With-in the first few minutes of playing the game, you’ll notice that everything is wonderful. The controls feel great and the challenge of playing the on the surface of the iPod is easy to get use to, but all good things must come to an end. Soon after starting Pac-Man CE you’ll start to get a little frustrated at the game’s content or lack thereof. Once you enter the Main Menu, you’ll see an option to buy the game’s Expansion Pack. Now, most games have DLC and iPod games are no different, so you might not even notice this fact. Then you’ll click the Play option, from here you’ll have another three choices; Mission, Championship and Challenge.

 

 

Mission is a timed Pac-Man board where new dots appear as you eat fruits. It’s kind of like telling a kid that he can’t have more until he finishes what’s on his plate. This mode is long and runs about 5 minutes at a clip. It’s not a great option for the iPod because of the length of time needed to play it, but if you need to kill 5 minutes this is a perfect option. Next you have Championship; this mode has a set of challenges based around teaching you the game. It’s a great way to get acclimated to the new play style on the iPod, so I would recommend it to new players. Then there’s Challenge; this is where the problems start. When you click on this option you’re prompted to buy the Expansion. It turns out that the Challenge mode isn’t in the game without buying the add-on. If you get over this and go back to the other two modes you’ll notice that those options also have most of their content available only after buying the add-ons.

 

 

All in all, Pac-Man Championship Edition is a fun game. But there is too much content pulled out of the game to create the game’s Expansion. Even if the game was a little longer I wouldn’t have a problem with buying the expansion, but more than half the game is sitting in the iTunes store waiting to be purchased. This type of move makes me feel like I have a $2.99 demo and I have to spend an additional $2.99 for the full game. Plus there isn’t even an option to just buy the full game outright. So instead of just getting some kind deluxe edition of the game, I have to get slapped in the face before I can be happy with my purchase, even if I’m willing to pay the $6 for all the content.

While these points about the content are true, I’m semi-happy with what I have here. I’m going to play it for hours on end and I’m even now itching to buy the extra stuff. So I have to consider these facts when I give Pac-Man Championship edition 7 out of 10.