Pac-Man

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This article is about the video game. For other uses, see Pac-Man (disambiguation).
Pac-Man
Image:Pac-man.png
Screenshot of the original arcade version of Pac-Man
Developer(s) Namco
Publisher(s) Namco
Midway
Designer(s) Tōru Iwatani — Game Designer
Shigeo Funaki (舟木茂雄) — Programmer
Toshio Kai (甲斐敏夫) — Sound & Music
Platform(s) Arcade
Release date(s) JPN May 22, 1980[1][2]
NA 1980[3]
Genre(s) Maze
Mode(s) Up to two players, alternating turns
Rating(s) ESRB: E
OFLC: G
Input methods 4-way joystick
Cabinet Standard upright, mini-upright and cocktail
Arcade system Namco Pac-Man
CPU 1x ZiLOG Z80 @ 3.072 MHz
Sound 1× Namco WSG (3-channel mono) @ 3.072 MHz
Display Vertically oriented, 224 × 288, 16 palette colors

Pac-Man (パックマン Pakkuman?) is an arcade game developed by Namco and licensed for distribution in the U.S. by Midway, first released in Japan on May 22, 1980.[1][2] Immensely popular in the United States from its original release to the present day, Pac-Man is universally considered as one of the classics of the medium, virtually synonymous with video games, and an icon of 1980s popular culture. Upon its release, the game became a social phenomenon[4] that sold a bevy of merchandise and also inspired, among other things, an animated television series and music.

When Pac-Man was released, most arcade video games in North America were primarily space shooters such as Space Invaders, Defender, or Asteroids. The most visible minority were sports games that were mostly derivative of Pong. Pac-Man succeeded by creating a new genre and appealing to both genders.[5] Pac-Man is often credited with being a landmark in video game history, and is among the most famous arcade games of all time.[6] The character also appears in more than 30 officially licensed game spin-offs,[7] as well as in numerous unauthorized clones and bootlegs.[8] According to the Davie-Brown Index, Pac-Man has the highest brand awareness of any video game character among American consumers, recognized by 94 percent of them.[9]

Contents

Gameplay

North American Pac-Man title screen, showing the official ghost names

The player controls Pac-Man through a maze, eating pac-dots. When all dots are eaten, Pac-Man is taken to the next stage. Four ghosts (Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde) roam the maze, trying to catch Pac-Man. If a ghost touches Pac-Man, a life is lost. When all lives have been lost, the game ends. Pac-Man is awarded a single bonus life at 10,000 points by default—DIP switches inside the machine can change the required points or disable the bonus life altogether.

Near the corners of the maze are four larger, flashing dots known as power pellets that provide Pac-Man with the temporary ability to eat the ghosts. The ghosts turn deep blue, reverse direction, and usually move more slowly when Pac-Man eats a power pellet. When a ghost is eaten, its eyes return to the ghost home where it is regenerated in its normal color. Blue ghosts flash white before they become dangerous again and the amount of time the ghosts remain vulnerable varies from one board to the next, but the time period generally becomes shorter as the game progresses. In later stages, the ghosts do not change colors at all, but still reverse direction when a power pellet is eaten.

In addition to Pac-dots and power pellets, bonus items, usually referred to as fruits (though not all items are fruits) appear near the center of the maze. These items score extra bonus points when eaten. The items change and bonus values increase throughout the game. Also, a series of intermissions play after certain levels toward the beginning of the game, showing a humorous set of interactions between Pac-Man and Blinky (the red ghost).

Ghosts

A model of the four ghosts

Initially, Pac-Man's enemies were referred to as monsters on the arcade cabinet, but soon became colloquially known as ghosts.

The ghosts are bound by the maze in the same way as Pac-Man, but generally move slightly faster than the player, although they slow down when turning corners and slow down significantly while passing through the tunnels on the sides of the maze (Pac-Man passes through these tunnels unhindered). Pac-Man slows down slightly while eating dots, potentially allowing a chasing ghost to catch him.

Blinky, the red ghost, also speeds up after a certain number of dots are eaten (this number gets lower in higher levels).

