Once upon a time, there was a game called Diamond Mine. It had you swap jewels in a grid and create chain reactions for big scores. It was much fun and so Microsoft hosted it on Microsoft Zone and the game was renamed Bejeweled.

The game became insanely popular—the web’s Tetris—and spawned sequels and versions for many platforms. Clones appeared, including the excellent Zoo Keeper for Nintendo DS, which hugely ramped up the concept’s speed and excitement levels.

Eventually, PopCap retaliated with the stunning Bejeweled Blitz, a Facebook app that was also welded to the iPhone version of Bejeweled 2. The hook: one minute and no waiting for the grid to settle before swapping more jewels. It took the polish and addictive qualities of Bejeweled and smashed them into the exciting speed of Zoo Keeper. Power-ups created frantic, thrilling games, and online scoreboards enabled you to battle friends.

All was good in the land, and they all lived happily ever after… Except they didn’t, because PopCap then ruined its game. If there’s one thing the company should have learned from Tetris, it’s that adding complexity to a simple game screws with the format. And if there’s something PopCap should have learned from online gaming, it’s that level playing fields are important, unless you want to turn your creation into forced grinding depression, MMO-style.

Bejeweled Blitz now has ‘coins’. These enable you to buy ‘boosts’, to attain higher scores. PopCap presumably argues that this rewards long-time players. I’d argue that long-time play is rewarded by added skill and higher scores. All the revision does is provide people who play the game enough to cherry pick cheats to leapfrog others on the high-score table. So rather than being Tetris, Bejeweled Blitz is now Bejeweled MMO, just about the biggest, saddest drop it could have suffered.