While video & online games are making first small steps towards Bitcoin, gambling is already there. Cointelegraph looks into why cryptocurrency payment systems are still underdeveloped. Bitcoin as part of online gaming ecosystem The talks started in 2011. Back then, entrepreneur Calvin Ayre published a list of his own predictions for online gaming industry in 2012. One of them was about Bitcoin. It said: “Someone is going to figure out how to make this work and when they do, all the anti-gambling, over-regulating authoritarian governments will be exposed as emperors without clothes.” Today, cryptocurrency payments make an integral part of gaming ecosystem. According to some estimates, 40% of Bitcoin turnover is related to online gaming. There are more than 150 Bitcoin and altcoin casinos worldwide, not to mention several hundreds of websites accepting cryptocurrencies as an alternative payment method. The majority of these sites use Bitcoin as a gaming chip or the betting currency. The spectrum of games is extremely wide: from the digital versions of Poker and Blackjack to Bitcoin-based bookmaking. Another category of platforms allows players to compete against each other for coins. These competitions are usually based on well-known video games or simple PvP skill-based games, developed specifically for this purpose. Finally, there is also a number of games where player can receive a reward for the gaming process itself. Bitcoin as ideal casino chip Several years ago, speaking of Bitcoin advantages, experts called the currency an ideal casino chip – “immediate, private and irreversible” – and claimed it combined the best attributes of an optimal e-Gaming payment method. However, the time doesn’t stand still; both markets are developing rapidly. Eventually, such dynamics have brought to surface some shortcomings of existing systems, and it became clear that even the so-called “match made in crypto” has its […]