Names

The ghosts are introduced during attract mode by the following names and nicknames:

Ghost Color Original Pac Man[10] American Pac-Man
Character (Personality) Translation Nickname Translation Alternate
character		 Alternate
nickname		 Character (Personality) Nickname
Red Oikake (追いかけ) chaser Akabei (赤ベイ) red guy Urchin Macky Shadow Blinky
Pink Machibuse (待ち伏せ) ambusher Pinky (ピンキー) pink guy Romp Micky Speedy Pinky
Cyan Kimagure (気まぐれ) fickle Aosuke (青助) blue guy Stylist Mucky Bashful Inky
Orange Otoboke (お惚け) stupid Guzuta (愚図た) slow guy Crybaby Mocky Pokey Clyde

Behavior

A ghost always maintains its current direction until it reaches an intersection, at which point it can turn left or right. Periodically, the ghosts will reverse direction and head for the corners of the maze (commonly referred to as "scatter mode"), before reverting to their normal behavior. In an interview, Iwatani stated that he had designed each ghost with its own distinct personality in order to keep the game from becoming impossibly difficult or boring to play.[11] The behaviors of each ghost have been exactly determined by disassembling the game.[12]

Despite the seemingly random nature of some of the ghosts, their movements are strictly deterministic, enabling experienced players to devise precise sequences of movements for each level (termed "patterns") that allow them to complete the levels without ever being caught. A later revision of the game code altered the ghosts' behavior, but new patterns were soon developed for that behavior as well. Players have also learned how to exploit other flaws in the ghosts' behavior, including finding places where they can hide indefinitely without moving, and a code bug occasionally allows Pac-Man to pass through a non-blue ghost unharmed. Several patterns have been developed to exploit this bug. The bug arises from the fact that the game logic only performs collision detection on tile granularity. If a ghost and Pac-Man switch tiles simultaneously, a collision isn't detected.[13]

Split-screen

The 256th split-screen level can not be completed because of a software bug.

Pac-Man technically has no ending—as long as the player keeps at least one life, they should be able to continue playing indefinitely. However, because of a bug in the routine that draws the fruit, the right side of the 256th level becomes a garbled mess of text and symbols, rendering the level impossible to pass by legitimate means. Normally, no more than seven fruits are displayed at any one time, but when the internal level counter (stored in a single byte) reaches 255, the subroutine erroneously causes this value to "roll over" to zero before drawing the fruit. This causes the routine to attempt to draw 256 fruits, which corrupts the bottom of the screen and the whole right half of the maze with seemingly random symbols.[14]

Through tinkering, the details of the corruption can be revealed. Some ROMs of the game are equipped with a "rack test" feature that can be accessed through the game's DIP switches. This feature automatically clears a level of all dots as soon as it begins, making it easier to reach the 256th level very quickly, as well as allowing players to see what would happen if the 256th level is cleared (the game loops back to the first level, causing fruits and intermissions to display as before, but with the ghosts retaining their higher speed and invulnerability to power pellets from the later stages). When the rack test is performed in an emulator, a person can more easily analyze the corruption in this level.[14]

Pac-Man and the ghosts can move freely throughout the right half of the screen, barring some fractured pieces of the maze. Despite claims that someone with enough knowledge of the maze pattern could play through the level, it is technically impossible to complete since the graphical corruption eliminates most of the dots on the right half of the maze. A few edible dots are scattered in the corrupted area, and these dots reset when the player loses a life (unlike in the uncorrupted areas), but these are insufficient to complete the level. As a result, the level has been given a number of names, including "the Final Level", "the Blind-Side", and the ending. It is known more generally as a kill screen.

Perfect play

A perfect Pac-Man game occurs when the player achieves the maximum possible score on the first 255 levels (by eating every possible dot, energizer, fruit, and monster) without losing a single life then scoring as many points as possible in the last level.[15][16] As verified by the Twin Galaxies International Scoreboard on July 3, 1999, the first person to achieve the maximum possible score (3,333,360 points) was Billy Mitchell of Hollywood, Florida, who performed the feat in about six hours.[17][16]

In December 1982, an 8-year-old boy, Jeffrey R. Yee, supposedly received a letter from U.S. President Ronald Reagan congratulating him on a worldwide record of 6,131,940 points, a score only possible if the player has passed the Split-Screen Level.[16] Whether or not this event happened as described has remained in heated debate among video-game circles since its supposed occurrence. In September 1983, Walter Day, chief scorekeeper at Twin Galaxies, took the US National Video Game Team on a tour of the East Coast to visit video game players who claimed they could get through the Split-Screen. No video game player could demonstrate this ability. In 1999, Billy Mitchell offered $100,000 to anyone who could provably pass through the Split-Screen Level before January 1, 2000; the prize went unclaimed.[16]

Development

The game was developed primarily by Namco employee Tōru Iwatani over eighteen months. The original title was pronounced pakku-man (パックマン ?) and was inspired by the Japanese onomatopoeic phrase paku-paku taberu (パクパク食べる ?),[18] where paku-paku describes (the sound of) the mouth movement when widely opened and then closed in succession.[19] Although it is often cited that the character's shape was inspired by a pizza missing a slice,[4] he admitted in a 1986 interview that it was a half-truth and the character design also came from simplifying and rounding out the Japanese character for mouth, kuchi (口) as well as the basic concept of eating.[20] Iwatani's efforts to appeal to a wider audience—beyond the typical demographics of young boys and teenagers—eventually led him to add elements of a maze. The result was a game he named Puck Man.

