“Candy Crush declined more than we had expected,” said Zacconi, referring to the “gross bookings” metric that describes how much players have spent in the game. King’s chief executive Riccardo Zacconi admitted as much when speaking to analysts after the company reported its financial results for the second quarter of 2014. It might be the biggest, but the original game has peaked. “We are building for the long haul, and Candy Crush is definitely our biggest franchise.” “We look at some of our key games as franchises: it’s a commitment that these games will keep evolving,” said Knutsson. Now, though, the company is trying to capitalise on “Candy Crush” as a brand in its own right. Until now, “Saga” has been the brand for its puzzle games: Bubble Witch Saga, Farm Heroes Saga, Pet Rescue Saga and so on. The new game is also a subtle change of strategy for King. Dropping soda in makes a big difference to the gameplay, and makes it distinctly unique versus the original game,” said Knutsson. “We have evolved and innovated a lot in the game’s mechanics. The main addition for Candy Crush Soda Saga is, as you may have guessed, soda: purple bottles which can be used to flip gravity while players are matching sweets and creating combos to make them disappear. But you can play it side-by-side with the original game, and we will continue developing both in parallel.” We wanted to create a game that brought something fresh to Candy Crush. It’s just an additional title for the people who love Candy Crush, which is still a huge game being regularly updated with new levels,” King’s chief creative officer Sebastian Knutsson told the Guardian, ahead of the launch. Not that the company is describing it as a sequel. It launches today on Facebook, and will be available for mobile phones and tablets before Christmas, although King has been testing it on Android in some countries already. Now it’s getting a sequel: Candy Crush Soda Saga.

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