Bejeweled is probably one of the most successful and popular causal games of all time. Now PopCap Games has announced that Bejeweled has sold over 50 million units and that it will mark the 10th Birthday of Bejeweled with a 10 month long celebration. Throughout 2010, the company will release what it calls “new installments” in the Bejeweled line-up, hold the first-ever community wide competition for Bejeweled Blitz, and hold many promotional events.
“Bejeweled has obviously succeeded beyond our wildest dreams,” Jason Kapalka, co-creator of the game and co-founder and chief creative officer at PopCap said. “When Brian Fiete, John Vechey and I built the game ten years ago, we had no grand aspirations for it or PopCap, we were trying to survive as a company during the depths of the dot-com collapse. Little did we know we’d still be selling copies of Bejeweled a decade later!”
The game was originally launched in the spring of 2000, and popularity has dwindled even now. In fact, the company continues to sell a copy of Bejeweled every 4.3 seconds somewhere in the world.
One of these so-called new installments in the franchise is an all-new way to play Bejeweled Blitz, the 1-minute social adaptation of the game. The company also pledges to conduct various contests and promotions. A ‘Show Your Bejeweled Love’ contest that kicks off next month encourages fans of the game to celebrate their love for the original match-3 puzzler in several audio and video forms. More details will be made available in early March.