Cryptocurrency’s Found its Core Audience Wanting to Use Coins as Intended

Cryptocurrencies, specifically the original crypto, Bitcoin, were established to create a form of money that could be globally accessible and trusted. Launched after the crash of the US housing market, it was clear that the aspiration of Bitcoin, at least, was to usurp fiat currencies.

Now, they're more widely seen as a vehicle for investment, to gamble on price rises and drops, with governments being slow to react to their rise to prominence. Very few countries have strong, clear-cut regulations regarding cryptocurrency and its use in transactions. As detailed on analyticsinsight.net, international regulations on cryptocurrency are yet to come into force, and most nations don't consider it to be legal tender but do permit its use.

One distinct community of people who have taken to cryptocurrency in the form that it's intended is the gaming community. There's a very large crossover between crypto-enthusiasts and gamers, with word of these revolutionary coins being discussed and traded between the gaming communities for well over a decade.

Some mainstream platforms got on board, with Microsoft and Steam allowing for Bitcoin payments via BitPay. Still, real progress is being made in other lines of gaming, with crypto proving to be the solution to problems that have inhibited gamers in the past.

Cryptocurrency payouts for the players

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As noted, the online gaming circles have several cryptocurrency enthusiasts, with word spreading quickly about this revolutionary new form of money that bypasses fiat currency. The relative anonymity, speed, global network, and lack of fees all became very appealing, with coins standing out whenever someone would search online for an alternative money system.

With so many gamers talking about the likes of Bitcoin and Ethereum, it didn't take long for online gaming platforms to seek to expand their payment methods. For years, online gambling platforms found that they couldn't reach their whole target audience because of the limitations put upon them by using fiat currency payment methods.

This gave rise to crypto-gambling platforms, which offer players the opportunity to make deposits in popular cryptocurrencies, play them in casino games or bet them on sports, and then make withdrawals in cryptocurrency. As shown on asiabet.org, crypto-gambling is particularly handy in places like India, with it offering anonymity, fast processing, and not a single fee for deposits or withdrawals. Many casino operators are open to accepting at least one cryptocurrency. As this site points out, blockchains are also an important piece of the puzzle and have allowed crypto to be recognized as a valid payment method.

A particular preference in crypto gambling, as it's being termed, has gone to the casino games. Limitations in many places around the world make these games all the more intriguing, which is why cryptocurrencies, with their anonymity and trustworthiness, are used on them the most. Online slots are prevalent across the crypto casinos, but there's still a place for the classic table games – especially in their live dealer forms as they're like playing at a real casino, but without the hassle.

Of course, being a relatively new concept to the mainstream, the only stumbling block is that you need to acquire, store, and learn how to use cryptocurrency. It can be somewhat confusing, especially when it comes to choosing the type of wallet that you want to use, but overall, it works just as regular money does, though solely digital.

The idea of being able to play for cryptocurrency payouts, as is the case on the crypto-gambling sites, has spread into other realms of gaming, too. The enthusiast crossover has led to some competitive gaming promotions offering bitcoin as a reward for in-game performance, with the software Infuse making this possible through the Bitcoin Lightning Network. Then, there are platforms that are fully integrating blockchains and using cryptocurrency as a means to manage the games themselves.

Solving the problem of digital replications

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There are many lines of gaming that have distinctly struggled in their transitions to the digital space, with these being the games that revolve around collecting and trading individual items. The problem with the digital space, though, is that these items can be released at the will of the publisher, with their values being greatly decided by them, too. Furthermore, replication of these digital items isn't overly difficult.

New gaming platforms have emerged to ensure that the digital items that people acquire are one-of-a-kind, owned only by the holder, and have a value dictated by the players. This is all built on the blockchain, primarily Ethereum. The likes of Enjin Coin, Decentraland, WAX, and The Sandbox all utilize coins and tokens for gaming, with the key being non-fungible tokens.

An NFT, as they're known, is a piece of data stored on the digital ledger, and thus, the blockchain continually certifies that it's a unique entity. Any attempts to replicate it are quashed by the software immediately, as the records won't align with the ledger, and it keeps account of which wallet owns the data. This data can take the form of anything, and in gaming, it can be a skin, weapon, avatar, profile, or just about any digital asset that can be granted ownership to players.

To date, anyone who gets a digital game asset, such as a digital trading card or a reward from a loot box, is only being given access to it via a license from the game's central server. With these assets being forged on a blockchain as NFTs, players truly get to own the digital items that they acquire. It's especially effective in card games, but would never be utilized by games like FIFA or Madden Ultimate Team, which grant themselves value to persuade players to buy items that become outdated or lose their servers each year.

While they certainly haven't struggled to transition to the digital space, online gambling sites, particularly casinos, are realizing that their games can be improved through cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. The most glaring example of where this could be shown is with the popular progressive jackpot games. With everyone playing at once, and the drop being randomly gifted to one player, having it all run on the site's blockchain, with cryptocurrencies being the tender of the game, there'd never been any replicants or false entries to the slot. So, whatever goes in is guaranteed to be paid to the exact number of people programmed into the game's blockchain coding.

Cryptocurrencies are gradually revolutionizing the gaming scene because the players want to make use of their advantages.