Bitvest
Overview
In the crowded and competitive world of online gambling, Bitvest is one of those that doesn’t try to overdo its concept, focusing on the simplicity of lightweight games that combine quick microbets with the option to invest in its crowd-funded bankroll.
Originally touted as a Bitcoin faucet, their mainstay Plinko game remains its major crowdpuller, with the faucet and other deposit-free rewards now offering in-game Tokens instead of satoshi (which can then be converted into Bitcoin when enough is accumulated).
Gameplay
There are 5 games on offer for you to gamble your Tokens or Bitcoins: Plinko, Dice, Slots, Roulette and Betspin. With Plinko, you can even adjust your prize row customisation to suit your style of playing.
The Dice game offers a chance for massive winnings, with maximum payout multiplier of 990,000. In effect, you could win almost 1 million Tokens from a single Token wager! You can either manually enter your Roll Target (Betting High or Low against a number from 1.0000 to 99.9999) or enter your desired multiplier. For simpler use, there’s also a slider bar to set your target.
Investment
It also claims one of the highest investment incentives, earning investors between 1.15% to 1.8333% of total site wagers, which is about 10 per cent more than what other site investments offer.
More accurately, when you are investing, you earn based on your share of the total site bankroll. Basically, you earn about 70% of profits the site makes, calculated from commissions and the individual game’s house edge. Individual investors can also stand to gain much more of the bankroll through margin adjustments, earning (and therefore, increasing risk exposure) up to 5 times of your actual investment.
The site is pretty transparent about the back end of its bankroll, furnishing verifiable details of Proof of Liabilities and Proof of Reserves as assurance to investors.
Bonuses
There are random chat “Rains” (to participate in chat, wager at least 0.01 BTC), that will enable you to win random Tokens simply for participating in the chat room. Recently, in-chat games have also awarded significant amounts of Tokens to players, while big winners have been known to “Rain” Tokens on other players in chat.
Depositing and Withdrawing
All deposits are taken only in Bitcoin but require 1 confirmation before you are able to play with your balance. While waiting, however, you are free to collect Tokens from the faucet every 90-120 seconds provided you a balance of under 50 Tokens.
Tokens can be exchanged into Bitcoin in denominations of 200,000 Tokens for 0.002 BTC or 1 million Tokens for 0.011 BTC. Effectively, this means that 1 Token is currently valued between 1 to 1.1 satoshi.
Withdrawals are painless and the site requires no verification for this process.
Pros
Quick and lightweight site.
Quick deposit and withdrawal.
Attractive investment option.
Verifiable provably fair mechanisms with clear house edges.
Faucet and chat rain option for free-to-play options. Surprise Happy Hours.
Cons
Only five games to choose from.
Only Bitcoins and in-house Tokens as currency.
Support not obviously reachable but available from chat and forums.
Bottom Line
Simple and straightforward, gamble and/or choose to invest. Could do better with more games.