When first launched in Japan by Namco, the game received a lukewarm response, as Space Invaders and other similar games were more popular at the time.[5]

The following year, the game was picked up for manufacture in the United States by Bally division Midway, under the altered title Pac-Man (see Localization, below). American audiences welcomed a breakaway from conventions set by Space Invaders, which resulted in unprecedented popularity and revenue that rivaled its successful predecessor, as even Iwatani was impressed with U.S. sales.[20] The game soon became a worldwide phenomenon within the video game industry, resulting in numerous sequels and merchandising tie-ins. Pac-Man's success bred imitation, and an entire genre of maze-chase video games soon emerged.

The unique game design inspired game publishers to be innovative rather than conservative, and encouraged them to speculate on game designs that broke from existing genres. Pac-Man introduced an element of humor into video games that designers sought to imitate, and appealed to a wider demographic than the teenage boys who flocked to the action-oriented games.

Pac-Man's success in North America took competitors and distributors completely by surprise in 1980. Marketing executives who saw Pac-Man at a trade show prior to release completely overlooked the game (along with the now classic Defender), while they looked to a racing car game called Rally-X as the game to outdo that year.[21] The appeal of Pac-Man was such that the game caught on immediately with the public; it quickly became far more popular than anything seen in the game industry up to that point. Pac-Man outstripped Asteroids as the best-selling arcade game of the time,[22] and would go on to sell over 350,000 units.[23]

Pac-Man went on to become an icon of video game culture during the 1980s, and a lot of Pac-Man merchandise was marketed with the character's image, from t-shirts and toys to hand-held video game imitations and even specially shaped pasta.[24] The Killer List of Videogames lists Pac-Man as the #1 video game on its "Top 10 Most Popular Video games" list.[25] Pac-Man, and other video games of the same general type, are often cited as an identifying cultural experience of Generation X, particularly its older members, sometimes called Baby Busters.

Localization

The North American Pac-Man cabinet design differs significantly from the Japanese Puck Man design.

For the North American market, the name was changed from Puck Man to Pac-Man, as it was thought that vandals would be likely to change the P in "Puck" to an F, forming a common expletive.[26] Puck Man machines can be found throughout Europe.

When Midway released Pac-Man in the United States, the company also redesigned the cabinet's artwork, as the Namco-style artwork was more costly to mass produce. Puck Man was painted overall white featuring multicolored artwork on both sides with cheerful Pac-Man characters in different poses while Pac-Man was painted yellow, with simple artwork on both sides front and back.

World Championship

Carlos Borrego, winner of the Pac-Man World Championship, alongside Namco's mascot

On June 5, 2007, the first Pac-Man World Championship was held in New York City, which brought together ten competitors from eight countries to play the new Pac-Man Championship Edition just prior to its release on Xbox Live Arcade. The top two scorers, Robert Glashuettner of Austria and Carlos Daniel Borrego of Mexico, competed for the championship in a single five-minute round. Borrego was named Pac-Man World Champion and won an Xbox 360 console, specially decorated with Pac-Man artwork and signed by Tōru Iwatani.[27][28]

Ports

Pac-Man is one of the few games to have been consistently rereleased for over two decades. In the 1980s, it was released for the Apple II series, Atari 2600, Atari 5200, the Atari 8-bit computers, IBM Personal Computer, Intellivision, Commodore 64, and Nintendo Entertainment System (1987 and 1990). For handheld games, it was released on the Game Boy (1991), Sega Game Gear (1991), and Neo Geo Pocket Color (1999), as well as Pac-Man: Special Color Edition for the Game Boy Color (1999), Pac-Man Collection for the Game Boy Advance (2001), and an unlockable in Pac 'n Roll for the Nintendo DS. However, it has been most widely distributed in Namco's long-running Namco Museum series, first for the PlayStation in 1996 and for many major consoles released since, as well as the handheld systems Game Boy Advance, PSP, and Nintendo DS. An Xbox 360 port was released via Xbox Live Arcade on August 9, 2006. Pac-Man is also available in its original form as part of the GameTap service. On September 12, 2006, a port was released for play on the popular iPod music player. Also avilable at iPhone and iPod touch, was released on July 9, 2008. There have been efforts to hack the preexisting Ms. Pac-Man cartridge (as well as other variants in the Pac-Man series) to create the original Pac-Man.[29]

