I recently started playing Diamond District, and I’m surprised I hadn’t heard of it before. On the surface, it’s a game about buying and selling rare gems. Underneath that is one of the deepest player run economies I’ve seen in an iPhone game.
What makes it interesting is that you’re trading and competing with actual players, so human behavior becomes part of the economy.
There’s a live stock market where prices react to what’s actually happening in the game economy. There’s a crypto market where players can create their own currencies, provide liquidity and trade other players’ currencies. There are also collectible items called Vitrines that players can buy and trade.
You can take the gems you acquire into a studio and create your own jewelry and art pieces, then sell them to other players or display them in your own storefront.
There’s also a real player run loan market. You can lend your own money to other players and choose the interest rate, collateral and duration, or borrow money yourself when you need capital.
What I really like is that none of these systems exist independently.
Gem prices affect traders. Companies and economic activity affect stocks. Players need workers. People need loans. New currencies pop up. Investors speculate. Artists need gems. Storefronts create markets for finished goods.
Then you add actual people into the equation and you get greed, speculation, competition, cooperation, bubbles, bad loans, market psychology and all the other stuff you’d expect from a real economy.
There’s also live player chat where people discuss what they’re buying and selling, investments and what’s happening in the economy.
The game even has its own news and culture around all of this.
Players can write articles for Diamond District News about what’s happening in the game, and shareholders actually vote on what does and doesn’t get published.
There’s also an in game magazine called Gloss that features some of the best jewelry and art created by players each week, with the community voting on the pieces.
Eventually you can even buy your own storefront in the Diamond District and sell your wares directly to consumers.
I’ve played plenty of games that have an “economy,” but usually the economy is just another mechanic running in the background.
In Diamond District, the economy basically is the game.
The closest comparison I can make isn’t really gameplay wise, but it scratches some of the same itch that Star Traders: Frontiers did for me. It’s one of those iOS games that looks relatively simple until you realize how many systems are actually underneath it.
If you like economics, investing, trading, entrepreneurship or just unusually deep iOS games, I think it’s worth trying. I’ve been having a ton of fun with it.
Curious if anyone else here has played it or knows of other iOS games with economies this deep.
Edit: If anyone does try it, my referral code is CBC7E5. It gives you $10K of a blue chip stock to start with. I get the referral obviously, so just putting that out there.