Back in the early 80’s, I was extremely big into Pac-Man (still am, really). But there were a few arcade classics that could lure my quarters away from the Pac temporarily. BurgerTime was one of those games. Now a new generation can enjoy making giant sized burgers with BurgerTime World Tour on Xbox LIVE.

The basic gameplay remains unchanged. Play as Chef Peter Pepper and maneuver around mazes, climb ladders, and walk on burger parts. When you completely walk over a piece of a burger, it’ll fall to the level below, knocking any ingredients below it. When you make all the burgers in a level, you win.

But you have to watch out for evil food enemies who will make you lose a life if you touch them. You can temporarily stun baddies by throwing pepper at them, but you only have a limited supply so use it wisely. You can also dispatch enemies by squishing them under burger parts, or by making bad guys fall along with the part of the burger you were just walking on. This is especially strategic because if an enemy falls along with a burger part, it’ll go down a couple more levels.

World Tour adds a few new twists to the formula, though. The mazes are viewed wrapped around a cylinder, so you get a neat 3-D effect. You can now jump over enemies and collect other power-ups besides pepper, such as a spatula for spin attacks, and rockets to boost you to the top of the maze quickly. New enemies appear, such as exploding habanero peppers. If you do squish an enemy into a burger, you’ll get a bonus and make a new kind of sandwich. Such as a spicy burger if you squash one of the habanero peppers in it!

World Tour features more than 50 levels in locations like New York, Mexico, France, and Japan. You can even play multiplayer through split screen and online. The only problem I had with the game is that since you can’t see the whole maze at once, it’s harder to keep track of the burger and enemies’ locations. And the graphics are so bright and colorful that sometimes I had a hard time seeing the bad guys.

Another problem I had is a little more nitpicky. I didn’t like Peter Pepper’s new look. He’s lanky with a handlebar moustache in the new game, and I always thought he should be more short and squatty like in the old arcade classic. But hey, if you don’t like how he looks, you can always plays as your Xbox avatar, which I thought was cool to see my likeness in one of my favorite arcade games. I also appreciated the nod to the classic BurgerTime theme song, too. It’s too bad the original game isn’t on here either. But if you enjoy BurgerTime as much as I did, you might want to check this one out sometime anyway.

Kid Factor

Nothing objectionable or violent here. You do squish cartoony food monsters in burgers and hit them with pepper, but that’s as violent as it gets. When you get hit by an enemy, you just do a little dance and fall off the screen. Reading skill is helpful, but not required, but younger players might get frustrated at the difficulty, as the game is pretty tough even on Easy Mode. BurgerTime World Tour is rated E for Everyone.

One thing about BurgerTime World Tour is that it always makes me hungry for burgers when I play it. When I tried it first at E3, I had to get an In and Out burger before hopping on the plane home. And when I downloaded the game last week, I went to Sonic soon after. Are there any video games that make you hungry? What’s your favorite burger place? Let me know in the comments section!

Tags: Game Reviews