Fandom Sports launches esports prediction platform
Published: Mar 17, 2021 - Last Updated: Jul 10, 2023
Earlier this year, Canadian esports company Fandom launched a brand-new website for its upcoming esports prediction website – and now, three months later, it’s finally time for the big launch. Well, almost – but esports fans can now at least head to the Fandom website to check out the real-time prediction options that the software has. Full roll-out won’t be complete until Q4 of 2021 when the last elements launch and the software will also be made available in Asia.
Current games covered include Overwatch, Dota 2, LoL, and CS:GO. The idea behind it all is to build a peer-to-peer wagering platform where users can make predictions in real-time, and get rewarded if they’re right. Following the new website was the purchase of dedicated servers for a private cloud infrastructure – in other words, an independent and stable service to support the launch of their platform.
Betting against the crowd
Compared to traditional esports betting where betting odds are offered on the outcome of a game or round, this platform doesn’t have fixed categories – instead, players will pick and watch matches that interest them and be able to type predictions, such as ‘X will have the most kills, defuse the next bomb’ and so on. They then select a stake, and make their wager public.
Other players can see those wagers and agree with the predictions, bet against them, and so on. In other words, it’s interactive! There are even options to let a player add friends and check out other player’s prediction histories (and of course their own). Additionally, players can challenge their friends and bet with or against them directly.
Esports betting has never been more social
There is another way to wager as well – by simply swiping on suggested predictions created by an algorithm, such as ‘Will there be 28 kills’ or ‘Will the game last more than 14 minutes’ and so on. These can be made simply by swiping right or left for yes or no. As the games proceed the Fandom platform then informs them in real time how things go, whether they win or lose.
Safety and payments
The in-game currency used for the stakes naturally needs to come from somewhere. To this end, Fandom CEO David Vinokuro said:
“We’re currently testing various payment gateways and will launch the full wagering platform in early Q2 2021 once our private cloud infrastructure is deployed. Furthermore, we are building out our rewards matrix to encapsulate recent announcements pertaining to our non-fungible token strategy.”
In other words, there will be some crypto/blockchain tie-ins as well as some form of loyalty strategy, as the NFT tokens mentioned are likely to be rewards that can be minted on the FTP platform. Furthermore, Fandom has announced that players will also be able to win in-game rewards at some point, such as skins, promo materials, avatars, tickets, and more.
Through a level-up system, players can unlock new tiers of predictions and functions, while also keeping track of their wins and losses, of course. If players don’t want to bet, that’s fine too – Fandom also allows them to stream games. Not just one – there is a picture-in-picture option that allows users to track and watch multiple games at the same time, focusing on whichever one interests them most while hopping to another match if the action happens somewhere else for a bit.
