When PopCap started back in 2000, they weren't concerned with the relationship between mobile and social -- mostly because neither of those things were considered game platforms yet. But things have changed drastically, and through it all, the company has managed to adapt and prosper. Giordano Contestabile, Brand Manager for Bejeweled, hosted a talk on the wealth of opportunities currently available to developers in cross-platform connectivity and elsewhere, and how best to take advantage of them. 

We recently reported that developer Wooga was removing their games from Google+ come July 1. If that wasn’t bad enough news for the already struggling platform, it looks like PopCap is following suit with Bejeweled Blitz: Come June 18, the game will no longer be available on the social network.

When it comes to gaming, there are two very distinct markets out there: the East, and the West. In the West, PopCap Games is a household name. Everybody knows the folks behind lovable games like Peggle, Plants vs Zombies and Chuzzle. But in the East? Well… in some parts, PopCap does quite well, but when it comes to Japan, PopCap doesn’t have a single self-published game on the market. But that’s all about to change with Bejeweled Legend.

Popcap is continuing its tradition of making its hit games available on seemingly every available platform, today announcing that an HTML5 version of Bejeweled is now available on the Chrome web store and that both Peggle and Plants vs Zombies will soon be available on Android-enabled devices.

As most of the United States struggles with record heat waves, the summer of 2011 may also be recorded as one of the hottest in the brief history of casual games. As the mercury continues to reach its highest heights, so are the valuations on casual games companies—witness Zygna’s upcoming $1 billion IPO and EA’s $750 million+ purchase of PopCap. Yet, Nintendo’s staggering loss of approximately $300 million in Q1 shows a marketplace struggling with balance.

Overheated, interglacial or ice age? Where is casual gaming going? An examination of key indicators provides some insights to this changing climate.

Chalk this up as a rumor that turned out to be true. Electronic Arts has acquired PopCap Games for $650 million in cash plus $100 million in stock.

This is less than the $1 billion that was initially reported, but there is an earn-out.

According to TechCrunch, the earn-out scale is rather huge. If PopCap earnings are $91 million or less within a 2 year period, PopCap does not make anymore money. If earnings end up being $343 million or more, PopCap makes an additional $500 million, making the total acquisition price $1.3 billion!

Techcrunch is reported a rumor that someone is close to buying PopCap Games for $1 billion. That’s right, I said it - $1 billion … dollars!

Techcrunch speculates on who the buyer may be. Rumors were that Zynga was looking very closely at PopCap but got scared off by the big price tag. There is always Electronic Arts, but with their own valuation of $5 billion, $1 billion sounds awfully high. Other good candidates are companies from Asia, especially since this has been an area of huge investment for PopCap in the past few years.