List of Bejeweled 2 pre-release and unused content

Bejeweled 2 is the second game in the Bejeweled franchise and it got a lot of unused content as seen below. This article contains information about beta elements and unused content related to the game Bejeweled 2.

Gameplay

Early	Final

A mockup showing "The embryo of the Bejeweled 2 game interface!" which has arrow buttons which served an unknown purpose. May have been to scout puzzles in Puzzle mode.

Early	Final

A mockup of an early Puzzle mode UI. It looks similar to the final's, albeit vertically flipped.

Early	Final

This screenshot appears to show an early galaxy map, based on the bulbs/digits around each sphere. Each sphere is one planet with 10 puzzles, which there are 8 worlds with 10 puzzles each, which equals to 80.

While this total number did not change in the final release, the order of the planets, the number of planets, and number of puzzles within each planet did change. The number of planets doubled, while the number of puzzles within each planet halved (AKA 16 planets with 5 puzzles each). Each planet button has a distinct icon, containing angel wings, a skull, lightning, another skull but with cross bones, a solitaire club, another type of wing, and something that looks like spikes or a... strange plant. The top planet is being previewed, and has a yellow beam of light going to the center of the screen. The preview window states the possible name for the planet ("Checkerboard Frenzy") and the difficulty as "very hard"; the only planet in the final game which states checkerboard pattern-type puzzles is Toroid X, the 8th planet. No difficulty ranking exists, but planets get harder through progression.

The backdrop seen is actually one of the backdrops that was going to be planned in the cancelled "Planet Pack" (albeit in higher saturation, hue shifted, and flipped) which stated to have more backdrops along with more puzzles.

The planet in particular.

Early	Final

An early screenshot of Classic mode. The gem textures are from Bejeweled, with the special gems using placeholder graphics (glowing variants of the gems likely represent Power Gems, the rainbow sphere likely represents Hypercubes, the gray box likely represents Rock, and the Bomb represents itself, albeit missing the counter). The UI also appears to be made using placeholder graphics.

Jason Kapalka (game designer) stated in the Bejeweled GDC Postmortem that Classic mode originally featured the Rocks and Bombs from Puzzle mode during normal gameplay. They were later removed as the team didn't want the game to be too complex. The final has an unlockable mode named Finity which has the Rocks and Bombs alongside normal gameplay, probably as a way to use this modified Classic mode concept.

Planets

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Various early planet renders.

Early	Final

This second planet looks similar or is an early render of Level 2's planet, known as Tau Heximus in Puzzle mode.

Unused Musics

Fanfare 1

Offset 127, with tempo 128. Interestingly, this is the third track that plays when you place the CD into a CD player, but doesn't appear anywhere in-game. In the source tracker, this sequence in the source tracker is called "Get Ready!" as this might imply that this is played when you start a game in the main menu.

Fanfare 2

Offset 128, with tempo 125. A leftover duplicated fragment from the track that plays when you complete Puzzle Mode. Additionally, this sequence in the source tracker is called "Complete!" as it might imply that this might play after you complete a level. Likely was not going to be used as the music would have to stop to play this, then fade back in the main level loop tracks of Classic or Action.

Extra

Offset 144, 145, 184, each with tempo 125. These sequences are attached to each other at the end of the music tracker file. The first two sequences here are possibly scrapped for being too similar/early version of the track Schein. Additionally, offset 184 is a fragment of Final Destination on offset 168 heard at the end of Puzzle mode as well. This file is called "Mists of the Past/Totenschein" in the OpenMPT source tracker. Skaven has said that he did want to use Mists of the Past, but didn't get to, so he didn't want to delist it so it appears at the end of the IT file.

Notably, the music is used from the Nintendo Wii version.

Unknown track 1

Offset 115, 116, each with tempo 128. Unlisted sequences that do not appear on the music tracker file's surface. It seems to be an early draft of the song "Schein".

Unknown track 2

Offset 141,142,143, each with tempo 136. Unlisted.