Namco has repeatedly rereleased this game to arcades. In 2001, Namco released a 20-Year Reunion cabinet featuring Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga that permits the unlocking of Pac-Man for play. In 2005, Namco released a board openly featuring all three of the games on the 20-Year Reunion board in honor of Pac-Man's 25th Anniversary. The NES version later became a Classic NES Series title for the Game Boy Advance, and was also released for download via the Wii's Virtual Console service in May 2007.

Namco's wireless division, Namco Networks America Inc., released a line of Pac-Man games for cell phones in 2002, starting with the original arcade version and following up with Pac-Man game extensions like Pac-Man Bowling and Pac-Man Pinball. This division also launched a networked game, Ms. Pac-Man For Prizes, in 2004. Pac-Man mobile games are available on both BREW and Java platforms across major cellular carriers, as well as on Palm PDAs and Windows PC phones. There is a port of Pac-Man for Android[30] which can be controlled not only through an Android phone's trackball but through touch gestures or its on-board accelerometer.

Atari 2600 port

Main article: Pac-Man (Atari 2600)
The Atari 2600 Pac-Man only somewhat resembled the original, and its flickering ghosts were widely criticized.

The Atari 2600 version of Pac-Man was developed by programmer Tod Frye and published in 1982 by Atari. It was the first port of the arcade game, Atari being the licensee for the video game console rights. Although it sold 7 million units to a user base of 10 million, this port's quality was widely criticized. Having manufactured 12 million cartridges with the expectation that the game would increase sales of its console, Atari incurred large financial losses from remaining unsold inventory. This was one of the catalysts that led to the North American video game crash of 1983, second only to the home video game version of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial in terms of unsold inventory.

Spin-offs

Sequels

Main article: List of Pac-Man sequels

Ms. Pac-Man

Pac-Man spawned numerous sequels, the most significant of which is Ms. Pac-Man. Originally called Crazy Otto, this unauthorized hack of Pac-Man was created by General Computer Corporation and sold to Midway without Namco's permission. The game features several improvements to and changes from the original Pac-Man, including faster gameplay, more mazes, new intermissions, and moving bonus items. Some consider Ms. Pac-Man to be superior to the original, and even the best in the entire series.[6] Namco sued Midway for exceeding their license. Eventually, Bally Midway struck a deal with Namco to officially license Ms. Pac-Man as a sequel.

Bally Midway spin-offs

Following Ms. Pac-Man, Bally Midway released several unauthorized spin-offs, such as Pac-Man Plus, Jr. Pac-Man, Baby Pac-Man and Professor Pac-Man, resulting in Namco severing business relations with Midway. Some of these other titles were generally considered inferior and unimportant, serving to oversaturate the market with Pac-Man games.[31][4]

Pac-Man Championship Edition

Main article: Pac-Man Championship Edition
Pac-Man Championship Edition (2007)

Twenty-six years after the original Pac-Man, Microsoft worked with Tōru Iwatani and Namco Bandai to produce a remake of the game, Pac-Man Championship Edition. It was released for the Xbox Live Arcade on June 6, 2007.

Clones

Main article: Pac-Man clones

Many unauthorized versions of Pac-Man, such as Funny-Man, were created to profit from Pac-Man's fame.

Non-video games

In 1982, Milton Bradley released a board game based on Pac-Man[32][33] and another based on Ms. Pac-Man.[34] Several other pocket games and a card game were also produced.[35]

A group of students from the computer science department of Simon Fraser University had developed a "life-sized" Pac-Man system, using laptops and mobile phone tracking to track the location of the dots, ghost and Pac-Man. It has become a regular activity of Computer Science Frosh Week, and is usually played in Downtown Vancouver.[36]

A real-life version of Pac-Man has also been played around the Washington square park area of New York, in a game-christened PacManhattan.[37]

Film

In 2004, Crystal Sky Pictures announced they were producing a theatrical film adaption titled Pac-Man: The Movie. It will combine live-action and special effects.[38] The film was included in a $200 million deal with Grosvenor Park.[39]

Fruit machine

In the early 1980s in the UK, JPM released a fruit machine called "Fruit Snappa". Numbers on the reels move "Pac-Man" around a maze, eating prizes. It was released in 1982 and the Jackpot was a £2 Token Jackpot, and when the Prizes were raised the following year, the Jackpot became £3 and the machine was re-released under the name "Fruit Chaser". The Machine was identical in every other way to its predecessor.

