Social Game Reviews

Capitalizing on the success of their casual puzzle game Bejeweled, Popcap Games released Bejeweled Blitz onto the Facebook masses allowing players to test their twitch gaming prowess: players are challenged to amass high scores within a minute by destroying those jewels that we have grown to love. Fans of Bejeweled and Facebook are well served by this iteration of the puzzle game as the core gameplay and simple yet striking visuals remain and allows the player to enjoy the game in short bursts while infusing it with social networked connectivity. Don’t be fooled though! One one-minute session leads to another and half-an-hour later you’re trying to beat the score of your second-cousin’s wife’s pet frog (whose high score is one of fifty that is shown on a sidebar along side the main game window).

A perpetual high-score table of your closest (high-scoring Bejeweled Blitz) Facebook friends is ever present as you tackle your one minute of Blitz fun. It’s presence is a gift and a curse as you frantically click your way to your newest high-score but are always aware when you fall short of your friend’s score by 10 (or 100,000…) This aspect of social gaming allows you to know your competition as well as the score you have to beat to claim highest score on the table.

As you start mastering the art of blowing up jewels, you can post (gloat?) your high scoring exploits (in the form of medals) on your wall for your friends to see. You can even send your friends “Smack Talk” messages which include cartoon-like Bejeweled Jewels (Be-Jewels?) calling you out on your (in)ability to play Bejeweled Blitz.

In addition to knowing your friend’s scores, you are also given detailed breakdowns of your session’s scores by means of a bar graph. You are shown your points over time as well as your speed and the number of score modifiers (Flame, Hypercube, Star) that you’ve used during your one-minute bout. For the eager minded gamer, these metrics allow you to ensure that practice makes perfect, letting you change your strategy for higher scores on your next game of Blitz.

Another aspect of social gaming that is incorporated into Bejeweled Blitz is the idea of a team score. Over a given time period (Bejeweled Blitz challenges usually run for a week), you are given a team score that you have to target in order to win real prizes. Calculated as twice your score plus the combined score of your Bejeweled Blitz friends, you’re tasked with scoring a combined 1,000,000 points to win a Laptop with every Popcap game installed. (My current team score is 3,162,100…here’s to hoping!) Smaller prizes are also awarded for team scores of 100,000, 250,000 and 500,000 points. Although I’ve never met anyone who has won prizes from playing Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook (there are over 10 million active players every month), it’s a nice idea to know that playing as a team could net you a real prize.

In order to further encourage social gaming on the go, Popcap has updated Bejeweled 2 on iPhone with a Blitz mode that lets you connect to Facebook and play Blitz on the go. If you’re an iPhone owner who enjoys social gaming on Facebook and Bejeweled, then this iPhone app is for you.

It’s easy to assume that if you like Bejeweled fan and you’re a Facebook user, that you’ve given Bejeweled Blitz a try. It holds true to the Bejeweled formula and sense of style and allows the player to engage their friends in a game that is traditionally a single player experience. With the ability to taunt players, challenge friends and chase real world prizes, Bejeweled Blitz is a nice addition to the Bejeweled family and a fitting upgrade from a classic experience into a social networking experience while maintaining it’s single player sensibility.

So I challenge you, “Score As Many Points As You Can In One Minute.”

Related Links

Bejeweled 2 (Warning: Link opens iTunes)
Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook
Tips on how to improve your Bejeweled Blitz score