Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 is a significantly evolutionary step for the legendary gaming franchise and introduces many new mechanics to keep the game relevant and as tense as you remember from the arcade. While the basic premise remains the same in regards to eating little yellow cubes and destroying ghosts, the gameplay is much faster and the enemies more devious. There are ghost trains, dormant enemies and even bosses.
Before I talk about the various modes present in Pac-Man Championship Edition 2, let’s discuss the changes the game implements. Firstly, you don’t immediately die if you run into a “non-devourable” ghost. You bump into him and aggravate the entity. However, if you bump into him more than once, he starts glowing and then he eats you. Secondly, ghost trains give you a lot of points if you eat the pellet and chomp on them but in order to make them larger, you have to aggravate dormant ghosts which add to the chain. The greater the risk you take, the greater the reward. You can get hundreds of thousands of points by chomping on a massive chain. Lastly, there are bosses that need to be defeated after passing many levels in quick succession. You’re given a set amount of time to accomplish this. However, the battles aren’t anything special as you basically need to eat the pellet in the last level and doing so automatically destroys the giant boss. This is somewhat disappointing but I can’t imagine how Pac-Man would even fight a creature a hundred times his size.
Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 features an in-depth tutorial which teaches you all the new mechanics. I would recommend playing it because you will be lost without it. This isn’t the Pac-Man of yesteryear and is much more complex. Plus, you get some achievements out of it too.
The game includes two modes: Score Attack and Adventure. Score Attack involves playing through various levels and trying to get the highest score possible. There are certain requirements, like getting a “B” grade to unlock further levels, so it’s not as easy as it sounds. Once you’ve played through some of the Score Attack, you can unlock Adventure mode. Adventure mode is basically the same but you need to play through various levels which are significantly harder than anything presented during Score Attack.
Easy levels feature less enemies and a slower pace. However, the further you move along, the harder it gets. Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 is still a test of skill and quick reflexes but unlike the classic game, it’s meant for a modern audience and that’s why it’s more lenient and deeper. If you’re new to Pac-Man—mostly given your age—then this game is the right point to experience the phenomenon.
While the gameplay is stellar albeit repetitive, that’s understandable given it’s Pac-Man. The responsiveness of the controls is all that matters and they’re perfect. However, the levels are almost all identical and variations between them are simply graphical. Some of them are pixelated, some of them are modern, and some of them look like your typical dungeon crawler walls. You can’t just reskin levels and call that variety. This is where the title falls.
Summary
Overall, Pac-Man Championship Edition 2 is a great game which updates the old Pac-Man formula for a modern audience. It’s a step up from the original Pac-Man Championship Edition versions and offers hours of fun and tons of replayability if you want to aim for the high score. Unfortunately, the levels feel uninspired even though they add various features like jump pads. That’s mostly due to the fact that they’re all mostly the same with different visuals. Despite that, the game is well worth your time because it’s probably one of the most addictive Pac-Man games out there and has endless replayability.
Xian was a regular ICXM contributor between 2015–2017, publishing 162 articles across game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news. Their work focused on hands-on reviews, platform commentary, and breaking-news reporting during the Xbox One X launch year and Microsoft’s wider Play Anywhere / UWP gaming initiative.