Pac-man Championship Edition DX ( XBLA ) Review

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Review: Pac-Man Championship Edition DX
Released: 17th November 2010 (UK) (Out Now)
Platforms: XBLA, Also: PSN

How does one you improve on the 1980’s classic Pac-Man? With Pac-man Championship Edition. So how does one improve on Pac-man Championship Edition, which is already a great improvement over the original? With Pac-man Championship Edition DX that’s how.

Once again Namco have done an outstanding job with its latest edition to the Pac-Man franchise. Pac-Man C.E Edition DX is absolutely exciting and addicting to play, even more so than the previous championship edition. Pac-Man C.E Edition DX still follows the basic gameplay elements of the original Pac-Man. The game still has the player take control of Pac-Man, moving him through the maze eating pellets, power pellets and also bonus fruit. While at the same time the player needs to avoid running into the ghosts, but can consume power pellets to turn the tide for a short time and eat the ghosts. From this point DX makes several changes to the formula some similar to the previous championship edition and some all new elements. For starters like the previous championship edition there is the inclusion of a time limit rather than different levels like the original. Each of the several mazes you can choose from is split into two halves and collecting all the pellets on one side will cause a bonus item to appear on the other side. Collecting the item will cause the opposite side to maze to change. These two things are great additions that were introduced in the previous championship edition and remain pretty much the same in DX.

So what has exactly been added to the DX edition? Well the game now includes sleeper ghosts. Sleeper ghosts are stationary until Pac-Man moves past them. In doing so the ghosts will follow behind Pac-Man, doing so several times will form a train like trail behind Pac-Man. The long train of ghosts provides a massive score bonus when Pac-Man eats a power pallet and consumes the ghosts in succession. The speed of the game will increase as the player gets more points and to further add to the difficulty free roaming ghost will still appear in the maze just like classic Pac-Man. There are also other additions that have been added to the game such as bombs which when used will send all roaming ghosts and ones following Pac-Man back to the centre of the maze. I can’t even begin to describe how it feels when you are able to eat several ghosts in succession and build up a tremendous score. It’s like dealing a large blow to the ghosts like you’ve never been able to do before.

A great feature that I admire very much is the ability to change the character and maze graphical styles. The game allows you to switch between several graphical styles from retro pixel sprites to a more 3D Pac-Man look etc.

Much like the previous game the music greatly adds to the intensity as the timer counts down till those last few seconds. It really gets you going as you try and get those last few points with ghosts all over the maze and Pac-Man moving tremendously fast, all before the timer runs out. Not to mention the music playing on the main menu is absolutely addicting theme that plays over and over again in my head when I’m not playing the game.

All in all Pac-Man is about one thing and thing only the score. The game includes leaderboards and the ability to watch other player videos so you can watch some of the best Pac-man players go to work. The game also includes several maze designs, furthermore along with the Score Attack there is also Time Trial and Ghost Combo for players to tackle. Pac-Man C.E Edition DX is one of the best arcade games released last year. I didn’t think Pac-Man could get any better than Pac-Man C.E Edition but Namco have proved me wrong and have created another highly addictive and simply fantastic downloadable game.

PAC-MAN C.E EDITION DX BREAKDOWN

GAMEPLAY

Its Pac-Man move around the maze, collect the pellets, items and eat those ghosts. It’s all about achieving those high scores.

GRAPHICS & PRESENTATION

From the menus down to the actual gameplay everything is presented nicely. There is an Array of maze and character graphical styles to choose from too.

LONGEVITY

Lost a large amount of daylight time playing this one of the most addictive arcade releases since….. well since the last Pac-Man game.

AUDIO

That main menu music is unforgettable not to mention the music adds intensity when the game gets down to those last few seconds.

FINAL OPIONON: AWESOME