Cryptocurrencies were set to turn the whole financial world upside down. While it hasn’t happened yet, they are making strides and affecting a wide number of industries. One of the first areas to widely embrace cryptocurrencies was online gaming and gambling, and it’s easy to see why when you analyze some of the issues these industries have to deal with. Let’s take a look at what we can expect for the future of crypto and online gaming and why they’re a match made in heaven.
Crypto Gambling
Online gambling is the one area where cryptocurrency is showing the most promise right now. They allow players to deposit and receive funds without having to go through legacy systems. This saves a lot of time and makes online casinos accessible to the unbanked.
Another great thing about cryptocurrencies is that they allow for more privacy and less traceability. This makes them an option for people who live in jurisdictions where online gambling is illegal, or foreign residents trying to play their favorite games without having to deal with banking restrictions in their host country.
Bankroll Separation
Another benefit of crypto in online gaming is that it allows players to better separate their gaming budget and other obligations. They can allocate a certain amount of cryptocurrency for gaming only, which will make it harder for them to overspend. They will also be able to better tell how much they’re spending on gambling every month and make it easier to stick to a budget.
Lower Barrier to Entry
Building a crypto-based game or casino also has a much lower barrier to entry. When building a regular online casino or pay-to-play game, you have to deal with all the banking regulations that could make it almost impossible for the regular person to get in.
Games like CryptoKitties, by contrast, didn’t have to go through all the hoops that are usually required to launch a pay-to-play game. Virtually anyone can build a similar game, and we can expect many other indie crypto games to become massive successes in the future.
One of the reasons why it’s so easy for developers to create pay-to-play games on platforms of Ethereum is the ease of collecting in-app purchases. These will be much harder to implement in regular games and won’t be as seamless. Cryptocurrency payments can be processed instantly without having to go through a lengthy verification process or enter credit card credentials.
More Cost-Efficient
Depending on the cryptocurrency being used, fees can be much lower than when using things like PayPal, credit cards, or bank transfers. You won’t have to deal with exchange or handling fees, for instance. This is because everything is done through a peer-to-peer exchange. This means more money stays in the pocket of players and developers can maximize their profits.
As we can see, the future looks very bright for cryptocurrencies in the online gaming scene. They have many benefits over legacy systems that could make them a serious option in the future – that’s if they don’t end up eclipsing regular currencies.