Pac Pix (Nintendo DS)

One review stated that Pac Pix was a good idea, but basically a big tech demo rather than a game. I have to disagree with this - sure, Pac Pix is a one trick pony, but it is quite a trick, and much more involving that a similarly simple DS game, Mario & Yoshi.

Drawing your Pac Man, arrows or bombs is a brilliant concept, well executed, and a lot of thought has obviously gone into making the controls as intuitive as possible. Just as well, as a few reviews have mentioned, it does get very difficult very quickly.

While the graphics are simple (this is in keeping with its 'scribbled' theme and look), they really need to be with so much going on on-screen, and complement the game perfectly.

The game does have a few flaws - its horrendous difficulty level, and the slightly repetitive nature of the game, however, what is Pac Man if not repetitive? However, the player never gets bored seeing the Pac Man they have drawn themselves, come to life, and the addition of arrows and bombs adds an extra twist.

Works best as a quick pick up and play title, after the initial novelty wears off (this itself will take some time), with a quick burst here and there, it'll definitely be one that you'll want to keep in your collection. Highly recommended.


Buy this now!   May 31, 2005
13 out of 16 found this review helpful

This is a great game!! Its a cross between an arcade game and a puzzle game. You draw pacman (using 'magic ink') to eat the ghosts on each screen, and to stop him from walking off the screen you draw walls to deflect his movement. You need to clear the screens of evil ghosts before the time runs out, but as the puzzles get harder and ther ghosts become more difficult to eat, you get new abilities such as arrows that you can draw to stun ghosts and activate switches, and bombs that you can draw to destroy walls and stun ghosts.
Its an innovative game idea and very addictive. I can't stop playing it and recommend it to gamers that are looking for something unique and fun for the Nintedo DS.


so pac man is dead?   June 27, 2005
8 out of 12 found this review helpful

If you thought Pac-Man was dead and so 15 years ago, you better think again, because he is back with more interactivity then ever before!

Grabbing your handy stylus (your main object of beating this game), you sketch your way through 12 stages (almost 60 levels... and even more when you beat the first book) of monster eating, item collecting, arrow shooting, bomb exploding, and pac-man sketching action.

With most of the action going on at the bottom of the screen, don't take your eyes of the top one. At the top, their are fruits (item road), monsters and extra lives (item road) to be collected. Either big or small your pac-man can gobble up the competition by you drawing a pac-man, any size.

Do you want to fire at that monster floating in a bubble at the top of the screen? Then quickly sketch an arrow and it will fire up at the top screen and will go which way you angled it at.
Is that annoying monster with a block on his head getting on your nerves? Then draw a circle, attach a line by drawing it on the circle and connect it to a flame. Literally blowing the hell out the monster's armor, it is now your chance to gobble the lil' freak up (I don't know about Pinky, they are pretty cute monsters)

Many different monsters have different attitudes. For example, Pinky will try to get away from you with caution, Nevervous Pete (or whatever the hell his name was) runs like hell to get away and you have to catch him, and the monsters with shells on the front of them, which you have to get behind them to eat em' up (trying to eat them from the front causes you to bounce back, if you bounce back 3 consecutive times, your pac man gets flung off the screen/killed).

The game offers so much interactivity it is almost nuts. For example, interactivity shines as you get to draw the arrows and try and deflect them off mirriors. Probably the only downside to this game was that there wasn't any multi-player. I mean with Pac-man games they always throw in something involving multi-player, but for this one, I guess not.

Another cool thing about this game is the Sketchbook practice. You can practice drawing your arrows, pac-man and bombs and even make other things spring to life, such as drawing a cloud, it starts to rain.... drawing a side-ways 8 turns it into a butterfly and it continues to fly all the way to the top of the screen). I have noticed most of the Nintendo DS games are based on high-scores , but thats ok for this game, because it is a must have for your DS collection and for all out sketch crazy, monster eating action!


Pac-pix great as a 1st ds game   September 13, 2005
5 out of 7 found this review helpful

I got my nintendo ds a few months after it was released, and after reading loads of reviews, it looked as if pac pix would be a great game to get so i got it.
the game gives you a nice pleasant intro and gives you an easy to get your head round tutorial showing you how to draw pacman and guide him around.
when you play the actual game, it is quite hard and considering it has no difficulty level choice, it shocks you at how hard it actually is.I got this game in june and i am only on chapter 10 of book 1 and i am quite an average gamer.if you take it to seriously, you will most probably lob it across the room so just have short bursts of playing it and then you will ease into one hell of a gaming experience.

Conclusion- if you like games that seperate themselves from the crowd,like me, then buy this, but do be warned it can get challenging.


Worth while   December 20, 2006
Beechy
5 out of 5 found this review helpful

I bought this ages ago. It is a technical marvel and showcases the DS well. But something's missing. It just isn't long enough and feels like a mini game. This should have been released with pac 'n' roll (good game; better than Monkey ball for DS I reckon) with some bits Pac pix style and some Pac 'n' roll's style. That would have been ace. But Pac pix as a whole game just starts to take the fun out of it. Still it is probably the best game to show the DS to a friend.