Fresh off my return to Hive, I decided I would not just write content but get back into Hive dApp development again. Some of you might know, but years ago I was actively involved with Steem Engine and then Hive Engine projects before I took a break from blockchain development.
I've had the idea for Hive Lottery for a few years now (originally it started out as a Hive bingo game). Hive Lottery is a simple, provably fair lottery app that runs on the Hive blockchain. And yeah, I know, how original, another crypto game of chance...
Here's how it works:
- Entry Cost: Just 2 HIVE tokens.
- Draw Mechanics: Each draw needs a minimum of 5 participants and runs for up to 24 hours.
- Max Cap: Hit 50 entries? Boom. The draw triggers immediately and a fresh one starts.
- Anti whale protection: to prevent gamifying the lotteries, a user can only enter a maximum of 3 times per lottery.
- Winner Selection: Fully random, seed-based, and verifiable by anyone.
- Fees: The platform takes a microscopic 2.5% fee from the pot. That's it.
Every draw uses cryptographic randomness and verifiable seeds. No shady backdoors. No hidden hands. Just pure, decentralized chance.
Because it's built entirely on Hive, you don't need to hand over personal details, connect wallets, or jump through centralized hoops. Just log in, play, and watch the pot grow.
Understandably, not everyone is a fan of yet another gambling app and I know many of these already exist. I know it's a bit of a contentious thing, but blockchains are great for games of chance because they're so transparent in how they operate.
I've implemented failsafes into the game so if you try entering a lottery that has closed, you're refunded. If you send more or less than the required amount of HIVE, you get refunded. If something fails, you get refunded. A lot of effort has been placed into ensuring that this can run decentralized, but I will be monitoring nonetheless.
You can find it over at https://hive-lotto.app/
I have done a lot of testing, but there might be some hiccups. I will be actively monitoring and improving this over time (different types of lottery and incentives, etc). But for v1, I wanted to keep it simple.