I agree with tye, though personally I prefer to use the

my ( $var_one, $var_two ) = @_;

type syntax. I find it easier to read, takes up less space
(hate scrolling continually just to see complete routine)
and it leaves the initial arguement array untouched.

Really just my personal preference,.. though intuition tells me that an array assignment
would possibly be less resource intensive than a bunch of repeated shift calls.
Though neither would probably make a big difference in your program.

Your time would probably be better spend playing with Devel::Dprof
and finding out what areas of your program really need to be optimized.

Best Regards,
Wonko