Awards

Guinness World Records has awarded the Pac-Man series eight records in Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition 2008, including "First Perfect Pac-Man Game" for Billy Mitchell's July 3, 1999 score; "Most Successful Coin-Operated Game"; and "Largest Pac-Man Game", when, in 2004, students from New York University created Pac-Manhattan, a real life reenactment of the game, in which people dressed as Pac-Man and the four ghosts chased each other around Manhattan city blocks. Each player was teamed with a controller who communicated the player's positions using cellular phones.[40]

References

  1. ^ a b Namco Bandai Games Inc. (2005-06-02). "Bandai Namco press release for 25th Anniversary Edition" (in Japanese). bandainamcogames.co.jp/. http://www.bandainamcogames.co.jp/bnours/hotnews/index.php?id=21. Retrieved on 2007-10-10. "2005年5月22日で生誕25周年を迎えた『パックマン』。 ("Pac-Man celebrates his 25th anniversary on May 22, 2005", seen in image caption)" 
  2. ^ a b Tony Long (2007-10-10 (questionable)). "Oct. 10, 1979: Pac-Man Brings Gaming Into Pleistocene Era". Wired.com. http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007/10/dayintech_1010. Retrieved on 2007-10-10. "[Bandai Namco] puts the date at May 22, 1980 and is planning an official 25th anniversary celebration next year." 
  3. ^ Year 1980 shown on North American Pac-Man title screen.
  4. ^ a b c Green, Chris (June 17, 2002). "Pac-Man". Salon.com. http://www.salon.com/ent/masterpiece/2002/06/17/pac_man/print.html. Retrieved on February 12 2006. 
  5. ^ a b Goldberg, Marty (2002-01-31). ""Pac-Man: The Phenomenon: Part 1"". Classicgaming.com. http://classicgaming.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Articles.Detail&id=249. Retrieved on 2006-07-31. 
  6. ^ a b Parish, Jeremy (2004). ""The Essential 50: Part 10 - Pac Man"". 1UP.com. http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3122102. Retrieved on 2006-07-31. 
  7. ^ "The Legacy of Pac-Man". http://web.archive.org/web/19980121102807/http://www.gamecenter.com/Features/Exclusives/Pacman/. 
  8. ^ "Pac Man Bootleg Board Information". http://users.adelphia.net/~68hc11/bootpac/bootpac.htm. 
  9. ^ Davie Brown Entertainment :: Davie Brown Celebrity Index: Mario, Pac-Man Most Appealing Video Game Characters Among Consumers
  10. ^ DeMaria, Rusel & Wilson, Johnny L. (2003-12-18). High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games (2nd Edition ed.). McGraw-Hill Osborne Media. ISBN 0-07-223172-6. 
  11. ^ Mateas, Michael (2003). "Expressive AI: Games and Artificial Intelligence" (PDF). Proceedings of Level Up: Digital Games Research Conference, Utrecht, Netherlands. http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/~mateas/publications/MateasDIGRA2003.pdf. 
  12. ^ The Pac-Man Dossier, Jamey Pittman Ch. 4
  13. ^ The Pac-Man Dossier, Jamey Pittman Ch. 3
  14. ^ a b Don Hodges. "Pac-Man's Split-screen level analyzed and fixed". http://www.donhodges.com/how_high_can_you_get2.htm. Retrieved on 2008-04-29. 
  15. ^ Pac-Man review at OAFE
  16. ^ a b c d Ramsey, David. "The Perfect Man - How Billy Mitchell became a video-game superstar and achieved Pac-Man bliss." Oxford American, issue 53. Spring 2006.
  17. ^ "Pac-Man at the Twin Galaxies Official Scoreboard". Twin Galaxies. http://www.twingalaxies.com/index.aspx?c=22&pi=2&gi=3229&vi=3365. Retrieved on 2006-07-22. 
  18. ^ Kohler, Chris (2005). Power-Up: How Japanese Video Games Gave the World an Extra Life. Brady Games. ISBN 0-7440-0424-1. 
