This game can be fun with a little patience and lower-than-usual expectations about what a casino game should be. The other posts are correct, the controls and mechanics can be awkard and, at times, frustrating. For example, when playing Texas Hold'em, choosing "BET" places a predetermined amount of money on the table. In the roulette game, selecting chips, choosing "accept" then scrolling through a menu to spin the little ball is not very intuitive. But I think it's a good time waster for the train ride to work.

After being burned by Bicycle Casino on Xbox, I was surprised when I saw that a new casino game had been released for the Game Boy Advance. After the slightly disappointing GBA version of Caesar's Palace, I was hoping Golden Nugget Casino would fill the void of a good portable gambling game. I guess I should have been skeptical when I saw Majesco's name on the box. They were the ones that distributed Caesar's Palace. Imagine my surprise when I popped the cartridge in and saw a menu screen that was eerily reminiscent of Caesar's. I decided to give craps a try first. My name came up on the screen with little stars surrounding it. The table looked very familiar. Wait a minute... this IS Caesar's Palace... just with a new name on the table.

Yes folks, if you already own Caesar's Palace for the GBA, don't bother wasting your money on this. It's the exact same game, minus a slot machine (I believe Caesar's had 3, GN only as 2 and they both are not very good). If you don't own Caesar's, it's not a bad gambling game by any means, but the controls and presentation are rather cumbersome. For instance, in craps, you must select your bet from the awkward chip menu, then move the cursor around to place your bet, then move the cursor all the way back to the bottom to select "Done" before the dice roll. Couldn't they have used a shoulder button to do an "instant roll" or something? Video Poker is presented well in terms of machine variety, but everytime you win, the screen scrolls down to display the paytable, then slowly scrolls back up to show you how many credits you have, the scrolls back to the "ready" position for the next hand. This takes a good 5-10 seconds after every win. A little bothersome to say the least. And finally, there is NO battery backup. If you want to save your progress, you write down a long password.

While it may sound like I gave an overwhelmingly negative review, Golden Nugget Casino is NOT that bad of a game. At the low price it's being offered at, it's a good pickup for long trips. Just be warned though- this is not exactly a new game!