Biodigital jazz, man.
Three years ago "Pac-Man Championship Edition" took one of the arcade's timeless mascots and revitalized it with faster gameplay and a greater emphasis on scoring.
With "Pac-Man Championship Edition DX," Namco has delivered an even better value with additional modes, mazes and the return of the obsessive leaderboard system.
Like the traditional "Pac-Man," the primary objective of any game mode is to eat as many pellets, bonus fruit and ghosts as possible.
As Pac-Man consumes more items, his speed increases to an abusive rate.
"Pac-Man: CE DX's" newest features are the addition of sleeping ghosts on each map and the ghost train.
When Pac-Man moves past a sleeping ghost it will wake up and follow him. As he passes more ghosts, the train will continue to expand.
This results in a massive train of ghosts that can be consumed for a vast amount of points.
The feeling of pure joy that a player gets when rapidly consuming Pac-Man's former oppressors is one of the most satisfying of the year.
Pac-Man also has a bullet time feature that automatically engages when he is about to run into a ghost. In addition to this are bombs, which can be dropped to immediately send all ghosts in the vicinity back to the center of the maze.
"Championship Deluxe" features nine different mazes including the original "Pac-Man Championship Edition" maze.
The best of these is the final, Darkness maze that shrouds the walls in black, forcing players to find their way using only the glow from Pac-Man and his ghoulish foes.
Each maze has individual score attack, time trial and ghost combo modes. In ghost combo the player attempts to make the largest train of ghost possible before consuming them and is scored accordingly.
Along with the new mazes and modes are eight different visual filters for each maze and six different styles of Pac-Man and ghost character models that players can choose.
The game also has a magnificent, if slightly limited, soundtrack that remixes classic "Pac-Man" tunes with techno and dub themes.
If the numerous game types and decorative features were not enough to hold any players attention, there are full leaderboard statistics to compare your scores to your friends and other players on each game type and maze.
It is astonishing that, 30 years after the release of the original "Pac-Man" arcade machine, the little yellow sphere continues to thrive as one of gaming's most enthralling experiences.
"Pac-Man Championship Edition DX" is yet another amazing downloadable game that is a must-buy for anyone who has the mettle to brave the ocular assault it provides.
"Pac-Man Championship Edition DX" is available on Xbox Live Arcade currently and will come to PlayStation Network on Wednesday.
Originally published in the Indiana Statesman.
