Banksters And Blockchain Gaming: Exclusive Interview With Banksters Founder And CEO Alex Althausen

Alex Althausen is the founder and CEO of Banksters, a blockchain-based mobile game. Banksters gamifies crypto mining using the Play-to-Earn model to reward users and simulate a crypto trading experience.

Launched in 2023, Banksters explores the world of fantasy trading, where users can customize their avatars and earn rewards for predicting and influencing market flow.

As a gamified trading platform, Banksters is pushing the boundaries of NFT and blockchain gaming by incentivizing users to trade and have fun in a simulated environment.

In this interview, Alex impressed upon me that gamified crypto trading can better help crypto traders to cope with the seesaw of the crypto world. Read on for more details.

Alex, can you briefly tell us about yourself?

My pleasure to be here. I live in Israel. Throughout my career, I have launched several trading platforms as well as trading products. Now, I am beyond happy to put all of the knowledge that I’ve gained in the past years into Banksters.

What's your route to blockchain gaming?

As we all know, web 2.0 gaming is slowly moving towards Web 3.0. Why is that? Because, at the end of the day, blockchain represents transparency and confidence.

You can compare it to an open book analogy which is why wouldn’t you want to have an open book in the gaming industry.

The majority of web2 projects are shifting to the web3 direction. Moreover, with the inclusion of NFTs, GameFi will reach higher results.

How did the idea that gave birth to Banksters come about? Can you tell us how it was founded?

First of all, trading has been really stressful lately. Since I have developed multiple trading platforms and products, I have arrived at an observation of how drained traders have become due to the instability and market fluctuations.

They don’t have a single space where they can share their skills. So, the idea came about when I saw that phenomenon.

Therefore, I established Banksters to address the stress issue, relax the trader a little bit, and allow them to have some fun along with friends. It is also meant to enable them to express their trading abilities.

Not only does Banksters gives you an opportunity to learn how to trade and influence the market, but also you can show off your well-deserved trading skills that have been gathered through the years.

How does Banksters work? Can you give an overview of its intersection with metaverse and NFT?

A player enters this unique crypto journey that helps understand how trading works. You might need a minimal theoretical or practical base which pretty much everyone has.

Now, we have those incredible abilities, i.e., “Elon’s tweets,” “Pump&Dump,” “Market Squeeze,” and others. What we did was we took the market price algorithm, analyzed the crypto market, and came up with the abilities.

Therefore, on the user side, as soon as an ability is applied, the players, so to say, replicate what is happening around the world in real-time. Thus, the user comprehends the trading process, terms, and features better.  What’s more, we offer a minting or “breeding” system, which is for NFT enthusiasts. A one-of-a-kind miner that perfectly knows how mining works, as well as taking in-game tokens for the web2 user.

Do you think that the P2E gaming model is broken? Is it experiencing a gradual shift from NFT to crypto? Or is NFT still an integral part of it?

I wouldn’t put it that way. However, the model has been applied wrongly. The launch that was made was not correctly included; the product was non-existent, and when it was eventually launched, the audience didn’t like it.

With Banksters, users have a chance to test an NFT before purchasing or investing in it. Nonetheless, P2E usually comes with token inflation. For that, the Banksters team has built an ecosystem where all tokens are stable. We have general token utilities as well as more specific token utilities that will maintain price stability.

We don’t really consider our project a Play-to-Earn. We stick to the Trade-to-Earn model, where a player has to win an investment round or a challenge in order to get rewarded with $BARS tokens.

You were recently quoted as saying that Banksters can help crypto traders to deal with crypto cycles. Can you further explain how it does so?

Here’s how I would explain it. Banksters is for next-door neighbors, whether 14 or 75 years old, meaning the game is for everyone. At the same time, it does have this professional side of it which attracts expert traders as well. Here’s the coolest part: our trading/gaming platform gives you a chance to test how everything works on the market and have fun at the same time.

Yes, Banksters can help you identify certain events that are taking place in the market at the moment. I’m pretty sure most of our readers have tried trading at least once, and they’ve noticed concepts that make no sense or explanation. This is exactly when Banksters steps in and provides that logic and comprehension.

Why do you think the crypto industry should be regulated? Can regulation spur much-needed growth?

Crypto regulation is a must. I have been scammed several times, yet I am not able to press charges.

Therefore, I strongly encourage regulation in the cryptocurrency space.

One of the most important aspects regarding banksters.com is that we are fully legal and regulated. We aim to reach certain jurisdictions similar to Japan or the United States for which we need specific licenses.

Every crypto project must be 100% legal, I cannot stress this enough. Should any project refuse to be so, that means they’re hiding something.

How has regulation affected the gaming industry?

I personally would not state so. As it has been mentioned earlier, if you desire to become a great trading gamer and keep leveling up, take a look at other games that are making hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. We can even encounter tens of millions worth of web3 projects. Sounds like something is missing, right? That is regulation.

As soon as more GameFi projects invest in the legacy aspect, they will be a great success. Yes, they can earn a bit less, yet those earnings are going to be “clean” and legal.

I firmly believe that regulation is the future for web3 gaming. It will identify and filter projects that hide something and the ones that actually contribute to the industry and generate amazing products.

Any parting words?

My final words would be about our special team that we’ve gathered.

We, as a team, have seen numerous storytelling projects that keep on promising a bunch of cool stuff, even though their product is not even ready and finalized.

At Banksters, people can test our product before anyone else. We don’t push or press anyone to buy anything. In fact, every web3 startup out there should have such an approach.

I think we can consider ourselves in the new era of web3 projects where you don’t need to trust words and promises but rather trust the team and a product.