Despite a sluggish stock, Zynga is still toiling away on new games hoping to catch their next big break. They pushed Zynga Slots to mobile last week which will probably do really well. Their next Facebook game, however, is a little more uncertain.

The next Facebook game from Zynga is called Ruby Blast. It’s a match-three puzzler with a twist. The player is not trying to clear the board of gems, but rather going deeper until the timer runs out. It’s a popular variation on the match three puzzle genre. So, does Zynga bring anything new to the table?

Surprisingly, Zynga has added some neat additions to the classic formula. The first is that your friends can join your game to help clear blocks. It appears that your friend’s face is applied to a drill and then they destroy a line of blocks.

While not new to the genre by any means, the fact that Zynga has included power-ups is a welcome addition. Too many puzzle games are just boring grindfests. Being able to destroy entire lines of gems or blocks with multi-tiered explosions is one of the best puzzle game mechanics.

That game also features the requisite leaderboards for competing with friends. If your friends are into puzzlers, then Ruby Blast may just be the Facebook game for you. If your friends hate you for your constant requests for items in Farmville, you may just want to play this one alone.

Check out the trailer for Ruby Blast. It should give you a look into the gameplay as well as Zynga apparently trying to tell a story via animatics. You can start playing the game once it goes live on Facebook or at Zynga.com.