it will be a fun little experiment quite frankly. Any money we earn will be paltry I'm sure, assuming it is ever paid.

Quite frankly, I'd rather know one way or the other if they are a scam. But I don't feel bad for anyone who plays on the site, if in fact it turns out to be a scam, with the type of "review" we gave them. Caveat Emptor...

Sorry, but I just don't understand this.

You're warning people that it might be a scam, but are also providing affiliate links to the site so you can also make a few bucks if people are dumb enough to sign up there anyway?

Sorry, I just can't agree with this.

I understand that affiliates like you have to walk a fine line between advertising and a responsibility to the community, but when you are already having serious doubts about a site, you shouldn't be directing anyone to play there, even with a warning. And you especially shouldn't be profiting from people who sign up despite the warnings.

I would think that the responsible thing to do would be only offering affiliate deals for rooms you either trust or mostly trust, while refusing to provide links to any room where you have doubts (even if not yet proven).

I ask you to reconsider. Your article was good, and your reasoning was sound. Don't ruin all of that by trying to squeeze out a few bucks from those who don't heed your warnings.

BTW, you can still run these same "experiments" by pretending to provide links to these rooms, and then instead take the user to a page instructing them that the link wasn't serious, and that your company doesn't deal with rooms which appear shady. That would still give you the metrics you're looking for.

[Fartapotomous]

Great writeup.

LOL @ this:

Why will Ourgame Poker necessarily become your choice?

Ourgame Poker is a major advance in the world of poker. Innovative software, most attractive special offers and the highest extent of service customizing ensure that you’ll get an ultimate pleasure of playing at our site.

Immediately after making a deposit with an indication of the Bonus code, you will see six face-down cards from which you may choose one. At the chosen card you will see the prize you have won which will be immediately credited to your account.

And that was supposedly written by a company based in London?



As you pointed out, clearly they are lying about that. I agree with you that it's based in Asia somewhere. The bad English looks very Asian, and the Asian imagery on the site also points that it's based there.


This whole thing looks very shady, and I wouldn't trust them for a second. In general, it's never a good idea to play on a site which lies from the get go.

Also, as you mentioned in your article, they don't even understand US payment processing, as evidenced by their ignorance to Skrill and Neteller not being in the American markets.


One question, though: Do you really have an affiliate link to them? I see at the bottom of your review (which, to be fair, seems honest and unbiased), you still give people the chance to sign up there. Are you getting a commission for this? If not, why give your readers an easy link to start playing on a possible scam site?

How Quaint is buying full flush balances as an affiliate at .40 on the dollar knowing the site doesn';t have money to pay back its players and he has priority cashouts. He is shadier then Melanie Weisner who at least sold for .75 haha In his defense he is getting married has travel plans someone has to finance this why not scam and roll some poker players they are easy targets after all.

[HowQuaint]

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...&postcount=229

[Dan Druff]

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...&postcount=229

Come on... do you really think we are that stupid?

You claim that you provided affiliate links to a shady site to do a "social experiment" to see who would click to sign up despite your warnings.

Now, why did we use an affiliate account to do our testing?:

1) Without one, we can't track the clicks properly.
2) We were actually hoping that we could meet the minimum payout threshold for affiliates, $50, to see if they would pay affiliates. This would have provided a (debateably valuable) data point for their legitimacy, insofar as actually seeing if they paid it out. Unfortunately, due to the fact that we were so good at discouraging people from signing up, we did not get that opportunity.
3) We have much experience working with affiliate managers. One contacted us before 2+2 began advertising O.P. We were curious to see if that person, or someone else from their company, as they undoubtedly have our contact information since they reached out to us in the first place, would contact us regarding this "negative review." No such contact was ever made.
4) Furthermore, we told the contact at O.P. about many of the flaws in their poker room that ultimately ended up in our negative review article. When they didn't understand some of them, we offered to be of assistance. Would they fly a representative of our company (me) out to their London offices to consult on their fledgling poker room? They were smashingly silent. We were hoping that we could light a fire under their asses with a negative article that ranked top 3 in Google (which we achieved). However, not a peep of contact was made.

I have two answers to the above: Bull and shit.

1) Yes you CAN easily track the clicks of a button without having it link outside of your site. You just need to check the server logs. It doesn't even require any programming knowledge. This is a horrible excuse. Besides, if you didn't know how to do it, I'm sure you could have consulted your web designer and asked him.

2) You were "hoping to reach the payout threshold for affiliates" to be able to tell if they're shady or not? Huh? So basically you're saying that you wanted your site's visitors to be the financial guinea pigs, so you can see if they get cheated while earning you affiliate dollars. And if you never get your affiliate money, that means they're shady. Got it. Nice of you to put other people's money at risk to prove this.

3 and 4) Again, horrible excuse. You say you put up an affiliate link simply to see if someone were to contact you about a negative review? Why not just cut out the affiliate part, e-mail them the negative review, and see if you get contacted? Again, this prevents people from being cheated as part of your "experiment".


BOTTOM LINE: You wrote a (fair) horrible review about what appeared very much to be a scam site. Then you put affiliate links at the bottom because you just couldn't resist possibly making a few extra bucks from degenerates who didn't read the review or didn't heed your warnings, because making money is all you seem to care about. If players are going to get cheated at Ourgame Poker, you at least want to get your share.

Sounds like the actions of a man who would "feature" another website on their front page which isn't paying people reliably for the past year, while putting in the site reviews that it's "safe" to play there.

You know, I didn't have an issue with you prior to these actions of the past few months. In fact, I even helped you blow up the story of that deadbeat stakee by covering it on my radio show.

But you're really not looking very good here. It's really starting to look like you have no problem earning dirty money by marketing known scammers.

[HowQuaint]

You are entitled to your opinion. But you are wrong.