Tournament Blackjack

You can save yourself a lot of heartache and disappointment in life if you simply prepare for the worst.

For example, don't expect England to win the next World Cup. If you've got any sense, put a few pounds on them not even qualifying.

Don't count on ITV ever making anything other than talent shows, don't hold your breath for a happy Christmas in Walford, and – most pertinently – don't expect a card game to ever deliver anything other than plain old cards.

In all fairness, some card packages in recent years have tried to stretch the genre, adding a touch of personality to proceedings by dropping in lines of dialogue here and characters with a backstory or two there.

Most, however, offer cards in a no nonsense fashion.

Playing it straight

Tournament Blackjack, which serves up blackjack in two forms (one-off casino play, and the tournament its name hints at) keeps things fairly plain and simple for the large part, allowing you to play the game either for small bets or full-on $500 wagers.

Controls are straightforward enough, with navigation around the menus – which revolve around sticking with your current hand, or risking a bust by going for the full 21 – handled via the number keys.

All other actions are assigned to '5', making Tournament Blackjack the kind of game you can play in the background – like, say, when England are getting knocked out of the next World Cup.

Tournament Blackjack does have one trick up its sleeve, however. While you can play the game by the standard rules, it also has something for the cheats.

Count yourself in

The Cheater School mode acts as both a tutorial – teaching you how to play and, most importantly, how to win – and an initiation in the art of card counting, which enables you to keep a track on the cards dealt out to your rivals and so make appropriate bets. You can even set the game to count for you, if you so choose.

While it's an interesting feature, it does place Tournament Blackjack in somewhat awkward territory. The short nature of the package would suggest this is something of an casual crack at cards, yet the card-counting school gives it a hardcore edge.

Either way, it's to Tournament Blackjack's credit that it avoids trying to turn play into a soap opera, instead opting to let the game itself tell the story.