Bitcoin Forum

I tried some of the games in this section and most of them are old concepts adapted to work with bitcoins (poker, lotto, roulette, lottery, etc.). I am not saying they are bad. On the contrary, there are really nice games here with a great design.
But I got myself thinking about a game that can only be played with bitcoins due to its special features and I think I came up with something. I will explain my idea so let me know what you think.

I am a programmer, but I never did anything web-related and I just don't have enough free time right now to create a project like this. If someone really likes the idea and wants to go ahead with it, great. If that someone gets lots of money from 0.1% comissions and wants to give me something, even better ;) But I am not demanding anything. Just wanted to share this.


Now what really matters, the game:

My game is similar to a lottery. Every person will buy a ticket and that money adds to a pot that goes to the winner (or winners). The difference here is that you buy that ticket with your receiving address (unique characteristic of bitcoins). Let me elaborate on that.
Each address has a number that is created by a simple mathematical algorithm. For example, if you assign a value to each letter, you can add all the digits of the address and you will get values from 1 (100000000000000000000000000000000) to 1985 (1ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ). Using this approach, your address is always converted to a number between 1 and 1985.

My game consists of a website where there are periodic lotteries (say once a day or once an hour, depending on the number of people playing).
In every lottery there is a value that determines the winner. Every lottery starts with the value 1. Every participant that enters the lottery must pay 0.1BTC and provide its receiving address. The 0.1 BTC increases the pot and the receiving address increases the value (with the algorithm explained above). If the lottery value reaches 1985, the value will loop and start from zero (1900 + 95 = 100). The winner(s) is the owner of the address closest to the lottery value when time is up.
So if there are 3 players when lottery ends and the value of each addresses is 1023, 456, 908, the prize pot is 0.3 BTC and the winner is the address with 456 (because (1023 + 908 + 456)%1985 = 402).

I picture this game with a clean and simple website that has a counter indicating the current number and time left. It should also show how many addresses are playing right now, their values and the current winner. It also has a textbox where the user can find out the value of his address before playing.


I am sorry for the text length. If you read everything... Thanks ;) I'm looking forward for opinions and suggestions.

Interesting. I don't think it would work as it's pretty easy to pick your address if you know what you are doing.
Have you seen bitlotto.com? It uses bitcoin's unique features to operate:
-each ticket is actually the transaction hash of the payment
-all tickets go to the same address so the jackpot is verifiable
-the winner is based off of a hash of a block and "real life" lottery numbers to prevent any manipulation...
Pretty much all the security features are a side effect of using the blockchain for everything.

You're right. Bitlotto is a really smart implementation. You use the network for everything. Just checked it :)

Regarding addresses, you can choose them? How? I am fairly new to bitcoins so I might have missed something... Anyway, even if you choose your addresses, there is no way to predict your victory because someone else might play after you...

To a degree. They won't be able to pick an exact address but they could generate thousands and pick one that helps them better than the others.

The "old concept" games already achieve something that is only possible because of Bitcoin's special features: Players from the United States can play these games without their financial institutions stopping them.