Pac-Man
Added August 9th, 2006 by Serenity Now
Pac-Man is the fifth and final title to be released from this summer’s Xbox Live Arcade Wednesdays. The cult classic arcade hit is celebrating its 25th birthday and in return it’s received full leaderboard support, achievements and that same addicting gameplay you spewed forth quarters for decades ago.
The game of Pac-Man revolves around your character, collectable dots, a grid and hungry ghosts that want to gobble you up for lunch. On the grid there are special power ups that enable you to eat said ghosts. The point is to gulp down all dots on each level in addition to capping the ghosts for extra points. Every time you eat a set of Pac-Dots, a piece of fruit (keys and other objects in latter levels) will appear in the middle of the playing field. This tasty bundle of joy not only gives you points to help boost your ranks on the leaderboards, but also bestows upon your GamerScore some well-deserved achievement points.
The game of Pac-Man revolves around your character, collectable dots, a grid and hungry ghosts that want to gobble you up for lunch. On the grid there are special power ups that enable you to eat said ghosts. The point is to gulp down all dots on each level in addition to capping the ghosts for extra points. Every time you eat a set of Pac-Dots, a piece of fruit (keys and other objects in latter levels) will appear in the middle of the playing field. This tasty bundle of joy not only gives you points to help boost your ranks on the leaderboards, but also bestows upon your GamerScore some well-deserved achievement points.
One of the foremost attractions to this version of the game is its 200 total achievement points made possible through 12 different goals. The objectives are pretty straightforward, to say the least, but then again it’s Pac-Man. They essentially consist of eating a set of Pac-Dots and obtaining the object that pops up. However, there are a few harder ones such as eating all ghosts 4 – count it – 4 times in a stage, and clearing milestone rounds such as 5 and 21. The milestone achievements, in all honesty, aren’t that tough to obtain as when you die, you can start from the point you reached at any future time.
If you have an HD setup, you will be able to take advantage of Pac-Man’s HD facets – although, in reality, it’s not going to make much of a difference due to the visuals not being given any type of graphical overhaul whatsoever. The audio, on the flipside, has. I didn’t immediately notice any substantial improvements, but as you play you’ll recognize that the effects and score possess greater polish.
Summary:
I have always been a Pac-Man fanatic. Its simplistic gameplay may seem dull and outdated in contrast to today’s multi-million dollar productions, but one fact about Pac-Man remains intact even after all these years. That fact is simply it is still darned fun to play. Throw in some achievements, leadersboards and a nifty price tag of only five bones, and you’ve got hours upon hours of classic gaming to be had.
