Playing on pogo.com in free mode while being bombarded with frequent "Club Pogo" advertisements is a little bit like belonging to a country club, but not having a membership card to get you into to the VIP lounge: you know it's there, you've heard it's pretty cool inside, and you'd like to be able to check it out, but you just don't want to shell out the $$ for a membership pass.

This page will, through descriptions and images, give you a bit of a taste of what it's like inside the pogo.com Club Pogo area without having to join or even do a free trial!

I've been a pogo.com player and enthusiast since the year 2000, but until recently I had never tried out "Club Pogo". However, thanks to a couple kind pogo players who nudged me into a free trial (thank you, "friend_2B" and "DavidSWUBC"), I figured it was about time to check it out, and I'm glad I did!

What is Club Pogo?

Club Pogo is Pogo on steroids. As a non-club player, you play games for free, earn tokens, put up with advertisements and intermissions (or inter-freakin'-mission's--IFM's--as they're sometimes called). This is all well and good, but if you're a true games player at heart and are looking for something a bit beyond the basic pogo experience, Club Pogo may be for you (at a price).

Here is a list of just some of the things that differentiate Club Pogo from regular pogo:

• Home Page: Club Pogo's Home Page is different from the regular home page
• Advertisements: There are no Advertisements! The first time I opened a game as a temporary Club Pogo member, I was a bit surprised that the window seems shorter! And it was! Because there was no advertisement at the top of the page, the entire window was about 100 pixels or so shorter in height than a regular pogo window. Cool. However, the game playing area itself remains the same size.
• Intermissions: There are no intermissions in Club Pogo! Regular pogo members will see a 30-second advertisement about every 7 minutes (depending upon the game). But in Club Pogo, there are no intermissions; you can take a break from your game whenever you want to, and it'll still be waiting for you when you get back.

• Avatars (what Pogo calls a "mini"): As a regular player, you probably already know that in each game room there is a list of players that are in the room with you. You can chat with these other players by using the chat box. But you'll notice in many rooms some players will have a small icon to the left of their name. This icon (which can vary from player to player) indicates that player is a Club Pogo member. If you click on their profile, you'll notice right away that there is a cartoon-ish looking person which represents them online. This character is called an "Avatar", and in pogo terms, it is called a "mini". Every Club Pogo member, including temporary members, can create a mini using many of the options provided to change hair color and style, facial features, clothing, and so forth. Club members can also add "goodies" to their mini, such as special backgrounds, or other items that might reflect that person's interests.
• Exclusive Games: There are lots of games in all genres available to regular pogo players, but as a Club Pogo member, there are many more cool games you can learn and play. How many more? A quick count of just the front page of pogo shows at least three dozen or more games that are available to Club Pogo members, but not to regular players. These are games like: "Tri-Peaks Solitaire" (a cool solitaire game that's a bit different from regular solitaire), "Pop Fu" (a sort of training game that will help you in poppit but is a game in itself), and "Jigsaw Detective" (you put together pictures like an online jigsaw puzzle to solve mysteries). But those are just examples--there are lots of other Club-only games including several word-based games, many casino-style games, and other exclusive games that you play against other Club players.

• Badges: Badges are the Club Pogo way of keeping score, sort of. They're similar to badges that you might earn in scouting or the military. That is, to earn a badge you must complete a specific task in a specific game, such as earning some number of tokens or reaching a certain level. Badges are not particularly hard to earn, though some can be time-consuming. I was surprised when I first signed up for a Club Pogo trial to learn that I had already earned 16 badges, apparently from my free play! But I wasn't aware of this until I joined the Club because badges don't show up in free play. You can earn badges through weekly "challenges" that are presented to you (they change week to week, and rotate through many games), or you can even select your own personal challenge to complete and earn a badge.
• Exclusive rooms: If you are a Club Pogo member, you have a choice of continuing to play in game rooms that anyone can enter, or if you prefer you can play in game rooms in which only Club Pogo members are allowed to join.
• Extended statistics: If you view a non-club-member's profile, you'll find some information about that player (if they've chosen to share it) and their playing statistics, presented in text format. But if you view a Club member's profile, you'll see a picture of that player's mini, plus the information is presented a bit more elegantly. And, in addition to statistics, you can also see the player's winnings (including wallpapers and screensavers not available to non-Club players) and the badges they've collected to date.


• Jackpot spin: The jackpot spinner is quite more elaborate in Club play. Plus, Club players get an opportunity to stop the spinner, but non-Club players do not.

• Gems: Club Pogo members can purchase "Gems" online. With gems you can purchase "premium" items such as badge albums and custom challenges.

All of these things Club Pogo features combine to make Club members more apt to sign up for the service (which costs about $30-$40 per year), and to keep coming back year after year. All in all, this amounts to extraordinary marketing on the part of pogo for their Club Pogo product.

Frequently Asked Questions about Club Pogo that might not appear on pogo.com:

• Do club pogo players have a better chance of winning a jp than non-club players? No. In fact, it would probably be illegal for pogo to make winning a jackpot more likely for paying players. Instead, they reward paying players with badges, wallpapers, and screensavers.
• How many people are club pogo members? Last time I checked, pogo was claiming about 1.5 million club members.
• Are the Club-only games interesting and enjoyable? Absolutely. Knowing the fun games that exist in the club gives one good reason to want to be a club member.
• Is it worth it? And this is the real question. And the answer is completely subjective. If you are someone who really enjoys playing games on your computer on the internet, Club Pogo may be a great option for you! But luckily pogo frequently offers a Club Pogo free trial period (no credit card required), so if you are on the fence, take advantage of the free trial to decide if you want to become a Club Pogo member. Watch the advertisements for the free trial offer. Good luck everyone!