Luck equals money (playandwin.co.uk)

Member Name: Brown_eyes1984

Product:	playandwin.co.uk
Date:	17/09/04 (243 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: fun, free, could win money

Disadvantages: addictive, lots of members so less chance of winning

Right well I'm hoping dooyoo have sorted out whatever problem they had the other day with my review.Sorry everyone for it being unreadable.I tried changing it as much as i could but it wouldn't change the unreadable bits.So I'm trying now without chuckleweb.ope this works!

Playandwin.co.uk is a website designed for us poor little people, who spend half our lives on the computer, using sites like ciao, to earn money. They feed off our boredom and financial status and tease us by giving us the chance to win up to £100 in cash every week just for playing highly addictive games such as card games, bingo, tetris, and scratch cards, all for free! That's right, I said free!

Usually websites that offer you the chance to win cash, charge you for playing the games. However, playandwin have realised that they will probably get a lot more money offering free games, than they would if they charged and they get their money through advertising I think. There really are a lot of members on there and there are more signing up every day so it's got to be a good site hasn't it?

*** So I can win cash then? ***

Yep, that's pretty much what you are playing for. The main prize as I mentioned above is £100. One person is awarded that every Thursday night. There's also 5x £20 to be won and they say that there is an unknown amount of £10 prizes through the scratch cards. In my experience there are usually three winners on the scratch cards each week.

So the draw is every Thursday night but how do you take part? Simple: Play the games!

*** So games equal prizes? ***

In a word, yes! When you play the games you get tokens. This is usually for doing well and progressing through the games. The tokens you have can then be transferred into tickets at the ticket shop. Sound simple enough? Well it is. There are twenty-two games, 5 scratch cards and a click and win section altogether. The games include:

* Five multiplayer games
* Eight card games
* Nine puzzle and arcade games

** Multiplayer Games **

The multiplayer games available are:

1) Western Whist. A game that is more commonly known to me as trumps and a fairly new game too. You play against three other players and the rules are far too long to list here but as with all the games, it does come with instructions.

2) Hearts. I think everybody knows this game but basically the aim of the game is to get the lowest amount of points to win. Again as with western whist, you play against three other players usually.

3) Bingo. A highly popular game with quite a few different rooms to choose from ranging from beginner to expert level. You can win big tokens here so that's probably why it is more popular. I got hooked on this game at one point! I don't think it needs any other explaining because I think we all know what bingo is.

4) Backgammon. Now this is a game I've never played. Usually I don't think anybody else does either. At the moment I'm logged onto the site and there are 10 people in there so it's grown in popularity since I first joined where it had 1 person playing. I don't really understand the rules of backgammon too well but there is an instruction section there in case you want to play!

5) Yatzy. This was one of my favourite games too when I first joined but I never seemed to win! LOL. That meant of course that I stopped playing it because I hate losing and I'm a very bad loser too. It's too long to explain but basically there's a list of moves you can attempt to make with usually five dice. You can choose different variations of the game though where the moves slightly change and you get more dice. This has proved to be a popular game too amongst the playandwin members. I usually find myself playing against just one member but you can play with up to three other people.

** Card games **

The card games seem to be a popular choice with members. Two new ones have just been added recently and most of the new games that come onto playandwin are card games. This isn't good news if you aren't a cards fan but trust me some of them can be fun!

1) Surfer Video Poker. This is the newest card game to be introduced onto the site but it has proved to be highly popular. It's basically poker in a fun setting and with a fun little twist. There is a little table showing the moves you can get with your cards and how many tokens they will gain you. If you get those moves the twist is you then get to play a game of 'higher or lower' or 'double or nothing' as they call it. This means you can gamble and try and gain more tokens by guessing whether the card is going to be higher or lower than the one shown. Look out for the little crab that walks across the screen...so cute!

2) Rocket 21 Deluxe. Here you have to make as many cards add up to 21 as possible. This is the other newest card game to be introduced and I feel it's a better version than it's earlier brother game 'Rocket 21'. With this one you don't have a certain amount of time to complete it in but to get a bonus spin you have to make the liquid in the rocket launcher thing move up to the top. The more time you take the more it goes down. A challenge but great fun!

3) Arabian Solitaire. This is one of my least favourite games. You can play it in two versions. Either a standard 1-draw game or a Vegas 3 draw game. I've always found the 3 draw more challenging so I tend to opt for that one. Basically it is solitaire with either 3 cards drawn at once at the top or 1. It's got a lovely background though which reminds me of Aladdin. Not a good game for getting lots of tokens but worth a play every now and again.

