the poker night duology is an interesting one, because in retrospect, after having playing both, I think 1 holds up better than 2 does for two specific reasons.
1: the items in tf2 are so much better than 2's it's insane
2: you can make the characters shut the fuck up as well as skip their dialog, which unless I'm stupid is straight up missing from the sequel. why? idk.
my first reason is pretty subjective, but the second one is so important for long term play. 2 feels so much clunkier once the charm wears off and you start hearing the same 10 conversations over and over. either way, poker night 1 is just poker with video game characters. most people only care about this nowadays for the tf2 stuff, and its really damn good. a totally ok poker sim, nothing I'll dedicate much time to

One of the classic games on Steam that I rather bought more for the free stuff in TF2. It seems like poker, nothing special, except for very respectable opponents who have something to talk about and everything is voiced perfectly, because the original voice actors for their characters were invited (what is Max worth, from the game Sam&Max, a crazy psychopathic rabbit with very original humor and also quite violent). In fact, this game is worth attention only because of the interaction of characters from different game universes with the poker table, but there is no other poker game like it (not counting the sequel).

Одна из классических игр в Steam, которую я скорее купил больше ради бесплатных вещей в ТФ2. Вроде бы покер, ничего особенного, кроме очень солидных соперников, у которых есть о чем рассказать и все озвучено идеально, т.к были приглашены оригинальные актеры озвучки своих персонажей(чего только стоит Макс, из игры Sam&Max, безумный кролик психопат с очень оригинальным юмором и к тому же довольно насильственным). По сути, эта игра стоит внимания только из-за взаимодействия с покерным столом персонажей из разных игровых вселенных, но другого такого покера не найти(не считая сиквела).

So I've finally played it, the Texas Hold 'Em poker game by telltale games. I never really played Texas Hold 'Em poker before, so this was a first try by actually giving it a chance. The big reason as for why, is because of the video essay's on it by meikkon. What a free thinker that I am, anyway let's get on it.
I did learn the game a bit, to actually win a few Tournaments on Normal difficulty, I got all the tf2 items in-game by knocking the opponents when they bet their items (that don't mean anything because I played this by the offline version), surprising there are more custom items you can unlock by winning the tournaments like card skins (there's a Sam and Max, a tf2 witch is my favorite, a strong bad set and more), a table theme (my favorite is the automata theme that changes the whole scene to black and white). I always love extra things like this. It's what makes want to go back to play a game that I can customize the experience.

The dialogue gets repetitive quick, but you can shut the character. In my experience, The winning quotes by Strong Bad got annoying. The cast is perfect, I think I got a crush on Tycho because of the voice actor cocky delivery on the lines that makes "I'm a gamer that chooses to live many lives" super tame. I kinda get the hate for Tycho, and the giraffe line makes Tycho seems borderline insane. But I wouldn't have it any other way, The banter in this game is fun listening a couple of times.

The animations have some of the typical telltale engine problems that you can find in any telltale game of the time, sometimes I can never see Tycho eyes in his smirk face. But the charm makes for it, like Heavy animations are spectacular.

I haven't unlocked everything in the game, but I think this games deserves a chance if you like the concept. It is a shame that you can't can buy this game anymore, and the concept of poker night's dream matches between characters of different franchises isn't being expanded. At least make it with telltale franchises or indie titles.

It feels weird to write a review for a game you can't get anymore but I liked it enough that I feel like it warrants it.

Steam's tracker says I played a total of 17.5 hours but I could swear it was much more than that based on how long this game remained in my brain long after playing it.

I originally got it way back when it came out for the TF2 items but was pleasantly surprised with the game itself. As someone who had never played poker before this, it was a great introduction to Texas Hold'Em.

The gameplay itself is fairly simple, it's texas hold em poker, you can't really go too complex with it at least not when playing against AI. The characters have "tells" of sorts but save for the few where they loudly and visibly go "goddamn my cards suck" I at least wasn't able to notice them, especially when the camera swaps between a wide shot of the entire table to a close-up shot of whoever is deciding their next move.
The AI gets really funky if you decide to just go All In every round, they either fold or try to call your bluff with the weirdest cards on earth.
You get cosmetic changes to the room/cards/table after X amount of wins and while these are nice, them being tied to wins rather than points/money/games makes it so that you're not going to see a new unlock very often.

The banter between characters is one of the best parts of the game, the first time you hear it. I only have surface level knowledge on the characters that aren't Heavy Weapons Guy but the conversations made me want to learn more/made me like them enough to remember the conversation.
Tycho is the elephant in the room. Him being here is weird, his character is very unlikable and what little of him there is to like is on the "god this guy is a sad Loser" end of the spectrum.

I think the best part of the whole game is the atmosphere it immerses you in. The music (which is A+, top shelf stuff) coupled with the group banter and the slow-paced game of cards gets you in a really cozy space where 3 hours can go by and you didn't notice (and you maybe even think "I can do one more game" which turns into 3).

If you have this game but never tried it, do so! It is very fun. Twenty hours should be more than enough to get most of the achievements if you are into that, I jumped back in the game to get some of those out of the way (save for the "get a straight flush" one because I am not going through that)
If you don't have this game I would at least suggest you look up the conversations between the characters and the music because Jared Emerson-Johnson made wonderful tracks.

TLDR: Game is fun for a couple of hours, music is GREAT, Tycho sucks.