New site mixes Texas Hold ’em with Hearthstone to make wizard poker an esport

Texas Hold ’em is one of the most popular card games in the world. Yet one company is looking to shake up a formula that began more than a century ago.

Earlier this week, Mediarex Sports & Entertainment launched a new poker site called HoldemX in an early testing phase. The company is using this platform to focus on a new style of Texas Hold ’em poker that combines that classic gameplay of the original with wild cards and bonuses that drastically change its pace and strategy. Mediarex specifically wants to bring together poker with the wild gameplay that makes online card games like Hearthstone, Magic: The Gathering, and SolForge so popular. With online poker worth around $3.5 billion in the U.S. (according to a Poker Scout report) and digital collectible card games worth around $1.2 billion in the United States (according to SuperData research), HoldemX is aimed at capitalizing on both of those audiences. Toward that goal, Mediarex raised $4.9 million in venture funding to bring HoldemX into existence.