Pac-Man World 2

Spooky is on the loose, the golden fruit is missing, evil is unleashed!
What’s a Pac to do? Enter Pac-Man World 2
and take control of the irresistible dot munching Pac-Man in over 6 fully 3D
worlds and 20 levels ‘packed’ with everything you’ve come to love in the Pac-Man
series, and a few new twists and turns. The mischievous ghosts have picked the
golden fruit from an ancient tree smack dab in the middle of Pac-Village and
unleashed the wicked entity ‘Spooky’. The sinister Spooky demands the ghosts
hide the golden fruit throughout the land. Without the golden fruit, Pac-Village
will be helpless to resist Spooky and the ghosts. So step aside, cause Pac-Man
is comin’ through, and he’s on a mission!

You
start out your adventure in Pac-Village, where Professor Pac
tells you that Spooky has been released, and you must find the golden
fruit so you can defeat Spooky and Pac-Village can return
to normal. Unlike the original Pac-Man, where you played in a maze/strategy
style to collect pellets on a 2D screen, Pac-Man World 2 is more similar
to it’s recent 3D titles such as Pac-Man World for the Playstation
console, where you navigate your cute, yellow, and oddly round Pac through various
3D worlds and levels, in a linear platform game fashion from the third person
perspective.

There are six different worlds where Pac-Man must travel to find the
golden fruit and defeat the bosses, who are all ‘Meched‘
out! The first world you go to is the forest, and similar to the rest of the
worlds, you’ll encounter all sorts of interesting characters and enemies, including
Pac-Bears (how cute), Beetles, and
of course ghosts. Other worlds include Tree Tops, Snow Mountains,
Lava, The Ocean, and last but not least Ghost Island.
Each of the worlds have their own unique environments and enemies specific to
the type of terrain. Throughout your journey you’ll need to collect Pac-Dots,
Power Pellets, Fruit, and Tokens, along with picking
up extra goodies such as bonus lives, health wedges, steel ball power ups, and
your main objective, the golden fruit.

Picking up the tokens will unlock different Pac-Man Arcade games in the Arcade,
which you can later play at your leisure. Being able to unlock and play such
classic retro titles like Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Pacmania,
Pac Attack, in addition to Pac-Man World 2 mazes, is a nice
incentive to collect all of the tokens. There are different items in each level
that will help you get where you need to be, like switches, moving platforms,
and helivators which you rev up to move and other creative things. Controlling
Pac-Man is easy based on the simple control configuration, that you’ll easily
become familiar with in a few moments time. As we said above, this is a linear
game, meaning you basically have one route which you must take to reach the
predetermined goal. The huge variety of environments and enemies makes playing
through the game rather interesting. Once you have completed a level, you can
also re-enter it to search for any fruit, tokens, or Pac dots you may have overlooked,
or go into Time Trial mode, where you race against the clock to finish
the level.

You move Pac-Man with the left thumb stick, and angle the camera with the right
thumb stick. For the most part, the camera is cooperative, however there are
spots in the game where it can be difficult to see your immediate goals or enemies,
especially in areas where Pac-Man is facing you. That was my only real complaint
about the game.

If you happen to come across a Galaxian while running around in Pac-World,
you will be warped to special areas known as Maze Mode, which is basically
the original style Pac-Man with an interesting 3D twist and a few new elements.
Galaxians will also count as Check Points, in addition to the many
check points you will encounter, though you may need to search a little longer
to find these ones. Also of interest to Pac-Man fanatics are some of the new
additions to the gameplay elements and maneuvers. Pac-Man now has a couple of
new abilities like Flip-Kick, Shimmy, Ice Skate,
Inline Skate, and swim with flippers or in a submarine.

Let’s face it, there’s not a whole lot ground breaking in the graphics category,
but Pac-Man fans aren’t playing for the exceptional graphics, and while the
opening cinematics is extremely impressive, the rest of the game concentrates
on gameplay more than display. The character animations are smooth, and generally
interesting and humorous, right down to the expressions on Pac-Man’s face. Another
creative touch was the introduction ‘mech’ styled bosses,’ pretty cool.
In comparison to other Pac-Man titles the graphics are the best we have seen,
but still pale in comparison to other titles that utilize the power of the Xbox
to the full extent. On a side note, when you’re idle in the game, Pac-Man gets
restless, and begins to exercise, makes you wonder how he keeps
that figure!

The
audio is cute, upbeat, unobtrusive, and a bit cheesy, but that’s what you would
expect to hear in the vibrantly colored Pac-World. They have also included many
of the original sounds, like Pac-dot munching, Power-up munching, and that fateful
swirl sound when your beloved Pac dies. Do I sense a little deja vu?
It’s terrific for the Pac-Man mood.

While the overall game seemed a bit short, since you can speed through them
fairly easily if you know what you’re doing, the replay value is huge given
all the extras and hidden goodies to find and unlock. You have your regular
gameplay, as well as Time Trial mode, and you can unlock many of the original
titles like Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man as we mentioned above. I think I have now
spent more time playing the original Ms. Pac-Man which I unlocked in the arcade,
more hours than it took to complete the game! Any fan of Pac-Man will certainly
get their money’s worth!

Overall
Score: 8.0 [not an average]

Whether you’re an old-school fan of Pac-Man, or you’re just entering
the ‘Pac!,’ Pac-Man is pretty tough to resist through his easy
and light-hearted game style, and that big, irresistible smile he wears almost
constantly. Fans of the classic series may also want to take a look at Namco
Museum as well.

• Namco
• Pac-Man
  World 2 Hints and Cheats
• Pac-Man
  World 2 Screenshots (Temporarily Unavailable, Sorry.)

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