I've made this for years, regular chocolate cake mix is fine, just not as rich. I've substituted Kahula for some of the water, used peanut butter chips instead of chocolate chips. The cake is so rich that I usually just sprinkle a little powdered sugar on it when I'm ready to serve it. I'm addicted to chocolate so I've never tried any other flavor of cake mix with different pudding flavors. I'm thinking it would come out just as moist.