How do you follow up one of the most iconic games of all time? With a twist.
Bejeweled, the match-three-gems puzzle game, has earned hundreds of millions of dollars and cost hapless players billions of man-hours.Wired magazine contributing editor David Kushner asked a founder of publisher PopCap Games in the November issue what it is that makes simple puzzle games so addictive. The company released its latest time sink, Bejeweled Twist, Monday. Kushner’s impressions of the game are below.
By guest blogger David Kushner
Eight years ago, Jason Kapalka and two 21-year-old friends from Seattle made the perfect puzzle game, a simple grid full of rubies and diamonds and emeralds. The object was to swap the gems around on the grid and try to match three of the same type to earn points. They called itBejeweled.
The three friends shopped their creation around to online game portals like Pogo, but received a tepid response. "It’s not even really a game," they were told. MSNBC.com offered them $1,500 for the rights.
Instead, Kapalka and crew decided to go it alone, creating an LLC called PopCap and releasing Bejeweled as a freeFlash app in 2001. They had no marketing budget, so they relied on word of mouth and free trial versions, which gently prompted players to buy the full version, which contained more difficulty levels and online scoreboards.