2020 — Big Announcement: new platform & game reveal

Introduction

Decentralized apps have many key advantages that traditional applications do not. Hundreds of dApps have been launched on Ethereum, TRON, and EOS, but none of these apps have even come close to widespread recognition. It’s frustratingly easy to determine the number of users who actually use dApps. For example, Decentraland (raised $24M in ICO), Augur ($5M), Axie Infinity ($1.5M), and Gods Unchained ($15M) all have less than 300 daily active users.

If you look into blockchains that have implemented feeless transactions, such as EOS, you’ll notice that they have more users than Ethereum. The key is simple: many dApps on EOS use the game token-return mechanism, which means that rewards are distributed whether the user wins or loses. In these dApps, users can adjust the probability of winning to, say, 50%, and get as many game tokens as possible through “free” betting. This is a common approach to manipulating game statistics inside dApp catalogs, allowing you to see perfect stats with a bunch of users and breathtaking daily volume. Moreover, according to a report released by the AnChain blockchain security firm, most of the statistics that dApps churn out don’t even come from real people.

They discovered that gambling dApps on EOS make up the majority, accounting for around 65% of all transaction volume. This fact shouldn’t come off as surprising seeing as this is, unfortunately, a common practice in the crypto world. According to a Bitwise report claiming that “95% of trading volume is fake”, this practice applies not only to dApps, but also to cryptocurrency exchanges.

As a result, there is a clear lack of mass adoption. User acquisition costs soared mostly due to the low number of crypto users and the tough competition in attracting them. With a budget of $10,000, you can draw 10,000 regular users from the web or the App Store to your game. As for dApps, you actually waste it all on overpriced ad placements on specific crypto resources, netting you a drastically lower number of users.

Idea

After the development of Gamblr, we found ourselves inspired by blockchain technology and advantages of which dApps offer to users. And we’re still inspired! By diving deep into the dApp ocean, we, in addition to the amazing experience we had, understood the exact issue with the current dApp market. As a result, we decided to pivot our platform towards bringing genuine mass adoption to cryptocurrency, while still keeping the key advantages of dApps and decentralization. Due the developing Gamblr 2.0, the following 10 fundamental principles remain:

• Cross-blockchain. The dApp should be available for Bitcoin, Ethereum, EOS, TRON, IOST, and every blockchain platform with our without smart-contracts
• Low entry threshold. You don’t need to have crypto assets or even a wallet to start.
• Click-n-play. Instant authentication via your favorite platform including Facebook, Google, and Metamask
• Cross-device client. Play with any device on any distribution platform such as Telegram, Google Play, or Facebook
• Free Play mode. All users should be able to play for free and have fun — risk-free!
• Easy deposits. Deposit any crypto asset (including ERC20 tokens) or fiat currencies through authorized payment providers

The Game

The idea sounds simple: Let’s try to connect blockchain users and regular web users with the biggest game in the world!

And yes, the game is Poker — the most popular board game in the casino industry! It’s a game known by millions, a game where luck plays a huge role for beginners and professionals alike, with lots of variations and different modes. Gamblr’s Poker will offer a variety of different game modes including Texas Holdem: Sit’n’Go (instant multi-table tournaments), Instant Poker (fold to switch table), Private Games (play with your friends only), Voice Games (voice chat at the table) and much more! We’re also working on integrating all the Gamblr casino games into the Poker client! Imagine instantly switching from the poker table to slots, spinning, and then switching back to the table! There are many more cool features in the final release which we will explore in the articles to come.

Distribution

As we pointed out in the introduction above, the number of dApp users is quite low. That’s why we’ve decided to bring the advantages of cryptocurrency to the mass market! This will allow us to acquire a much larger audience for the game. As a result, we made the cross-client device and platform both independent. What’s more, you can start playing immediately via 1-click opt-in through your favorite auth. provider! Regardless if you’re an advanced Scatter user or a housewife on Facebook, you’ll get access to the powerful dApp with a press of a button!

But wait; won’t Google and Facebook put a stop to this? Let’s take a closer look! We can divide this gaming market up into two sections: casual playing for free chips (not withdrawable, bought via in-app purchase), and playing for real-world money. Many casual poker games including Zynga Poker, WSOP, and more, have over dozens of millions of downloads! On the other end, you have apps that represent poker rooms using real-world money. You can’t deposit or withdraw real money using these apps, but you can play for real if you log in with your account created on the original poker room website. That’s exactly how the PokerStars app works!

By default, starting to play Gamblr’s Poker as a casual game for free, on any platform, is quite simple. However, if you want to go further and deposit or withdraw cash — you should access the web wallet and complete a few necessary steps in order to start playing for real money! This approach provides an excellent opportunity to gain lots of casual players for free and afterwards, to build strong funnels for adopting them into the crypto world!

Economics

Many interesting projects have been released recently, ranging from the entire DeFi ecosystem to cross-chain bridges like RenVM, or, for example, the Plasma project — a blockchain that allows you to make payments using fiat currency (similar to PayPal for crypto). We intend to integrate all these products into Gamblr Poker. Thanks to the DeFi ecosystem, users will be able to make deposits and withdrawals in any currency — from BAT to SNX (in addition to the standard ETH). And with RenVM integration, users will be able to make deposits or withdraw their winnings with Bitcoin. Imagine a case when a player, entering a game via Facebook, wins a freeroll tournament and has the ability to instantly withdraw funds to any crypto wallet. Even if he wasn’t familiar with cryptocurrency before, our tips and tutorial videos will help him! At the same time, we do not want to limit users in their choice of payment method, so we’ll be integrating services like Plasma to accept fiat payments and in the future, when entering local markets, local payment providers in the scope of fiat-cryptocurrency.

It is important to note that all the requirements for KYC/AML in transactions where there is fiat currency will be entrusted to providers offering this service. In the event of transactions such as cryptocurrency including interblockchain bridges, users will be exempt from these procedures, as Gamblr payment gateways will be organized exclusively on smart-contracts, similar to the DeFi ecosystem. The entire system will be combined into a single token, a universal utility-token — the equivalent of $1. We will talk about the token structure in the articles to come.

To summarize all of the above: you can download the game through Google Play, register with your Facebook account, enter a tournament after paying a BAT token to participate, and if you win, you can withdraw half of the prize to Bitcoin with the help of renVM and the other half to your VISA card, following the KYC procedure from a payment provider (for example, Plasma). What’s more, Poker will be the first dApp published using the most popular blockchains with smart-contract support. There is no need to compete between blockchains — we will unite all the platforms with the universal token and smart-contract system!

Current State

We plan to release a beta version of the game within the next three weeks. Many of you will be invited to participate in beta testing, for which you will receive special bonuses in the future. The game is currently in alpha testing and you can see how it looks in our promotional video:

Starting with this article, we will be publishing more information on the development process, future plans, and describing the cool features that we’ll be adding to the game. Stay tuned!

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