Capital Entrepreneurs member company PerBlue was featured in a story on Zmogo to talk about PerBlue’s success creating a virtual economy in its game Parallel Kingdom. From the article:
In its short history, the Parallel Kingdom franchise has pioneered several firsts: first real-time MMORPG for iPhone and Android, and the first location-based MMORPG on iPhone and Android. Now the developer, PerBlue, is continuing to take the game into new territory – a micro-transaction based mobile economy.
In the MMO genre, virtual economies are common and almost inevitable in some cases. In Parallel Kingdom, a de facto in-game economy naturally evolved when the developers first gave players the ability to drop items on the ground and transfer gold directly from player to player. This style of trading was unregulated and led to scamming in which players would drop items on the ground for trade only to be picked up by the other player who sometimes never sent any gold. Even with these limitations, a very active economy flourished in the game.
 In the new version, a consummable resource called “Food†is required for some features. Every new player starts with some for free, and they can get more by purchasing it in the game or trading with other players. This allows players to acquire more of this resource without having to pay money if they don’t want to.
 In addition, trade posts and cities have been introduced. These allow players to trade with each other safely and securely. Players put items up for sale and other players visiting the city can browse and buy anything they come across. This has led to many players making careers in the game solely as traders, visiting trade posts, scouting out good deals and selling in another city.