Review of CryptoSlots Casino

For as long as I've been gambling online, I've been playing at both Slotland and WinADay Casino. Both sites are run by the same operator, Slotland Entertainment, and they have proven to be reputable casinos, and some of the best for Americans to play at. Their latest casino project is known as CryptoSlots, and it has well and truly jumped on the cryptocurrency bandwagon. You won't find any traditional banking options here, but what you will find are reasonably fast payouts and a unique game selection that I have come to expect from CryptoSlots' sister sites.

Software and game selection

CryptoSlots presents itself via a web-based instant play platform. There's nothing for you to install, as everything works directly in your web browser whether you are using a PC, Mac, mobile phone, or tablet. I logged into CryptoSlots using my Galaxy Note and had no issues navigating the site or selecting the games I wanted to play.

Signing up for an account is as simple as filling out four things: pick a username and a password, check a box asserting that you are legally old enough to gamble, and supply your email address which you'll have to verify thereafter. After years of conditioning from playing at casinos that ask for your life story before you can even begin to play, I was quite surprised to find that is all this casino asks you for as long as you play at the site. Together with the use of cryptocurrencies for financial transactions, if you are so inclined you could use a VPN and a disposable email address and be effectively anonymous while playing at this casino, with both the good and bad that entails.

The game library at CryptoSlots is small and is mostly comprised of slots, although there are a few video poker machines available for play as well. You'll only find these games on offer at Slotland's other sites, but the full library hasn't been ported over to CryptoSlots just yet. When I was looking at the casino, there were just 19 slots on offer as well as 6 video poker machines. I would expect that more games will be ported over in the future, but you shouldn't be expecting hundreds of games to choose from. The games are all optimised for both mobile and desktop play, so they load quickly, and don't require Flash or any other unusual browser plugins.

CryptoSlots does not feature a sitewide progressive jackpot like Slotland or Winaday. Instead it has a special game that is called Jackpot Trigger that can only be played using what the casino calls jackpot tokens. You earn these tokens by playing on the site and accumulating winnings. Every time you accumulate a multiple of $100 in winnings you are awarded one jackpot token. Using these tokens on Jackpot Trigger can win you various prizes up to the major jackpot which is fixed at $1,000,000.

Banking and customer support

As the name suggests, CryptoSlots' banking system goes full bore with cryptocurrencies, so there are none of the usual credit card or eWallet methods at all. You are given the option of Bitcoin, Litecoin, or BCash to move money to and from the casino. However in a disappointing twist that I didn't see coming, I soon found that no matter what you use to deposit into the casino, it is converted into U.S. Dollars which is the only unit of currency used by all the games. While I guess this is familiar and comfortable for a lot of people, it leaves you exposed to the notorious volatility of the crypto/fiat exchange rates. In a worst case scenario, you could deposit using Bitcoin, win, then withdraw, yet end up with less Bitcoin than you started with, if the exchange rates moved against you while you were waiting for your withdrawal. Of course, to be fair, this could work in your favour in reverse. But I think one element of gambling is quite enough when I am playing at a casino. I would far prefer to see this casino allow me to deposit, play, and withdraw in Bitcoin without converting to anything else in between.

There aren't any upper limitations specified for withdrawals, though if you request more than $10,000 the casino says it will split your withdrawal up into multiple smaller payments to separate blockchain addresses. The minimum withdrawal amount is a little steep at $100, considering how cheap and easy it is to pay out any amount using cryptocurrency. While cryptocurrency blockchains work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and should be trivial to pay out nearly instantly, CryptoSlots only processes withdrawals once per day for all withdrawals submitted before 23:59 GMT on the previous day. While this is faster than most American-friendly casinos, it still pales in comparison to some other betting sites that handle cryptocurrency withdrawals within minutes. And the potential time delay reiterates the point about those crypto/fiat exchange rate fluctuations I mentioned earlier.

Customer support is pretty solid at CryptoSlots, as the casino has their team available through email and live text chat. I reached out to the team and had a response to my question in under a minute. I didn't really ask anything that would be too taxing for the support team, but my previous experiences with support at Slotland and WinADay has been positive.

Security and fairness

Site security is addressed using SSL encryption, and it should be noted that using cryptocurrencies for banking does add another layer of protection for privacy. As mentioned earlier this casino does not ask you for personally identifiable information. However given the use of pseudo-anonymous payment methods and the lack of identification, one improvement I would like to see at this casino is the use of two factor authentication to protect accounts. As things stand, if an unauthorised person does get into your account somehow, once your money is withdrawn to crypto it is gone forever with no way to get it back.

CryptoSlots doesn't hold a gaming license from a regulator in a recognised jurisdiction. Instead the site works under a license from Anjouan (a little known island in the Indian Ocean) which is little more than a stamp on a piece of paper. It is patently clear that this casino could only really work the way it does in terms of anonymity due to lack of regulation and enforcement of various laws. On the other hand, the operator has proven itself to be professional and reliable for almost two decades now.

Fairness is an interesting concept with a site like CryptoSlots. No payout rates are disclosed for its games, nor are payout percentage audits published. However it does employ one quite ingenious technology that cryptocurrency casinos have promoted in recent times, known as provably fair games. Though you don't actually need to use cryptocurrency to have a provably fair game, it seems the two have become somewhat synonymous due to the common use of cryptography.

What does this actually mean? In a nutshell every game at CryptoSlots has a mechanism that allows you to verify that the casino is playing fair and not cheating you after you place your bets. This is accomplished by supplying you with an encrypted set of spins or deals before you wager your money that you can use to verify after the bet is completed to see that the result of your bet was fairly determined. In fact CryptoSlots has gone a little further than other sites that I have seen this on, in that they guarantee that there is a possibility of getting a winning spin on every single wager using this method. There is a good explanation of how CryptoSlots' provably fair mechanism works on their website if you want to find out more about how to verify your results.

Responsible gaming issues

Responsible gaming is a thorny issue for this casino. First up there are no controls in your account settings that you can use to limit your gaming on the site. If you do want to limit your gaming or even self exclude, you will need to chat to someone in the customer support department. So not great, and certainly not up to modern standards enforced by regulated casinos.

But far more important is that I could not shake the nagging question of whether a site that allows anyone to play more or less anonymously without any identity verification at all can in any way be described as "responsible". While the potential anonymity is convenient and even attractive on a personal level for me, it is concerning when considering issues such as problem gambling and underage gambling. Obviously the benefits of anonymity come at a cost, and I am not convinced that this casino is doing enough to mitigate the potential problems raised by their choices.

Conclusion

As you can probably tell I am a bit torn on this one. There is no doubt that the site provides a quality casino experience for players, albeit with a very limited selection of games and the issues mentioned in relation to crypto/fiat currency conversion. There aren't many boundaries at all in terms of player region restrictions, which will be welcomed by players in more restrictive locations. On the flip side there aren't really any boundaries at all in other aspects such as identity verification and age limits, which is disappointing, if not downright irresponsible.