Game Reviews

Pac-Man is one of gaming’s oldest icons. He has survived 30 years by eating power pellets and chasing ghosts around various mazes. During the heyday of arcades he was featured in over 10 different cabinets and has since moved on as the mascot for Namco Bandai. To celebrate 3 decades of entertainment Namco has released an updated version of 2009’s Pac-Man Championship. Should you spend 800 Microsoft points to help them celebrate? Read on to find out.

The classic gameplay formula of Pac-Man has always been pretty simple. You control Pac-Man with the goal of eating dots and avoiding ghosts until you clear the entire board to advance to the next level. In the classic game in order to eat ghosts you would eat a “power pellet” that turned the ghosts an alternate color and they would avoid you. Namco has taken this tried and true formula and made several key changes to modernize Pac-Man. All of these additions make for an impressive retro inspired arcade title. In Championship DX Pac-Man’s goal is still to eat all of the power pellets on screen. Instead of advancing to a new board the game will spawn new pellets and ghosts once a fruit has been eaten. This means that Pac-Man has to always manage a large string of ghosts. Instead of limiting the number of ghosts per board, the baddies from the previous round will remain on the screen leading to a large snake like tail that will follow our yellow hero. There are several other enhancements to the gameplay that really add to the enjoyment of Pac-Man DX. Here is a brief breakdown:

Timed Gameplay - Rather than focusing on the clearing pre-set number of boards the gameplay in Pac-Man Championship Edition DX is based around timed gameplay. As the clock countdown in the main mode you’re in a race against time to collect the highest score possible.