The Xbox Live Arcade has been an unexpected hit for the Xbox 360, with gamers in droves downloading and playing an assortment of classic, re-released and new arcade titles. For a few dollars, the Xbox Live Arcade has been bursting of late with a variety of quality titles, and Jetpac Refuelled is no different.

Jetpac Refuelled comes somewhere in the middle of the classic coin-op titles that make up the vast majority of the Xbox Live Arcade. While this is indeed a classic game, dating back some two decades, Jetpac Refuelled is a fresh attempt to reinvigorate the addictive gameplay of all those years ago, and of course, give it a graphical makeover worthy of today’s gamers tastes.

If you weren’t around in the mid 80’s and didn’t live in Europe, than you most likely wouldn’t have encountered the ZX Spectrum, the gaming console of choice for the European consumer. Although it wasn’t big outside of Europe, it still housed many fine games, and Ultimate (later Rare) was one of the key British developers to consistently create quality titles for the console. One such early game was Jetpac, which at first glance was a standard 2D side scrolling shooter.

The Stamper Brothers however injected some personality and a unique feature to the game. As the name implies, the main character has a jetpack, which allows the player to fly up into the various platforms needed to obtain the occasional Fuel Pod while using the ray gun to shoot off pesky aliens. It was and remains addictive, and it is this game which has been given the full next generation treatment from it’s original development studio (and the original “retro” version is also included).

So, playing the downright primitive version of Jetpac Refuelled today shouldn’t gain too many fans, but surprisingly, the game’s well thought out concept and gameplay prove amazingly addictive. This is relative to the new Refuelled mode, which offers over 100 action packed levels full of flying and menacing aliens, a heap of aliens to blast away and loads of planets to travel to and explore.

You might think of Joust while playing Jetpac (this also has been released on the Arcade), however, there are some variations to that game. Instead of playing as a knight on an ostrich, you are a spaceman with a jetpack and a lot more firepower. Your rocket is in pieces every few levels, and, as well, every level you need to pick up six fuel pods to launch yourself off the planet.

The challenge comes from the Aliens, who are every bit as unique as the main character. Some fly faster than others, while others home in on you like a missile. Others bounce around and are unpredictable, while others take multiple hits to die. The aliens have multiple designs and multiple purposes, and most levels mix and match a variety of aliens to keep you guessing and on constant alert. It takes just one hit to drop your fuel pod, and another to kill you. Seems our Spacemen Spiff is pretty vulnerable.

But it’s the taking apart that matters - and it’s here that Refuelled has a leg up on it’s forebear. Your simple blaster can be upgraded through power ups, and you are also now equipped with a screen clearing smart bomb - very handy when the screen is overflowing with enemies and a great way to rack up high scores too.

Multiplayer plays a small part in Jetpac Refuelled, with players fighting it out over fuel pods to fuel their individual rockets, while still encountering aliens, aliens, everywhere. Both local and Live multi-play is available, and we encountered no lag in our play through. We also had no problems finding games, as multiplayer is quite popular.

The sound and graphics have been given that next generation push that most gamer’s today expect, with the music, while repetitive, being quite catchy and suitable to the game’s premise. The graphics are very detailed, with multiple layers to the backgrounds. The aliens are the real stars, and the lighting effects (of which there are many) are excellent. This is one of the better looking arcade games.

Outside of these incremental improvements, this is by and large the same game that came out almost a quarter century ago, and is not likely to enamour people if they weren’t interested back then. Still, what improvements have been made just about perfect a game that in many respects was fine just as it was.