Before Mario, Sonic, and the rest of
their pals ruled the video game mascot scene, Pac-Man was the unchallenged king
of characters.
When his self-titled first release found its way into arcades
across the world in 1980, it started the first mascot craze in video game
history. For historical context, Jimmy Carter was President of the United
States and M*A*S*H was still going strong on television. Video games were
barely on people's radar before Pac-Man.
Suddenly, Pac-Man merchandise was everywhere: T-Shirts, patches, bumper
stickers, and boxes of Pac-Man cereal were just a few of the things you could
buy to show your loyalty. There's still a rumor going around that there was a
quarter shortage in 1980 because the United States had come down with a serious
case of Pac-Man fever. This medical
condition inspired a song by the same name, sung to the tune of schizophrenic
rock star Ted Nugent's Cat Scratch Fever.
Namco cashed in on the craze quickly,
releasing loads of Pac-Man related
games over the next five years. Super
Pac-Man, Pac-Man Plus, Jr. Pac-Man, and the strange trivia game Professor Pac-Man were all underwhelming
versions of the original game, with a few cosmetic and gameplay tweaks.
With all that quantity, they managed to
squeeze out some quality as well. There are five Pac-Man games that should be
played by every video game enthusiast. Some are hard to find, but with
emulators, Ouya, and the various download services available on current
consoles, it shouldn't be too much of a chore to track them down.
 |
| "ooooooohhhh baby!!!" |
5. Baby
Pac-Man: This will be the toughest to find of all the games on this list,
because its an arcade game unlike anything else I've ever seen. You control
baby Pac-Man on the screen, much like the rest of the games in the series. When
you go to the bottom of the screen, a pinball game starts! You try to rack up
points using standard flippers. It's a particularly strange experience because
the pinball table is about half the length of an ordinary table, so that you're
not too far from the action when it returns to the video screen. It's a unique
experience that's worth hunting down.
4. Pac-Land:
Namco took Pac-Man out of his familiar maze and put him into a 2D
side-scrolling platformer that provided a great challenge. They ditched the
traditional joystick to move Pac-Man around, and replaced it with two buttons
you had to continuously press to make him run in one direction or the other.
There were a lot of tough jumps to make, and having to press those buttons with
your left hand while timing jumps with your right was tough. It was a
refreshing and fun change of scenery for Pac-Man, and the best home version of
the game was released on the Turbografx-16, which holds a special place in my
heart. Pac-Land was recently released in the WiiU eShop, so you can check it
out for yourself without spending a lot of dough.
 |
| "Get back here, you little bastard!" |
3. Pac-Mania: Pac-Man returned to the
maze in Pac-Mania, but it's a very different experience from the earlier
titles. It features a pseudo-3D isometric perspective, with our hero covering a
lot more ground as the screen scrolls left and right to cover the entire maze.
The coolest addition to Pac-Mania, by far, was the addition of a jump button.
You weren't forced to run every time you saw a ghost anymore; instead, you
could bounce right over his head. Things got tough in later levels when the
ghosts gained the ability to jump, but the added mechanic made for a really fun
experience.
2. Ms.
Pac-Man: It started as a game mod put together by some college students
using an original Pac-Man motherboard. It became the most popular Pac-Man game
of all time. You can still go into almost any movie theater or children's pizza
joint and find the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga combo game, because they're two timeless
classics that are still fun today. It was a wonderful evolution of the Pac-Man
formula, with different mazes and item point bonuses that bounced around the
screen. It's the first game I can remember that featured cutscenes, where the
game told a little story in between levels. They were short and sweet,
describing the relationship between Ms. Pac-Man and her eventual husband. The
music featured during these cut scenes is still stuck in my head to this day.
 |
| "I am the champion!! Eat this!" |
1. Pac
Man Championship Edition DX: Nostalgia be damned, this is the best Pac-Man
game ever made. It's available on PS3 and Xbox 360 for download, and it's a
must-play for even the most casual fan of Pac-Man. The levels change while
you're still in the middle of them. You can get insane combos, chomping fifty
ghosts or more in one stretch. The game moves extremely fast in the later
levels, so the developers gave players the ability to “grind" or hug the walls so that
you knew which direction you were going next. It's very addictive; however,
when you look at the scores on the world leader boards, you'll probably find
yourself thinking "How the hell do they DO that!?" Fortunately, they
record the top players' games and show you exactly how they did it. Then you
realize just how much time you'll have to sink into the game to come close to
their scores.
-Tom McDaniel