Synopsis: A good-looking, enjoyable app that’s unfortunately not very good at poker.

Pros:
* Good graphics, good sounds, and okay music.
* Several options and features to tinker with, including biographies of all of the players.
* Solid effort for a 1.0 release.
* Inexpensive (at the introductory $0.99 price).

Cons:
* Slider for selecting a bet amount is absolutely horrible. Sometimes I had to tap and drag five or more times to get the amount I wanted. Ironically, this was the one iPhone-specific UI element that was added to this port of the game.
* Fair strength 6-handed, but tight, tighter, and way-too-tight by the time you get down to heads-up (it’s actually pretty boring to steal the blinds repeatedly). Even the real Phil Hellmuth doesn’t play as few hands as his doppelganger here. Also, players have no concept of short-stack play (Phil keeps waiting for great hole cards as his stack dwindles away to nothing).
* Limited to a 2- to 6-player, single-table “Practice Game”. If there’s more, I don’t see it, even after defeating the highest level.
* Limited to 3 sets of 5 opponents (who sit at the same seats every time), and 5 difficulty levels: Very Easy and Easy (same players), Medium, Hard and Very Hard (same players). The App Store description says 4 difficulty levels, so they must have added one at the last minute. Also, when playing fewer than 5 opponents, the players are always added clockwise, so you can never start a heads-up match against the Poker Brat (he’s the 3rd opponent, and you’ll be going against the player on your immediate left).
* Elliptical panning around the table is slow, annoying, and even dizzying (yet still better than Imagine Poker’s horizontal panning).
* Music and sound are controlled by a single option. I would have liked the sounds without the music, but at least the music is only at the beginning and end of the game.
* Game Settings revert to their defaults before every game (Options are saved correctly).

P.S. – Love him or hate him, Phil’s been good for the popularity of poker.