4) Spider. This is another recently added game. I found it to be another one to play every now and again but not one I could play too often. You get to choose whether you want easy, medium or hard. I personally choose easy lol. I really find it too hard no matter what setting I have it on. The object of the game is to move all the cards from the 10 stacks at the top with as few moves as possible. It's quite confusing but there are instructions.

5) Egyptian Pyramids. This is one of my favourite card games. Your aim is to get rid of all the cards on the screen by using the cards at the bottom. For example, if there is a queen at the bottom of the screen you can get rid of any card on the screen that is either a king or a jack. It's basically whatever card comes before or after the one shown at the bottom. If it's a 3 you can get rid of a 2 or a 4 and so on. You carry the sequence on until you can't and then you click on the unturned bottom card. It can get quite addictive! Not too bad for tokens either.

6) FreeCell. Not really a popular game, and one I can see them replacing when they think up something new. The graphics aren't too clever on the game either; it looks quite old. The object of the game is to build up four stacks of cards in their suits. Similar to spider but easier I think. Still too much effort for me though!

7) Super 7 Solitaire. Quite a few people play this but I tend to stay away from it because I can get more tokens from other games. It's basically solitaire and if you complete it you get a bonus spin. Simple!

8) Rocket21. This is the older version to Rocket21 deluxe. You have to get as many 21's in just over a minute. It's quite challenging and definitely a game of speed. Not bad for tokens either.

*** Puzzle and Arcade games ***
1) Mini-Jong. The object of mini-Jong is to find all the pairs and remove them. It can be quite hard because the tiles are all stacked over each other so you have to be careful to choose the right pairs. Quite good for tokens and a fun game to play.

2) Mah-Jong. This is the older version to mini-Jong. It has the same kind of game play where you remove the pairs. You can choose between easy, medium and hard.

3) Balloon Buster. I personally find this the hardest game on the site. You have to get two or more balloons of the same colour and pop them by clicking on them. However, the balloons below the ones you pop move upwards so you have to be careful that they are going to have a partner somewhere. I've hardly ever completed round one. It really does take a lot of brainpower.

4) Super diamond mind. This is one of my favourite games. You basically have to get three or more coloured diamonds in a row to make them disappear. You can move a diamond down, up or across if there are two colours that it can join in any of those directions. At the bottom of the screen you will find all the different coloured diamonds in two rows. If you get rid of the diamonds in that order you get a diamond spin which gives you various game bonuses like extra tokens or deletes a row of diamonds etc. It really is easier than it sounds and a lot of fun too!

5) Word Game. This is my fiancés favourite game. You basically just make up words from some letters it gives you in two minutes 30 seconds. A great one for tokens.

6) Money Spin. Personally I don't like this game. It's like a slot machine and you use tokens every time you play. In my experience I always end up losing twice as many tokens as I win. Just like the real thing!

7) Space bricks. If you love tetris you'll love this. I have found this to be the best game by far for tokens. It takes a long time to play though and I find I get bored when on round 50! But if you can persevere it is great for tokens as I said.

8) Ice cubes. Another game where you have to beat the clock. Blocks start building up and the object of the game is to keep them down. To do this you have click on them when there is three or more colours together. You will get hand ache after a while with this as it gets faster and harder the higher the round you get to.

9) Diamond Mind. This is a simpler version of super diamond mind. You simply get rid of all the diamonds with three or more of the same colour in a line. There doesn't have to be any particular order so it's easier than super diamond mind. This game can get quite addictive!

*** The Scratch Card ***

You get 5 scratch cards a day where you have the chance to win £10. You mainly win tokens though or sometimes nothing. They are quite fun and worth doing every day.

*** The Click and Win Section ***

To be honest I always forget about this section. This is where playandwin will make their money. You have to click on the advertisers banner and it gives you 500 tokens for each one you click on. You wait until the advertisers page has loaded up then you can close it and see what other banner has appeared on the playandwin site. It will sometimes be the same one...don't worry it will give you another 500 tokens for clicking on it again! I usually find when I do, do this, I get at least 3000 tokens. So worth doing if you remember!

Now out of all those games you can't honestly tell me you don't like at least one can you? So if I have attracted your attention to the site it's time to tell you how to join!

*** Where do I sign??? ***

On the homepage on the left hand side menu you should see a section to log in. Underneath that you'll find a button that says 'Register User'. Simply click on that and then another page will load up where you will have to fill in your details such as name, e-mail, username etc. There's nothing complicated there so you should find it easy enough. Once you have completed that you will be a new user!

*** Finding your way around the site ***

The site is pretty busy looking so at first glance it could look confusing. However, if you look closely you'll see everything is pretty straightforward. After you have logged in you'll see a range of games that you can click on with pictures by them so you know what they are. If you don't see the game you like just click on the 'Online games' section on the left hand side.

