Arcade Game: Pac-Man (1980 Namco/Midway)

An all-time classic arcade game that one should like. It influenced many maze games in later years. Cheats were used in this game since it got tough as it progressed, and the controls did not feel right on an emulator. I did it to show you some of the cut scenes and the items that Pac-Man eats. It was known as Buckman in Japan. Originally released by Namco, it was licensed to Midway for Western release.

Pac-Man was launched by Midway Manufacturing, with permission from Namco, in the USA on October 10, 1980. A total of 96,000 units were made in America.

It is said that when Bally/Midway got the rights to Pac-Man, Namco had four different games available, which were later licensed to Game Plan and Bally/Midway. Game Plan's Ken Anderson mentioned that he and Bally's Dave Marofske flipped a coin to decide who would choose first from the games. Game Plan won and picked a tank game (which they released as "Tank Battalion") instead of Pac-Man. The other game they received was released as "King & Balloon." Bally/Midway took Pac-Man and "Rally-X" for themselves.

Midway made the following changes to the game (compared to the original Namco version):
- The game's name (and its main character) was changed to Pac-Man. Check the Namco Upright version entry, Trivia section, for more information about this name change.
- The names/nicknames for the ghosts in this version are:
- Shadow - "Blinky" (red ghost)
- Speedy - "Pinky" (pink ghost)
- Bashful - "Inky" (cyan ghost)
- Pokey - "Clyde" (orange ghost)
- Note that the pink ghost's nickname is the same as in the Japanese version.
- Unlike the Japanese version, the American version does not have a DIP switch for different ghost names.

The game's popularity in the early 80s was such that it led to a hit song by 'Buckner and Garcia' called 'Pac-Man Fever.' Initially released as a single in December 1981, it eventually reached #9 on the pop charts. Its popularity was so great that the label asked them to make a full album of video game-themed songs. The album 'Pac-Man Fever' was quickly released in January 1982 and featured eight songs based on Donkey Kong, Frogger, Asteroids, Centipede, and other popular games.

The game also sparked a small industry of successful how-to books and strategy guides on how to win the game using patterns with names like the "Bazo's Breaker," "Donut Dazzler," and the "GET pattern" (named after the first letters of the players’ names from Davis, California: George Huang, Ed Bazo, and Tom Fertado).

A Pac-Man unit is seen in the movie 'Getting There,' in the 1982 film 'Jekyll & Hyde - Together Again,' in the 1982 film 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High,' in the 1983 film 'WarGames,' in the 1983 film 'Joysticks,' in the 1983 film 'Koyaanisqatsi - Life out of Balance,' in the 1985 movie 'The Heavenly Kid,' in the 1985 film 'Better Off Dead,' and in the 1986 movie 'The Color of Money.'

A Pac-Man unit also appears in the pilot episode of Season One of 'The A-Team.' It is where Amy (Melinda Culea) meets Murdock (Dwight Schultz) for the first time.
MB (Milton Bradley) released a board game based on this video game in 1982 (Pac-Man Game, 'As Much Fun as the Action Packed Arcade Game of the Same Name'). In this board game, the dots in the maze are shown as white marbles. There are also yellow marbles that represent the power pills in the maze. Additionally, there are two ghost pieces of the same color in the game. The goal is to roll the dice and move your Pac-Man piece around the maze, eating as many marbles as you can using the number on one die, while moving either ghost piece using the number on the other die. There are yellow dots printed on the game board to show the path each character must follow; these dots do not count as spaces. Use the ghosts to try to catch your opponents. When this happens, that opponent goes back home and gives up two marbles to the player who moved the ghost. If a Pac-Man eats a yellow marble, that player has the chance to eat a ghost. When this occurs, the eaten ghost goes back to the ghost area, the player takes two marbles from any opponent, and the player’s yellow marble returns to the game board. The game ends when all white marbles are gone, and the player with the most white marbles (yellow marbles do not count) wins.

'Pac-Man' is also the nickname of the Filipino boxing champion Manny Pacquiao. The two-time world champion is known as the only boxer who has knocked down both future Mexican 'Hall of Famer' Marco Antonio 'Baby Face Assassin' Barrera (knocked out in the 11th round) and Erik 'El Terrible' Morales (knocked out in the 10th round). Pacquiao has been on the top 10 list of the best 'pound-for-pound' fighters in the world.

In the multi-cultural country of Malaysia, 'Pac-Man' is a slang term used to describe men who only date women of different races.

The name 'Pac-Man' has also been given to a nebula, listed as NGC 281. The Pac-Man Nebula is an H II region in the constellation of Cassiopeia. It includes or is close to the open cluster IC 1590, the double star HD 5005, and several Bok globules. The shape of the nebula looks like the famous video game character, Pac-Man. It can be seen in amateur telescopes from dark sky locations.

The Cassini spacecraft (Cassini-Huygens) took images during a close approach to Saturn's moon called 'Mimas', captured by the composite infrared spectrometer (CIRS). The images show the changing temperatures that Mimas experiences. The combined map of these images forms the shape of the character Pac-Man.