FunFair is a blockchain platform for online casino gaming which is aiming to provide a low cost, high quality and transparent casino experience that is provably fair. The FunFair project itself isn’t a casino, it’s simply the underlying technology that will be licensed out to casino operators and organizations. The platform’s main features include:
Fair – As a blockchain-based platform, FunFair is transparent and provably fair with verifiable game logic written into its smart contracts.
Fast – The platform offers faster gameplay than traditional online casinos. Deposits and withdrawals are almost instant because users don’t need to use a central bank.
Secure – FunFair holds the potential winnings of every game in escrow and they are instantly paid out to the winner. Blockchain registration and payments eliminate any chance of fraud.
Convenience – FunFair has streamlined registration, know your customer (KYC) protocols and payment steps. You won’t have to wait on the casino to cash out your winnings… Winnings of any size will instantly be credited directly into your wallet.
FunFair features its own internal token called FUN that powers every aspect of the platform, from developer rewards to player wagers and winnings. FUN is used for all platform actions, including betting, paying out players and lending, as well as compensating game makers and affiliates. Casino operators must use FUN tokens to pay their licensing fees.
FUN Pricing, Market Cap and Volume
FUN was launched during a token event on June 22, 2017, with a fixed supply of 11 billion tokens. The tokens were distributed as follows:
– 4.45 billion tokens are in cold storage.
– 4.6 billion tokens are in circulation.
– *2.3 billion tokens are held by the founders.
*These tokens are locked and will be released slowly over a period of 18 months.
FUN began trading at ~$0.011 and its price has remained more or less the same in the months that followed. Like most alt coins, its price rose sharply in December 2017 and January 2018, but it has since gone down to pre-2018 numbers. Some events planned for 2018, like the main net launch in Q2 2018, may give the price a bump.
How FunFair Works
FunFair is built on top of the Ethereum blockchain and its games are defined by immutable smart contracts to guarantee security and lower the risk of cheating and fraud. The platform can be used to launch thousands of casinos hosted by operators of all sizes from anywhere in the world.
A FunFair license allows operators to easily set up and host their own casino under a private label. Operators who choose to utilize FunFair will have the freedom to:
1. Create customized games based on traditional casino games or select games from the FunFair marketplace.
2. Offer users amenities like standard rooms for regular players or VIP rooms for high-rollers.
3. Create customized in-house bonuses for rewarding loyal users.
Before launching a casino, operators must have a reserve of FUN tokens in their wallet to ensure they can accept bets and cover their liabilities. The amount of tokens an operator needs is dependent on the scale of operation they expect to have. Operators can expect to save a significant amount of money on hardware, operational overhead, and chargebacks. Even the number of physical servers required by FunFair is reduced because gameplay is executed via smart contracts which are deployed on the Ethereum blockchain.
Once an operator is ready, they can publish a full casino suite and go live in just two clicks. FunFair will initially launch with six well-crafted visual games that cover a broad range of gaming types, including blackjack, roulette, baccarat, slots, and a host of other traditional table games. Its portfolio of games is expected to expand as the platform continues to develop.
The FunFair team is still working out an economic model for incentivizing developers to create games for the platform, but developers can expect to get generous royalties because of the lower costs of running the system.
Fate Channels
Blockchain-based games tend to be slow because it usually takes at least a minute for blocks to be mined before game results can be sent back to a player. FunFair’s patent-pending implementation of state channel technology, known as Fate Channel, makes the response time of blockchain games almost instant without congesting the Ethereum blockchain.
Fate Channels are state channels that are opened for the duration of a game session and facilitate communication between the casino and player. Transactions occur only at the beginning and end of a gaming session, allowing users to make hundreds of bets in one session. This means you only need to pay one gas fee even if you make several bets in one session.
Fate Channels are a game changer for the online casino market. FunFair is working on a new version of the technology that is completely serverless to even further reduce the operating costs of casinos. The update is scheduled to come out sometime in 2018.
FunFair vs. Other Cryptocurrencies
FunFair is not a unique project. There are other blockchain platforms that are attempting to accomplish similar goals. Sp8de, for example, is a competing blockchain gaming platform built on the Cardano network that wants to create distributed casino apps that completely eliminate the problems of traditional and online gambling environments. FunFair stands out from other similar projects for the following reasons:
Instant, Frictionless Gaming – With Fate Channels, users can enjoy a near instant response time from games.
10x Cheaper Betting – The gas cost of playing a single hand of blackjack can exceed $1 and dice games can reach $0.75 per bet on average. Since one gaming session on FunFair can handle hundreds of bets at once, the platform’s transaction costs are quite low.
Putting Social First – All of FunFair’s games are designed to be easy to share so that users can form groups and play with their friends. FunFair plans to add functionality that enables operators to give affiliate revenue to highly social players in the future.
HTML Only – FunFair is browser-based and it follows HTML5 and WebGL standards to provide quality 3D graphics and a fast, responsive user experience similar to what users would expect from app-based games. Games built on the FunFair platform will run directly in desktop and mobile browsers and won’t require an app download, eliminating one of the major hurdles of player onboarding.
Serverless Operations – FunFair is engineered to be completely serverless, allowing for much lower overhead costs than traditional online gaming systems, which can cost millions of dollars to deploy. Operators can cheaply create peer-to-peer casinos that don’t need servers or employees to run.
Buying, Selling and Storing FUN
FunFair tokens (FUN) can be acquired from Binance, Bitfinex, EtherDelta, HitBTC, AirSwap, Gate.io, and NovaExchange by using Bitcoin, Ethereum or other supported cryptocurrency pairs. It is worth noting that compared to other cryptos, some exchanges charge unusually high fees for transferring FUN tokens to external wallets. Because of this, make sure to find out how much your chosen exchange charges before trading FUN.
The Fun token FAQ recommends using MetaMask for storage, but Ethereum wallets like MyEtherWallet (MEW), Jaxx, Parity, Exodus, and Mist should work just as well. For long-term storage, try a Trezor or Ledger Nano S hardware wallet.
Liquidity of FUN
FUN has good market liquidity for an altcoin with such a large volume. The project is providing an interesting solution to the problems plaguing online casinos, and by licensing its infrastructure, it avoids stepping on the toes of the large casinos that dominate the gambling industry. It’ll be interesting to see how this project does in the coming years, especially after the launch of its main net.