  19. ^ ""Daijisen Dictionary entry for ぱくぱく (paku-paku), in Japanese"". http://dic.yahoo.co.jp/dsearch?enc=UTF-8&p=%E3%81%B1%E3%81%8F%E3%81%B1%E3%81%8F&dtype=0&dname=0na&stype=0&pagenum=1&index=14705600. Retrieved on 2007-01-27. 
  20. ^ a b Lammers, Susan M. (1986). Programmers at Work: Interviews. New York: Microsoft Press. ISBN 0-914845-71-3. 
  21. ^ Bowen, Kevin (2001). "Game of the Week: Defender". ClassicGaming.com. http://www.classicgaming.com/rotw/defender.shtml. Retrieved on 2006-08-17. 
  22. ^ "Player 2 Stage 4: Two Superstars". The Dot Eaters. http://thedoteaters.com/p2_stage4.php. Retrieved on 2006-08-17. 
  23. ^ Bowen, Kevin (2001). "Game of the Week: Pac-Man". ClassicGaming.com. http://www.classicgaming.com/rotw/pacman.shtml. Retrieved on 2006-08-17. 
  24. ^ "The Pac-Page (including database of Pac-Man merchandise and TV show reference)". http://pac-man.classicgaming.gamespy.com/. Retrieved on 2008-10-24. 
  25. ^ McLemore, Greg. "The Top Coin-Operated Videogames of All Times". Killer List of Videogames. http://www.klov.com/TOP100.html. Retrieved on 2006-07-22. 
  26. ^ Kent, Steve. Ultimate History of Video Games, p.142
  27. ^ Run, Gobble, Gobble, Run: Vying for Pac-Man Acclaim - New York Times
  28. ^ Xbox.com | Calendar of Events - PAC-MAN World Championships
  29. ^ 7800: Pac-Man Completed. - AtariAge Forums
  30. ^ Nguyen, Vincent (28 May 2008). "First LIVE images and videos of FULLSCREEN Android demos!". http://androidcommunity.com/first-live-images-of-fullscreen-android-demo-20080528/. Retrieved on 2008-07-05. 
  31. ^ "Ms. Pac-Man". Killer List of Videogames. http://www.klov.com/M/Ms._Pac-Man.html. Retrieved on 2006-07-31. 
  32. ^ "" Milton Bradley's PAC-MAN Board Game!"". X-Entertainment. 2003-04-14. http://www.x-entertainment.com/articles/0770/. Retrieved on 2006-07-31. 
  33. ^ 1982 Milton Bradley Pac-Man. The Great Game Database.
  34. ^ 1983 Milton Bradley Ms. Pac-Man. The Great Game Database.
  35. ^ Gill, Chuck & Vicki. ""Pac-Man non-video games"". The Virtual Pac-Man Museum. http://www.zutco.com/toy_game_1.htm. Retrieved on 2006-07-31. 
  36. ^ http://www.cs.sfu.ca/news/index.cgi/articles/2007-11-15-1.html
  37. ^ ""PacManhattan website"". http://www.pacmanhattan.com/about.php. Retrieved on 2008-08-21. 
  38. ^ "Crystal Sky, Namco & Gaga are game again". Crystalsky.com. Retrieved on 11 August 2008.
  39. ^ Jaafar, Ali (19 May 2008) "Crystal Sky signs $200 million deal". Variety.com. Retrieved on 4 September 2008.
  40. ^ http://www.pacmanhattan.com/about.php

Further reading

  • Trueman, Doug (November 10, 1999). "The History of Pac-Man". GameSpot. Comprehensive coverage on the history of the entire series up through 1999.
  • Morris, Chris (May 10, 2005). "Pac Man Turns 25". CNN Money.
  • Vargas, Jose Antonio (June 22, 2005). "Still Love at First Bite: At 25, Pac-Man Remains a Hot Pursuit". The Washington Post.
  • Pac-Man Guide at MameWorld. In-depth strategy guide, including basic techniques, chase patterns and ghost behavior.
  • Hirschfeld, Tom. How to Master the Video Games, Bantam Books, 1981. ISBN 0-553-20164-6 Arcade strategy guide to several games including incarnations of Pac-Man. Includes hand drawings of some of the common patterns for use in the arcade Pac-Man.
  • Hirschfeld, Tom. How to Master Home Video Games, Bantam Books, 1982. ISBN 0-553-20195-6 Follow-up guide covering home versions among others.
  • The Pac-Man Dossier. A complete description of ghost behavior and gameplay via source code analysis and studied observation, including additional information on the split screen, the collision bug, and the Namco easter egg.

External links

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