Electronic multi-play poker with face-up hand in bottom row

摘要

The present invention relates to a method of operating an electronic video poker machine having a video display device with a viewing area bounded by an upper boundary, a lower boundary, a left side boundary and a right side boundary to facilitate play of a multi-hand poker game, the method comprising:a) displaying in the viewing area of the video display device a video display comprising a plurality of poker hands including a first poker hand having at least five face-up playing card images and at least a second poker hand having at least five images in the shape of playing cards, each of the playing card images of the first poker hand being displayed in a first row and each of the playing-card-shaped images of the second poker hand being displayed in a second row, the first row of playing card images of the first poker hand being positioned so that there is no other poker hand positioned between the first poker hand and the lower boundary of the viewing area of the video display device;b) detecting the selection by a player of none, one or more of the face-up playing card images of the first poker hand as playing cards to be held;c) if one or more of the face-up playing card images of the first poker hand were selected to be held, displaying a duplicate of each of the one or more face-up playing card images selected to be held from the first poker hand into the second poker hand;d) if one or more of the face-up playing card images of the first poker hand were not selected to be held, terminating the display of the one or more face-up playing card images in the first poker hand that were not selected to be held and replacing the display of each such playing card image with display of a replacement face-up playing card image to display a first completed poker hand having at least five face-up playing card images;e) if one or more of the face-up playing card images of the first poker hand were not selected to be held, displaying one or more face-up playing card images in the second poker hand in addition to the duplicate playing card images that were displayed in the second poker hand via step c) to form a completed second poker hand having at least five face-up playing card images; andf) determining an amount to be awarded to a player based on the first completed poker hand and the second completed poker hand.