web3 Support is coming to Gala Games! — MOVE YOUR BITCOIN

This is going to be SLIGHTLY technical, but don’t let that worry you too much! The important part is that we are coming closer and closer to integrating web3 functionality to the Gala Games website, which would enable you to connect any Ethereum address to your Gala Games account! This is VERY GOOD NEWS!

However, it also means that we are deprecating and removing support for Bitcoin.

Currently, when you create an account on the Gala Games website, you are given a 12-word mnemonic recovery phrase, which is used to compute both your Ethereum and Bitcoin addresses. While accounts were being created on Gala Games servers, that worked well enough. However, in the interest of continual decentralization, we want people to be able to bring their own Ethereum address. This presents a problem if a user shows up with their own ETH address and connects it via web3 while the BTC address is generated through other means. It introduces a lot of confusion and potential frustration on the part of the users.

Therefore, we have decided to sunset the idea that users have their own BTC wallets connected with their Gala Games user accounts. We love Bitcoin, and may integrate the ability to purchase items with an external BTC wallet in the future, but we can streamline backend operations significantly without the Bitcoin wallet.

What does this mean for you as a user?

Not a whole lot, because there is nothing you can do with the BTC wallet functionality right now. However, you will want to either move your BTC off the Gala Games connected address, or use your mnemonic to open that address in a third-party BIP39 compliant wallet (one which allows you to use a 12-word mnemonic to import an address).

A good list of these wallets can be found here: https://www.blockplate.com/blogs/blockplate/list-of-bip39-wallets-mnemonic-seed

We will be removing the BTC wallet on January 1st. You will always be able to use your 12-word mnemonic phrase to interact with that Bitcoin address, it just won’t be supported by the Gala Games platform.

Note: We do not have the ability to help you send anything from your BTC address or to access it ourselves.