The latest Pac-Man game for iPhone came out today, and for keen iOS gamers its premise may seem familiar.

"Pac-Man's at it again, feeding his hunger for yummy yellow dots," explains the App Store listing for the awkwardly-named Pac'n-Jump. "Bouncing and bopping, he just can't stop! Bounce for the skies! Keep your momentum, but be careful: one fall and it's back to the bottom."

In other words, a vertically scrolling game where Pac-Man jumps up platforms collecting power-ups, steered left and right by tilting the iPhone. Essentially, it's Pac-Man getting remixed with the dynamics of Doodle Jump.

It could be seen as a clever mash-up of a classic gaming brand with a modern game dynamic that's proved highly popular on the App Store – Doodle Jump recently notched up its 10 millionth download.

Then again, Pac'n-Jump could be seen as a cynical attempt to reboot an ageing franchise by copying something that's been more popular with modern-day iOS gamers. An argument likely to provoke a raised eyebrow from those of us who relished Doodle Jump partly because it brought back fond memories of games like Rainbow Islands.

This morning, I clocked Pac'n-Jump's launch on the App Store just before attending a talk at the Connected Creativity Conference in Cannes by Matt Mason, author of The Pirate's Dilemma.

In the talk, he hailed the pace of innovation in the games industry, and traced that back to the ease with which developers can copy and "remix" one another's ideas, innovating on top of them.

Whether Pac'n-Jump is doing the latter is open to debate, but it's hardly out of character for the iPhone gaming market.

Doodle Jump has already spawned hordes of games running with the idea of its "doodle" visual style. Flight Control inspired a host of games using the line-drawing dynamic. And there are already several iOS games where you sling angry things that aren't birds at things that aren't pigs.

Angry Birds, Doodle Jump and Flight Control all took inspiration from older games in their turn, of course, too. The key was that they all did it in a way that felt fresh to iOS gamers who had or hadn't played their inspirations.

Does Pac'n-Jump feel fresh? Is Namco's new game a canny reboot of the franchise, or something more cynical? How else might Pac-Man be reinvented for touchscreen mobile devices? Let us know by posting a comment.