Unknown track 3

Offset 146, with tempo 136. Unlisted.

Unused graphics

loaderbar.png

A very high-detailed and shiny loader bar. The used one is more energetic.

SCORE.jpg

An unused score widget. Interestingly enough, a prerelease image has a section in the middle which also has this shine, texturing, and palette.

Bejeweled Leftovers

waitbar.gif

The unused loading bar from Bejeweled is also in Bejeweled 2, still unused.

scorefont1.png

The menu score font from Bejeweled.

The slider knob from Bejeweled.

Unused backdrops

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According to this download source, with an included digital signature MD5 hash by PopCap themselves for authentication, Bejeweled 2 might have had a planned expansion pack that was scrapped for unknown reasons nearly a year after the game's release.

Running the installer would place new files under the C:\Program Files (x86)\PopCap Games\Bejeweled 2 Deluxe\images\backdrops folder, which includes a variety of 12 new backdrops under the codename planetpack. Besides these images, no such attachment or modification of files is done by the installation.

Version 1.1 was coded to have backdrops.lst updated with detection of new images being uploaded onto the backdrops folder, after executing the game. Version 1.0 prior lacks such a feature, however.

Without official sources, it is inconclusive calling it as an incomplete puzzle pack as nowhere does the installation process mentions an update to Puzzle Mode - perhaps a major backdrop update only.

It is also worth mentioning most or all backdrops were later reused in Bejeweled Twist.

Leftover Development Content

Source code

A portion of source header files and a precompiled header file are present in the data directory in the Mac OS X version (one of the files has no data, unfortunately). How exactly the developers did the same mistake in Zuma is an unsolved mystery. Interestingly, a file called test.h is also present which is pretty much a generated resources file for testing, however this one only has most audio files listed, but SOUND_LEVEL_UP and SOUND_MENU_CLICK are defined in the file, unlike the final game's resources file which suggests they were internally renamed in development. ProfileMgr.h was carried over from assumedly Zuma.

Development Images

Under the Japanese localization, an unused folder named _dump can be found within the data folder, with contents of what consists to be game development leftovers. As these images are not under the usual images folder where all the graphics of the game are usually stored, they are independent and cannot be manipulated to appear in-game through the modification of the configuration files.

An HTML file is present within the folder that displays the five development images as thumbnails, while also showing size, transparency, and resolution info.

img0000.png

A window screenshot of FontTester from the PopCap Framework, loading img0001.png for the characters. The tool can load a font descriptor file to preview rendering of related text using the characters. Such a program is nowhere to be found within the game's files.

img0001.png

The main textured font base used for the game's "LEVEL X", "WORLD COMPLETE", etc. lines.

img0002.png

The full text "AWELCOME HOME" that is linked towards the image of img0001.png. This text by itself is either scrapped out from the final game or used for demonstration purposes.

img0003/img0004.png

A 64×64 black square that is duplicated twice but with sequential file names; there is a possibility that it might have served as the base background for img0001's text generator program.

Debugging Font

resources.xml contains an entry for a debug font, which is as the path implies, Continuum Medium.

<Font id="DEBUG" path="ContinuumMedium18outline.txt" sm_path="ContinuumMedium12outline.txt" />

PAK support

The game's executable has full support for loading from a main.pak. Unfortunately, PopCap never released a version of the game using one and the game does not read the music directory in a PAK.

Development text

CVS

The game executable mentions a CVS directory in the root of the game installation that doesn't exist, suggesting the game was built off CVS version control.

