Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) is the reference for application developers at the moment, as the App Store has reached critical mass. The natural inclination, then, is the subject of the iPhone – and by extension, the IPAD.

“The process of Apple’s approval to enter the App Store can be a mystery with little feedback from them, and they do not make any guarantees about the time that the application will sit in queue for review,” Andy Gilbertson, Vice President marketing PerBlue, a developer of mobile games, said TechNewsWorld.

“When we launched the latest version of the” Parallel Kingdom, which attempted to place long enough for Apple’s approval process, but ends up being a guessing game and guess wrong, “he said. “As a result, our version of Android hit the market about two weeks before the Apple version is approved.”

In a game like “Parallel Kingdom” – in real time, the persistent world game – two weeks is a lifetime.

“Many of our players, Apple has become very frustrated users of Android were getting such a huge advantage, and I’m sure that some players lost as a result,” Gilbertson concluded.

                          

Most people associate Wisconsin with cheese and beer, but you should think about adding startups to that list. Led by a tidal wave of mostly young entrepreneurs, Madison, Wisconsin is staking a claim as the startup capital of the Midwest. Madison was recently ranked as the 7th most innovative city in the country by Forbes magazine – just above perennial powerhouse Boston, MA.

Several key organizations are driving the growing startup community. Capital Entrepreneurs is a group of over 56 companies that meet on a regular basis to help founders network and develop connections. MERLIN Mentors provides free mentoring services to new startups. Applicants are assigned a team of experienced entrepreneurs who help founders navigate many of the challenges facing a new company. These groups, along with the University of Wisconsin, are fostering a great culture for new startups.

                          

Entrustet, PerBlue, GoBuzz, GeoHuddle, Door-6, Student Spill, Y-Innovation, Sector 67, Hardin Design and Development and Badger Trips were among the companies in attendance representing Capital Entrepreneurs.

                          

“Apple’s approval process to get into the App Store can be a mysterious one with little feedback from them, and they make no guarantees about how long your app will sit in the queue waiting to get reviewed,” Andy Gilbertson, vice president of marketing at PerBlue, a mobile game developer, told TechNewsWorld.

“When we released the latest version of ‘Parallel Kingdom,’ we tried to allot enough time for Apple’s approval process, but it ends up being a guessing game and we guessed wrong,” he said. “As a result, our Android version hit the market nearly two weeks before the Apple version was approved.”

In a game like “Parallel Kingdom” — a real-time, persistent game world — two weeks is a lifetime.

“Many of our Apple players became very frustrated that Android users were getting such a huge head start, and I’m sure we lost some players as a result,” Gilbertson concluded.

                          

Parallel Kingdom started as a role-playing game where users had to move in the real world to move in-game. Users reluctant to leave the sofa thought that “sucked”, so now they play with other characters in a region of a Google Map, trading items, fighting and using instant messenger. It has 125,000 registered users and 15,000 regular weekly players.

                          

Then there’s Parallel Kingdom (pictured) for the iPhone and Android platforms, designed by a company called PerBlue in Madison, Wisc. It has 125,000 registered users, of which around 15,000 are active on a weekly basis, with an average session time of 18 minutes. Players typically play the game for 1-3 months.

Parallel Kingdom is reminiscent of role playing games (or RPGs) on the computer or a games console in that it is loaded with features such as a fighting mechanism, a virtual aid to the player, leveling up the character, instant messaging with other players, trading items and food and so on. The character can move in a certain area of a map in the game (projected on Google Maps) and proceed to other areas as they play the game further.

Parallel Kingdom used to be completely tied to players’ location, which meant a player had to physically move in the real world before being able to move in the virtual game world—a feature the designers thought would be cool, but the players didn’t. “We learned that the hard way,” Says Justin Beck, CEO of PerBlue. “The feedback we got from our first iteration was almost uniform: It sucks!”

Now Parallel Kingdom is more lenient in the way actual location is featured in the game. Players don’t really want anything to hinder their experience of a game. If they have five minutes to entertain themselves, the last thing they need is to be told to get off the couch and move.

“We also found that people in general don’t go to that many locations in their lives on a daily basis. They go to school or work, to the gas station, or grocery store and so on. And if you, as a game designer, make them go to a specific location, then you are playing them. So we try to make things that are fun and location-relevant, like checking out where your friends are in the game,” Beck explains.

                          

PerBlue, the developer of Parallel Kingdom, has decided to celebrate the upcoming Earth Day by purchasing enough carbon offsets to power the virtual world’s game servers with renewable energy for a full year. Parallel Kingdom is a location-based game app for iPhone, iPod Touch, Android phones. It is free to download and play.

“The thought of having the entire virtual world of Parallel Kingdom powered by clean energy was a very cool concept to us,” said the CEO of PerBlue, Justin Beck. “Our company might not be big enough to save Earth, but at least we can save our own little world. I think that kind of thinking translates well to how each person can think about their impact on their own personal world.”

In addition to powering Parallel Kingdom’s virtual world with green energy, PerBlue is putting a portion of their revenue towards additional carbon offsets for 7 days starting on Earth Day. For every $3 spent by Parallel Kingdom players, 100 pounds of carbon offsets will be purchased by PerBlue. This will start on Earth Day, and will be effective until April 29th.

Justin Beck says, “We want to do something that allows our players to make their actions count as well. Parallel Kingdom has a great community of people that play, and we want them to feel that they can do something great for the world they live in while also enjoying the Parallel world they play in.”

The carbon offsets are to be purchased through Powered Green, a carbon offset provider based in Madison, WI. Powered Green’s renewable energy credits support the operations and project costs of renewable energy sources.

                          

Kati London from Area/Code spoke at Where 2.0 today in San Jose. She had some awesome examples of how location has changed social interactions in gaming.  Parallel Kingdom in 2008 was an iPhone massively multiplayer mobile game. Similar to World of Warcraft mashed up with Google Maps.

                          

Check out the story on Dane 101 or in The Badger Herald for more information.

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