Zuma Blitz producer teases trophy rooms, powers as potential updates

Jeff Green and Isaac Aubrey
If you have a spare 17 minutes, PopCap just posted an extremely long informative video interview between editorial director Jeff Green (left) and Zuma Blitz producer Isaac Aubrey (right). Their casual chat among classic arcade machines on a seemingly comfy red couch dives into everything from the future of Zuma Blitz to little-known facts about the game and explanations for a few of the game's drawbacks.

According to Aubrey, Zuma Blitz was in development for about one year before it launched on Facebook in late 2010 while the recent upgrade to Bejeweled Blitz--a project Aubrey also worked on--took somewhere around five months to complete. Early on, Green spoke his mind about the Heart system in Zuma Blitz (think Energy in FrontierVille), saying it was particularly punishing to begin with. Aubrey responded saying that while Hearts are clearly to get some players to pay up for more, PopCap also can't exactly make games entirely for free.

"We need to build these games in such a way that we can continue to work on them, continue to improve them and bring more games onto Facebook," Aubrey said. "It's a new environment that we're starting to get into. We're ready to bring in new features and pull out features that don't work. You can't please everyone, but certainly we try."

Green later expressed his concerns over the leveling system, which might discourage newer players from continuing the game after witnessing the immense scores of higher-level players (like this guy). Aubrey was quick to point out that players who have just started but improve their skills quickly can still outscore more "advanced" players.

As for the future of the game, Aubrey mused over a few ideas including full screen support, but warned that it would likely cause longer load times and "that's not really what we want to do." Possibilities for future features include new powers, cosmetic upgrades and even trophy rooms, according to the producer. When talking about the future, Aubrey told Green, "Let you're imagination run wild, but we haven't got there yet." For more details, check out the full interview here. And if it's up to Jeff Green, there could be plenty more where this came from.

What would you like to see come next in Zuma Blitz? Would you take a full screen mode if it meant waiting to play the game longer?

Bejeweled Blitz Cheats & Tips: 'Elite Technique' flicks your way to high scores

Every Bejeweled Blitz player should know the name "Kirbbard" cause he's the guy who discovered the 'Elite Technique' and shared it with the world (via YouTube) before his retirement from blitzing last May.

The Elite Technique allows players to merge gems that wouldn't otherwise be possible. Without power-ups or any kind of boosts, Kirbbard was able to score within the 800K range (the highest recognized score bracket is 500K). That's because merging gems lets you create Power Gems (these explode) and Hypercubes (these destroy all gems of the same color on the grid at your discretion).

While there's no guarantee that you'll score higher than the Blitz Bot, the Elite Technique is a valuable tactic in player strategy. It's also perfectly legit, so you're not cheating. On top of that, it takes a bit of skill to master as you're still relying on your own eyes and speed to spot the best clusters to use this technique on.

Here's a video with great examples of Elite Technique in action. For newbies who need to take this slow, here's a video tutorial for beginners that gives you the simple lowdown, how-to in both English and Chinese. Once you're done with the basics, move on to the advanced tutorial here.