The article below features Kavitha Shah, otherwise known as Kavishah of WorldWinner fame. She is one of the best Bejeweled 2 players on WorldWinner, and she is famous for winning $1,000,000 in cash during FUN Technologies’ gaming competition back in 2006. Enjoy!

Kavitha Shah: Playing Bejeweled for Fun and ($1 million in) Profits

Kavitha Shah considers herself lucky – and getting luckier. The 23-year old from Odessa, Texas won FUN Technologies’ WorldWide Web Games competition two years ago and netted a cool US $1 million in cash – by far the biggest prize ever awarded in a video game competition. But unlike most “professional gamers,” Kavitha won not through her ability to oversee thousands of troops and equipment in a real-time strategy game, or for her skills with rocket-launchers and railguns in first-person shooter games. Rather, Kavitha topped thousands of other players in the games Solitaire and PopCap Games’ Zuma and Bejeweled 2 “casual games.”

Now, she’s being flown to Seattle to attend the formal unveiling and official launch of Bejeweled Twist, the highly anticipated third installment in PopCap’s flagship franchise, which also happens to be the most popular puzzle game of the 21st century and Kavitha’s favorite game ever. “My Bejeweled 2 prowess was absolutely indispensible to my million-dollar win at the W3 Games tournament,” Kavitha says, “because it was the only game that I knew I would do better in than anyone else at the tournament. Having one of the three competition games ‘in the bag’ was a huge confidence booster.” Kavitha and her husband Vishal will attend the Bejeweled Twist launch gala on Monday, October 27 at 7 p.m. PDT and Kavitha will be among a dozen VIP customers feted at the event. The couple will spend a long weekend in Seattle enjoying the sites, but once Kavitha gets her hands on Bejeweled Twist, she may not leave the hotel room.

“I can’t wait to have a new Bejeweled game to play!” she exclaims. “Bejeweled 2 has provided me with a lot of entertainment and relaxation – not to mention financial security – and I’m sure the PopCap developers have come up with something new for Twist, and that it will be just as much fun as the original!”

Kavitha first discovered PopCap’s casual games on the Web while still in high school, and continued her passion for puzzlers during her undergraduate days at the University of Texas at Austin. While she started playing for fun, she now considers the games to have many other benefits – even beyond providing a seven-figure windfall. “I play casual games when I want to unwind after a long day, and I consider stress-relief to be a very important mental and physical benefit of playing,” she smiles. “Playing these games for a few minutes helps me clear my mind and get ready for the next task at hand.” Then there are the speed-typing benefits, which are paying dividends in school. “It is famously known among law students these days that the ability to type very fast gives you an edge on law school exams,” Kavitha explains. “Since I started playing casual games, my fingers have gotten faster and more accurate when it comes to typing. Whatever hand-eye coordination improvements I gained from playing piano as a child have been further refined as a result of casual gaming.”

“Even after winning the $1 million prize, I still play for two to three hours per day, mostly in short 15-minute bursts throughout the day when I’m trying to unwind,” she notes. “I play at home on my laptop, and sometimes I play in airports while waiting for a flight. I don’t mind paying the airport Wi-Fi fees because those costs are covered by winning more competitions on WorldWinner.” Kavitha plays for sizable cash purses almost daily, and estimates she’s won more than $150,000 in 2008 alone.

Kavitha now studies law at the University of Michigan, and has used her casual game winnings to help pay for school, a house, and recently a trip to Greece. “I was incredibly happy with my life before the big win, but I think the money removed some obstacles to certain things I have always wanted to do while I am young, like owning a home and traveling. I feel luckier than I ever have before since winning the tournament. 9 was always my lucky number, and I happened to win on 9/9/06 !”

When she’s not buried under law school textbooks, Kavitha enjoys movies, philosophical debates, college football, kayaking, photography, racquetball, traveling and spending time with her husband. While he plays traditional “hardcore” video games, Kavitha’s content to stick with casual titles – and PopCap’s games in particular. “Compared to hardcore games and even other casual games, PopCap’s games are easy to learn while still being difficult to master. This gives me just the right balance between some inscrutable hardcore game that requires hours to even understand, and a game that is so easy to master that playing it is just plain boring.”

Whether Kavitha’s mastery of Bejeweled 2 will translate into Bejeweled Twist expertise remains to be seen. But she says “it won’t be for lack of playing!”