Gaming the System Success in game development and knowing when to quit landed PopCap $22.5 million.

John Vechey has more than 240 employees, and sometimes he has to crush their souls. The affable co-founder of PopCap Gamesisn't heartless, it's just that for PopCap to be the "Pixar of the gaming world"--continuing to produce multiplatform hits such as the blockbuster Bejeweled, which has sold more than 25 million copies--you have to cancel a lot of projects that don't measure up, even if staffers have been devoted to them for a long time.

"We canceled a title that was in development for three years," Vechey says. "It all goes back to 'Is it fun?' Every game has got to be a great game. If it's not, we'd rather cancel it.