Feeding cyber-fish for cash or stacking digital jewels in a row may not sound riveting. But in the new world of casual gaming, millions are finding such prosaic activities strangely addictive

The object of the computer game "Bejeweled" is simple: Within a matrix of colorful jewels, you use your mouse or game controller to shuffle one of the stones left, right, up or down so it produces three matching jewels in a row. Do it and you get points, plus a rewarding musical chime.

Okay, maybe it sounds boring on paper. But five minutes with the game can quickly turn into 30 as you gain facility with the patterns and start to create an orderly array from the disorganized matrix at the game's outset. If you're not careful, 30 minutes will creep past an hour before you realize the boss is lurking or the pasta's boiling over.

Simple, satisfying and occasionally addictive, so-called "casual" video and computer games like "Bejeweled," from the game developer Popcap, are fast taking over keyboards around the globe. Industry watchers believe more than 100 million people worldwide — mostly women — routinely play casual games. Game industry research firm DFC Intelligence predicts the money people spend to buy or play casual games in North America alone will jump 46% this year, to $458 million.

One reason for the casual games boom is easier accessibility. Playing video games used to mean schlepping to the mall to buy a shrink-wrapped disc or cartridge that you'd shove into your computer or game system. Thanks to broadband Internet connections, millions of gamers are able to sample, play and purchase puzzle, trivia and card games with just a few clicks of the mouse. Many of the exact same game titles once found only on store shelves exist in the virtual world of online web sites and portals, like the "Games" section of charter.net, the Real Arcade site maintained by the Seattle Internet content company Real Networks (realarcade.com), or Microsoft's casual-games portal, games.msn.com.

A byproduct of the casual games phenomenon is a changing demographic for the video game category in general. The stereotype video gamer is a Gen Y 15-year-old with a skateboard lodged up against a bedroom wall. But the reality is different. For casual games — titles like "Bejeweled," "Cakemania" and "Super Collapse"— women make up 71 percent of the playing field, according to a June 2006 study by game provider Macromedia Corp.

That's a group where former retailing executive Julie Pitt fits right in. "I am the poster child of our demographic," says Pitt, who is the general manager of Real Arcade and lists the Popcap game "Zuma" among her favorites. She thinks casual games appeal to women partly because the games reward organizational skills and task mastery rather than the fleet-fingered mayhem associated with traditional young-male games.

"I don't mean to be sexist by this, but in many cases you find traditional games are where people are blowing things up. And in casual games you're trying to put things together and create order," Pitt says.

That wasn't so well known four years ago when Pitt and a handful of executives began working on ways to broaden the appeal of video games and the way they're distributed. Real Networks had started in the online games business by taking traditionally male-oriented video games and toning them down for online delivery and sampling. But researchers noticed a huge spike in usage when "Bejeweled" was added to the play list. "It took everybody by surprise," says Pitt. "It turned out our customer was female."

That helps explain why casual games are growing even faster than the overall video game category, which generates more income than sales of movie-theater tickets in the U.S. The Entertainment Software Association, a video game industry group, says 52 percent of the games people play online are casual games like puzzles, board games, trivia and card-games. Real Arcade alone serves about 600,000 game sessions a day from its web site.

Generally, there's a mix of free games, limited-time game samples and pay-to-own games available online. Sampling casual games online is easy. Many are available just by clicking on a game title or icon.

Others require that users download a special software application, called a "client," that permits a wider range of game features and interaction.

The good news: Unlike the old dial-up Internet days, fetching a game client takes just a couple of minutes. Plus, the software loads automatically, so you'll be up and playing in no time.

The rest is up to you. There are thousands of games to choose from and new ones being created every day. Just remember to keep an eye on the clock so you don't get lost in casual gaming's cyber-playground.