Cake Poker is like the new kid on the block and has taken the online poker world by storm. The Cake story began in 2004 when poker players got together and desgined a new room. Each team member came to the table with extensive experience from all aspects of the gaming industry and have provided a fresh, exciting new poker room. Cake offers a Gold Card promotion that has proven to be a great success. It has new ideas that the competition doesn’t offer and it’s refreshing to see a newcomer performing so well in the industry.

The two best aspects at Cake are the promotions that they run and the exceptional software. Because the promotions are so unique, it doesn’t feel like you are playing at just another room. It feels like you are playing somewhere new, fresh and exciting. The image that Cake has established over the past few years is well deserved and the players are rarely disappointed. The software is well designed, slick and easy on the eyes. I would rank it 2nd only to Poker Stars. That is a strong indication of how well developed the Cake package is. The only drawbacks are the average traffic and bonuses, but over time these will gradually get better. They aren’t disappointing, they are just industry standard. The other aspects of Cake overwhelmingly take priority in my opinion.

The software at Cake has a nice, soft feel about it. It looks as though everything is exactly where it should be and flows smoothly. The colour scheme is easy on the eyes and it has all the features that you need. At times I have seen it lag a little bit, but that was only once or twice and isn’t a regular occurrence. The team at Cake had an ambition to create a software that is better than the competitors and the have certainly achieved that.

You can play an unlimited amount of tables at once and full cash games have 10 players. It has a note taking feature that most sites have now to allow you to make better reads on players. The tournament lobby displays all the information you need including payouts, player rankings and time until the next break. The tables are easy to use, function well and long sessions are not a strain. Its hard to find a room that doesn’t have anything that annoys you in some way, but Cake almost does it. They don’t have avatars and instead have silhouettes sitting around the table. Some people like it this way but I prefer avatars. Overall the software is impressive, solid and enjoyable. I doubt that you will have any issues with the software at all besides maybe an occasional lag.

The main promotions that Cake runs is its Gold Card promotion. The way that it works it there is a 'vault' and each time the vault reaches a certain amount of rake then a gold card is given out. The gold card can be any card in the deck and is chosen by a Random Number Generator. If you were dealt the same card in the current hand, even if you folded, you will win the gold card. You can use the card in the Gold Card Daily Lottery and you can receive instant rewards like cash and tourney entries. This promotion is unique from the rest of the industry and is a nice change from simple loyalty Freerolls. If you like something a little bit different to break up the monotony of poker promotions, then I think you will enjoy the fresh promotion that Cake offers.

Cake offers a range of bounty, loyalty and guaranteed tourneys. Buy-ins are spread evenly and aren’t concentrated on a certain end. Cake now offers a weekly $150k Gtd tourney with a $162 buy-in. For Aussies that means that you can play in this tourney at 11am, Monday morning AEST. If you have Mondays free this is a great tourney to play in, the competition seems softer than most and you have a great opportunity to make some decent cash after the weekend.

The traffic at Cake Poker is nothing special, but you can always get a game at most limits. During peak times you can easily multi-table on at least 6 tables if you want so there is plenty of action. There is constant traffic in SNGS and they fill at a nice rate, without having too much of a waiting period. There is always enough traffic at the tourneys and you will be able to find a tourney that you like at most times you wish to play. Overall, without being excessive, there is enough traffic to get plenty of games, and lots of action. The traffic isn’t a major highlight of the room, nor is it a major setback.

The bonuses offered are industry standard and nothing sets them apart from the rest of the competition. 100% up to $500 can be found on a large number of sites so its obvious its not one of their highlights. It is still a solid bonus, but very generic. If you are looking for huge bonuses then this is not the place to be. The bonus provides enough incentive to play, if you like their software and promotions, which are exceptional.

When you play raked hands or pay tourney dollars you earn FPPs. They have a loyalty bonus where you earn gold chips for reaching a certain level of FPPs. Everytime you earn a gold chip, you get an accelerated level of FPPs until the next gold chip level, and it accelerates again. This is similar to other loyalty schemes, but they have just changed it in to gold chips to go along with their gold card promotion.

To claim your bonus you must enter the bonus code PSHARK when you first register. For more details go to the Cake Poker website.

Since the room started out in 2004, the quality of play has slowly been getting a little bit better. You will find all kinds of players at Cake and you will generally find that it is pretty easy to make money. Although the level has improved is still isn’t great by any stretch of the imagination. The best thing about the competition at Cake is that there are so many different types of players that you can target the types that you like to play against. You can often find tables with 5-6 loose aggressive player and on the other hand you can find a table where it folds around constantly. This offers great game variation and its up to you to choose your tables wisely so you can eat the fish alive.

There is no live support offered at Cake but they do make up for it with timely service. Their average response time is 5-10 minutes and in the dealings that I have had with them, they have kept to this promise on all occasions. The responses have been individually written and haven’t been an automated response. They have answered my queries with out any dramas and have always been helpful. They would score higher if they had live support, but the don’t so that is why they received this score. I did ask them if they had plans to implement live support but they believe that having an email system is more reliable and efficient for both them and the player. I disagree with this notion, but they are providing a good service so there is no need to complain.

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