I came

Holy shitsticks. If you're an XBLA user, and you love shoot-em-ups, go and buy/download Geometry Wars 2 NOW.

1) Graphics

More particles! I love how many more particles are in this version and how they toned down the background "grid" a little bit. I'm not a huge fan of the "curved" UI but after a while it isn't noticeable.

2) Music

In one word: trancetastic. Great beats, gets you in the zone, and keeps your foot tapping. My wife won't admit it, but I saw her tapping her foot when I was playing :)

3) Gameplay

New Modes:

I really enjoy the new gameplay modes. I played Geometry Wars Galaxies on the Wii and was really stoked at the new modes they added to add life back to a decent arcade game. With GW2 the additional challenge modes offer different styles of gameplay to get your brain in a different mode of operation than "IF IT MOVES...KILL IT!". I am completely hooked on the Pacifism, Sequence, and Waves. I'm not a huge fan of King mode but getting the 30-circles achivement was pretty entertaining.

Local Multiplayer:

I played this with my 5-year old and we had a blast. The mode where one person shoots and another steers is hard as hell but the hillarity of trying to tell your copilot what to do is worth the many lost lives. I *really* want to get 4 people together and try this out.

The only downside

No online multiplayer. No problem though, this game kicks so much ass it'll keep me busy even without the multiplayer component for many many hours.

5 out of 5 for me.