Patent ID: 8196929

Claim:
A gaming machine for providing a game to a player, comprising: a user interface allowing the player to place a wager; a video display; a controller coupled to the user interface and the display for providing a virtual deck of playing cards and allowing the player to place a wager using the user interface, each of the playing cards having a rank and a suit, for randomly establishing an initial player hand consisting of a predetermined number of the playing cards, displaying the initial player hand on the video display, allowing the player to discard zero or more of the playing cards in the initial player hand using the user interface, and replacing any discarded card in the initial player hand with a randomly chosen playing card from the deck of playing cards, forming a final player hand consisting of the same number of playing cards as the initial player hand, and for displaying the final hand on the video display, establishing a player score only as a function of the final player hand using a set of cribbage type counting rules, displaying the player score on the video display, and responsively awarding the player an award as a function of the player score and a predetermined pay table.