Everything you need is on the left hand side menu. There's a guide which gives you useful information on the site and it tells you about tickets etc. If you need to know more you can go to the FAQ section which can also be found on the left hand side. This menu doesn't disappear; it will be there on every page you load up (on the site of course!).

A fairly new thing they have introduced to the site is the time left until the next draw. It tells you to the second how long you have left to gain tokens and turn them into tickets.

There's also a token guide section, which tells you all the ways you can earn tokens. As I've mentioned there's the games, the scratch cards and the click and win section. There's also other ways to earn tokens though and that's through three other ways; tipping a friend about the site, sending a postcard and adding the site to favourites.

If you tip a friend about the site you get 20 tokens. You can easily do this through the homepage on the right hand side menu. You just fill in their e-mail address and click on OK. Simple!

If you choose to send a postcard to a friend you go through the token guide section and click on the link. Here you get to choose a picture for your postcard and then you personalise it etc. You get 30 tokens for each one you send.

The final way is by adding the playandwin site to both your favourites and to set it as your homepage. You get 500 token each' which would make a grand total of 1000 tokens for simply clicking on the link on the right hand side of the homepage.

So all in all it's quite easy to earn tokens and very little effort too. But how do you turn your tokens into tickets?

*** The Ticket Shop ***

This is a new thing they have added. Before this came along you just played for tokens and those tokens were automatically entered into the draw without the need for tickets. However, now with the ticket shop you can buy as many tickets as you like with your tokens. You don't even have to buy any until you want to. This is because they now let you build up your tokens to give you a bigger chance of winning. Here is how many tickets your tokens will buy you:

1000 tokens = 1 ticket

You can buy the tickets in either 1's, 10's, 100's and 1000's. To get 1000 tickets you will need 1000000 tokens. A lot isn't it? That's why I try and save my tokens as much as possible so I can buy 1000's of tickets.

*** Still not persuaded to Join? ***

As well as playing the games there is also a chat section on each game where you can chat with all the other players. You also have a chat profile page where other members can find out more about you and leave you a message. Several members of the site are moderators, which means they can kick people off the chat if they are being rude or nasty to anyone etc.

I've noticed the chat rooms are quite busy. The ones to go in with the most people in are 'Egyptian pyramids' and 'Vegas style poker'. People are generally friendly and it's an excellent chance to make new friends.

You can create a chat profile on the homepage on the left hand side menu. You just click on 'create chat profile' and it will guide you through what to do. It's quite easy and you can even add a picture of yourself there. It's well worth having a profile I think.


*** But if I win, where will the money go? ***

If you win they will pay you when they process payments once a month and the payment will come through Paypal. This is the only method of payment as far as I know so it is vital you have an account with them. Paypal is of course free to join too and there are no risks involved so that shouldn't be a worry if you haven't got an account yet.


*** My overall opinion ***

When I first joined this site I was excited about the chance of winning £100. It tells you on the homepage every Friday who the winners are and I couldn't wait to have my name on the list. This simply didn't happen though and so I gave up and stopped playing for a while. When I went back however, I was scratching away one of the scratch cards and I won £10. I was ecstatic lol. This then assured me that people do actually win and the good thing is there are different winners every week. In the year I have belonged to the site, I haven't seen the same person win the same amount twice. So the chance of winning is there and what's more, it's free!

I really do love the site. I find it really easy to navigate around and I like the fact that the games load up in a different window to the actual site. This allows you to carry on messing around on the site while you play (depending on what game you are playing of course; you might be too busy playing!).

Colour scheme wise the site isn't the most eye-catching in the world. It's Yellow and white mainly with a black line at the top with the name of the site in it. There's also a picture of the playandwin mascot (a monkey).

The site also doesn't take too long to load up. The games can sometimes take a while though, it just depends how fast a connection you've got.

Game wise it has a big variety and something for everyone and it's hard to tear yourself away once you start playing. The instructions for the games are mainly pretty simple but if for any reason you can't understand them you can always ask one of the admins. They'll usually know and be able to help you.

The only complaint I can give is that when you contact the playandwin team, in my experience I didn't get a reply back. It's always best to ask an admin because they are always there and they know what they are talking about. When I tried e-mailing playandwin a question about payment they never got back to me but that was when they were playandwin.com not playandwin.co.uk like they are now so I aren't sure whether the service has got better yet.

Apart from that though I have no complaints. I've chatted to some nice people on the site, it has a friendly atmosphere. It's fun and keeps me entertained if I'm ever bored. Also, because I'm so competitive I find the hi-score section on each game great because I can see what I have to beat to get on the scoreboard.

Well I think that just about covers everything. Hope this has helped!

Aimee xxx

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