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Pai Gow makes London debut at Empire and Golden Nugget
London Clubs International (LCI) is attracting Chinese gamers to two of its venues in the British capital with the addition of Pai Gow to its range of games.
Casino at the Empire in Leicester Square and the Golden Nugget on Shaftesbury Avenue, both close to London's Chinatown, now offer the game.
Pai Gow poker is about a thousand years old and played with Chinese dominoes. To support its introduction, LCI enlisted Billy Woo - an authority on the game and creator of Pai Gow poker, a variant played with cards rather than dominoes - to train dealers.
LCI Operations Director Chris Block said: "London Clubs International has always been interested in bringing new and exciting games of significance to key ethnic communities to the gaming floor in UK casinos. We have had so many requests to introduce Pai Gow to our venues over the years as it is such a traditional and much-loved game for our Chinese customers, we really wanted to trial it in two of our key London venues.
"Since we launched the game, there has been a huge buzz on the gaming floor at both Golden Nugget and Casino at The Empire and feedback has been extremely positive. There is no doubt the launch has been a success - we are welcoming new members daily who had specifically heard about the game in their local community, and once the trial period is complete, we hope to roll the game out across all our UK venues."
LCI - a Harrah's Entertainment subsdiary since 2006 - also operates Fifty, The Rendezvous and The Sportsman in London as well as six venues in other parts of the UK and casinos in Egypt and South Africa.
Separately, it has been running a series of regional heats in England and Scotland for the World Series of Poker Europe, hosted by LCI annually at Casino at The Empire. Winners from games at The Rendezvous in Brighton and Southend-on-Sea, Alea in Leeds, Nottingham and Glasgow, and Manchester235 will go on to the London finals.
