Original Tile Checks

Art is cheap to copy. Behaviour is not.

Every cue in the two lists above is worth checking, but they are not equally hard to fake. A convincing copy of the tile art takes somebody an afternoon and a screenshot. The things below take working software, which is why they are where copies actually come apart.

The strip has to lock. A real window closes and stops accepting taps, at the same moment, every round, whether or not you are ready. Imitations built to look like the table often stay tappable, or lock at a moment that conveniently follows your last action.

The history ribbon has to fill as you watch. Sit for five rounds. Each drawn picture should appear at the end of the ribbon and the oldest should fall off. A ribbon that was drawn once as an image sits there unchanged, and five rounds is long enough to notice.

Extra Pay has to live on the strip. The seal belongs on a picture, visible before the draw, carrying a printed figure. A separate button, a floating panel or a menu item called boost is a different thing wearing the name — Extra Pay.

The chip tray has to have edges. A real table prints a minimum and a maximum somewhere near the stake controls, because the host has to enforce them. A tray with no limits anywhere in sight is usually a mock-up of a tray.

One picture, every round, without exception. Not two winners, not a ladder of partial results, not a bonus round that arrives when you are losing.

None of these can be established from a still image, which is the practical reason a screenshot is never the answer to this question. Watching costs a minute. Ask for that minute of anyone — including yourself — before anything is staked.