Microgaming micro-management sees bland leading the bland

It was December of 2004 when I voiced my fear that the consolidation of online poker companies would see the Internet game's graphics embrace homogeneity and the blandness that so often goes with it.

The reality is now surely here, and, as forecast, Prima Poker - now known as Microgaming - holds the smoking gun. Click on all those rooms now locked in the Microgaming stable - many of them offer a sneak preview of what their tables look like. Temples of individuality they ain't.

At the other end of the imaginative scale, meanwhile, PKR goes from strength to strength, with 200,000 new members since Christmas. "PKR uses privately developed software and is not a part of any poker network," concludes the report.

Hold that thought.