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By Doug Trueman
1983: Friends of Pac-Man Invade
1983: Pac and Pal
System: Arcade
Developer: Namco
Publisher: Namco
Pac and Pal took Pac-Man gameplay the furthest away from the classic that Tohru Iwatani
had created, and the game's popularity suffered as a result. Pac and Pal featured Pac-Man
running around with a green ghost he had befriended. The "assistant" ghost would
pick up some of the scarce items that Pac-Man had to eat to finish the level and
hand-deliver them to him. Like in Super Pac-Man, keys were needed to unlock certain doors,
but in this case, doors were generally unlocked by "consuming" a
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card with a random fruit on the
opposite side. The locks surrounding the carded fruit would then vanish, giving Pac-Man
and his helper access to them. Even more bizarre was the inclusion of a button for you to
press: Pac-Man's power pellets didn't turn the ghosts blue; rather, Pac-Man himself would
become blue, and pressing the button would release a short-range attack (music notes,
smoke screen, etc.) that would temporarily stun any ghosts who walked into it.
While Pac and Pal could have been a success if it had been a new title with no history
behind it, the fact that it came from the famous line of previous Pac-Man games
disappointed gamers greatly.
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1983: Professor Pac-Man
Platform: Arcade
Developer: Bally Midway
Publisher: Bally Midway
Because the Pac-Man craze had dominated popular culture the previous year, Bally Midway
thought it could do almost no harm with its Namco Pac-Man license. It thought almost any
game it attached the Pac-Man label to would be a surefire success. Bally Midway was wrong.
Boy, was it wrong.
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Professor Pac-Man was a quiz-type game,
the kind that is now popular in bars. There were three types of questions the arcade
operator could select from: family (for parents and kids), adults (for bars), and prizes
(for casinos). The only real connection this game had to the Pac-Man license was that
"lives" were measured in terms of fruit (lose all your cherries and you're
dead), Professor Pac-Man tallied your score, and points were awarded by a Pac-Man that
chomped on dots from left to right. The sooner you buzzed in with your answer, the sooner
Pac-Man stopped eating. The number of dots that were left represented your score. Players
who answered a string of questions correctly on the first try could go for a "bonus
question" where they could earn extra fruits and thus extend their play time. But
even this didn't save the game. This was one of the worst and most bizarre Pac-Man video
games ever created. This game was a total disaster, and only 400 were ever produced. If
you've managed to see a copy of this title in your lifetime, consider yourself truly
blessed: Even the hardest of the hard-core gamers have never set eyes on this title …
though that's probably a good thing.
1983: Junior Pac-Man
Platform: Arcade
Developer: Bally Midway
Publisher: Bally Midway
Another spin-off to hit arcades in 1983, Junior Pac-Man added a new level of depth to
gameplay, while sticking to basics. Power pellets turned all ghosts blue, and there were
no keys, no spinning cards, and no super pellets. On the other hand, the bouncing bonus
items (like a tricycle) would turn every regular pellet they came in touch with into a
larger pellet that was worth 50 points instead of 10. The downside was that Jr. Pac-Man
couldn't gobble these as quickly as he could the normal pellets, so they had to be avoided
if ghosts were closing in. The bonus items would also destroy any power pellets they came
in contact with, often leaving Pac-Man Junior high and dry. Junior Pac-Man even got a
ghost of his own named Tim. Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Tim. Go figure.
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The best feature of all, though, was the mazes, which were much larger than the ones in
the previous titles. Generally about twice the width of a monitor, the playing field would
scroll horizontally or vertically to keep up with Junior Pac-Man. More pellets (and more
power pellets, naturally) were added, and rounds lasted significantly longer and were more
intense than in any of the other Pac-Man titles. This was the best maze-style spin-off the
series would see, other than Ms. Pac-Man.
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1983: Ms. Pac-Man
System: Atari 5200
Developer: Atari
Publisher: Atari
Ms. Pac-Man hit the Atari 5200 in 1983, and it was an improvement over the original 5200
Pac-Man. The graphics were tighter, and the sounds were much closer to the arcade
originals. It just goes to show that every good Pac-Man has a Ms. Pac-Man behind him.
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The only downside to all the Atari 5200
versions was that the joysticks that came with the super system didn't automatically
recenter. This led to more than a few untimely and heartbreaking deaths as Pac-Man or Ms.
Pac-Man turned the wrong corner or flipped a 180 right into the sheets of the oncoming
ghosts. Sad, but true. But Ms. Pac-Man was a success nevertheless (third-party
auto-recentering joysticks were available eventually) .
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