Command-Line Parameters

• -version - Shows the product name, version, build number, and build date with a popup instead of starting the game.
• -play - Plays a demo file then closes the game.
• -record - Records a demo and saves it after shutdown of the game.
• -recnum - Records sequentially-named demos each time you run the game. The filenames of the saved demos are "Popcap1.dmo", "Popcap2.dmo", "Popcap3.dmo", etc., with "Popcap" being replaced with a specified file name with -demofile.
• -playnum - Starts Bejeweled 2 with the previously recorded demo files sequentially.
• -crash - Crashes the game immediately with an Access Violation error.
• -screensaver - Makes the game act like it's a screensaver, any movement or key presses will immediately force close the game. Likely a remnant of Insaniquarium's screensaver command line.
• -demofile - Specifies the filename for the played or recorded demo and only works when used with the "-play" or "-record" command line parameters (see below). The correct syntax for this parameter is "-demofile=MyDemo.dmo" (minus the quotes), substituting "MyDemo.dmo" with your demo filename of choice (either a previously recorded demo to play, or a filename to save a new demo that you wish to record).
• -changedir - Changes the directory of where the game assets will be located.

Debug Commands

Pressing CTRL + ALT + D will play a sound to indicate that debug key input is enabled, allowing unique keys and key combinations to be typed for debugging displays or mechanisms, another use will disable it.

• F2 - Start/Stop perf timing.
• F3 - Toggle FPS display.
  • Shift + F3 - Toggle FPS/mouse coordinate display.
• F8 - Show current Video Stats (mostly used to see if 3D acceleration is currently on).
  • Shift + F8 - Toggle 3D acceleration.
• F11 - Take screenshot (goes into the ProgramData/OEM/Bejeweled2/_screenshots) directory.
  • Shift + F11 - Dump all program images in memory to the ProgramData/OEM/Bejeweled2/_dump directory.

Developer Notes

Present in config.xml.

<!-- Percent chance (0.0 - 1.0) that a bomb will fall -->
<!-- Percent chance (0.0 - 1.0) that a power gem will fall --> 
<!-- Percent chance (0.0 - 1.0) that a rock will fall --> 
<!-- Initial countdown value of a time bomb --> 
<!-- Mininum number of gems needed in a match to create a power gem --> 
<!-- Mininum number of gems needed in a match to create a wildcard destroyer --> 
<!-- Number of points for each explosion in a chain reaction --> 
<!-- Additional number of points for each extra explosion in a chain reaction --> 
<!-- Number of points for each normal gem in a hyper gem electrocution --> 
<!-- Number of points for each power gem in a hyper gem electrocution --> 
<!-- Number of points for each power gem in a set --> 
<!-- 
	The following difficulty levels are represented by a BASE and
	a MULT.  BASE is the value for level 1.  MULT specified how much
	that value increases per level.
	
	Also, note that that most of these values such as NormBonus take
	effect before the point multiplier is taken into account, which means
	that the point multiplier can change without affecting the difficulty 
--> 
<!-- How many points it takes to get to the next level in normal mode --> 
<!-- Controls for points multiplier in normal mode --> 
<!-- How many points it takes to get to the next level in timed mode --> 
<!-- Point multiplier for timed mode --> 
<!-- How fast does bonus bar start going down in timed mode --> 
<!-- How fast the bonus bar accelerates downward in timed mode --> 
<!-- How fast acceleration increases in timed mode --> 
<!-- How many seconds to advance velocity by per level --> 
<!-- How much grace time you are given per move in timed mode --> 
<!-- Multiplied by move points for additional grace time --> 
<!-- Max grace time --> 
<!-- Point multiplier for endless mode --> 
<!-- How many points it takes to get to the next level in endless mode --> 

This developer notes contains some notes that can be modified in every game modes except Original, Cognito and Puzzle such as: modifying base score points, changing the percent chances that a Bomb, Rock, Power Gem will fall, etc.

Regional Differences

Different Sounds

The Japanese version uses rather different-sounding voice sound effects for "No More Moves" and "World Complete", sounding comparatively "clearer" and "panned" to the ones featured in English releases.

No_More_Moves.ogg

World_Complete.ogg

Notably, the former file is used in all releases of the Xbox 360 version.

Bejeweled Leftovers

In the Japanese version, levelup1.ogg can also be found under the sounds folder as an unused voice sound effect, not present in the English versions.