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Classic Games (Games)

Pac-Man Turns 25 246

Posted by Zonk from the happy-birthday! dept.
blacklily8 writes "CNN Money is running a story about Pac-Man's 25th birthday. After going on a bit about the history of our favorite pizza sans one slice, the article waxes a bit on why the game was (and is) such a success, with some quotations from Namco's marketing manager: 'He's very colorful, very safe. It's definitely different than the trends going on in games. He just has an appeal.' I think it's because the game is just plain fun, with no need to rely on tech-demo thrills to attract attention. Time to dig out the X-Arcade." It's also *hard*, proving that challenging games are what people have always been looking for.
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Pac-Man Turns 25 More

Pac-Man Turns 25

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  • Pac Man's Obit (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:02PM (#12503840)
    eerro eerro wa wa wa

  • GUComics (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:02PM (#12503842)
    Let's not forget today's GUComics [gucomics.com], who also noticed that Pacman turned 25 :-)

  • There's also a Pac-Man (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Richard Aday ( 816593 ) <`ude.lfu' `ta' `evawria'> on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:02PM (#12503846)
    It's also *hard*, proving that challenging games are what people have always been looking for. There's also a Pac-Man, proving that games with a Pac-Man are what people have always been looking for.

    • Re:There's also a Pac-Man (Score:5, Funny)

      by MightyMartian ( 840721 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:04PM (#12503864) Journal
      I sometimes feel that my life has become heavily modeled on Pacman. It could be worse, of course. It could resemble Space Invaders or Frogger.
      • Fry: Ooo I have one. I'm good at video games and bad at everything else. That's why I wish life were more like a video game.

        Farnsworth: Can you put that in the form of a question?

        Fry: Uh, What if that thing I said?

    • Re:There's also a Pac-Man (Score:5, Insightful)

      by PopeAlien ( 164869 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:11PM (#12503933) Homepage Journal
      It was also very simple.

      Sometimes you just want to pick up a new game and play for a while without learning new complicated things. Heres to the games you can play with a beer in one hand!

      • Re:There's also a Pac-Man (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Teddy Beartuzzi ( 727169 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @08:18PM (#12504881) Journal
        It was also very simple.

        Absolutely. The article is dead wrong on this, it was popular because it *wasn't* hard. You could drop in a quarter and start playing instantly. No instructions to read, no learning which buttons to press, etc.

        It was also hugely popular because it was non-violent. Women loved the game, especially with most games being shooters of some sort.

        • It was also hugely popular because it was non-violent.

          How is Pac-Man "non-violent"?

          The game is based apon eating these little, defensless yellow balls. Oh, and you have four ghosts that can kill you at any moment... errr... well unless you have a power-up that allows you to "eat" them and send them back to their "graveyard".

          (Yea, I know I'm streaching a bit bit here, but you see my point...)
    • Probably most people who still play Pacman do it over a couple of beers with a sad tear in the eye.

      In this fast changing world it is nice to find something familiar from the 80s that you can do without getting busted or hurting that crook knee. I get my kicks by walking down to the hen house and gathering some freshly laid eggs, but I figure most NYC apartments don't feature a hen house.

  • First of a Flood (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Nom du Keyboard ( 633989 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:03PM (#12503850)
    Is this going to be the first of an accelerating deluge of articles as an increasing number of items from the explosive growth in early days of computing turn a quarter century?

    • Wrong (Score:3, Funny)

      by EmbeddedJanitor ( 597831 )
      Nope.

      I think yours is, however the first of a flood of predictions predicting a flood of articles.

  • His real name! (Score:5, Informative)

    by Rantastic ( 583764 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:04PM (#12503866) Journal
    And to think, his original name was PuckMan [vanschip.com].

    • Re:His real name! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by yanos ( 633109 )
      And to think, his original name was PuckMan.

      yep, and they changed it because it was such a obvious target for kiddies who would have scratch part of the 'P'.

      *wink* *wink*

    • Re:His real name! (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Actually, the original name was OuntMuncher.

  • And If you've seen Family Guy (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Man in Spandex ( 775950 ) <prsn DOT kev AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:04PM (#12503867)
    You'll understand how depressed [evilmonkey.tv] he is lately. Poor guy :/

  • Admit it /. editors (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:05PM (#12503878)
    You only posted this story to make use of the pacman icon.
  • ...than to have him as the icon for the "Classic Games" category.

  • Happy Birthday Pac-Man! (Score:3)

    by PhotoBoy ( 684898 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:07PM (#12503890)
    And best of all, Pac-Pix on the Nintendo DS is IMHO one of the most original and fun games I've played in a long time and is a very suitable tribute to the anniversary. It's good to see a 25 year old franchise can still innovate!

  • "Pizza sans one slice"? (Score:5, Funny)

    by anactofgod ( 68756 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:08PM (#12503898)
    I dunno about that. Playing PacMan always made me feel like reaching for some crackers to go with the cheese.

    So, was I the only one to find Ms PacMan, what with saucy bow and full red lips, sexy?

    Really? Me neither.

  • Some people are WAY too much into Pac-Man (Score:3, Funny)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:08PM (#12503901)
    Clikey [airmassive.com]...

  • First Game I ever played... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BronxBomber ( 633404 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:08PM (#12503904)
    and still one of the most addicting, followed closely by Super Mario Bros.
    I am thankful that the article did not mention the atrocity that was the 2600 port, the brutal Saturday morning cartoon, or Pac-Man's bland sequel, Pac-Man Jr.
    Cashing in on the craze nearly ruined the franchise then (its partially responsible for ruining Atari and top 40 radio as we know it), but it gave me endless arcade fun back in "the day".

  • definitely a tech-demo thrill (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Schlemphfer ( 556732 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:09PM (#12503906) Homepage
    From the summary:

    I think it's because the game is just plain fun, with no need to rely on tech-demo thrills to attract attention.

    Twenty-five years ago, Pac-man was a tech-demo thrill. Compare it to Space Invaders, the previous blockbuster game, and it's a night and day difference in graphics, sound, and presentation.

    But apart from that, I think one of the things that really made pac-man was being the first truly funny game to come along. And to invest each of the ghosts with a personality, and even make them chase differently, that's just genius.

    And don't get me started on having the intermission shows, the fantastic sound effects, and the fruit prize intended to lure greedy gamers to their doom. It wasn't until the mid-80s, with Zaxxon, Pole Position, and especially Marble Madness, that Pac-Man lost its luster for me.

    • it's a night and day difference in graphics, sound, and presentation [...] And don't get me started on having the intermission shows, the fantastic sound effects,

      Let me help you have a quick trip down memory lane for a minute:

      .A...e.A..

      beep..beep..bipbipbip...beep

      Seriously, I'm of the Pac Man generation, but I never but mildly enjoy the game: the "great graphics and sounds" were truly crap, and the ghosts had no personalities at all (unless you're talking about some evolution of Pac Man I'm not a
      • Sorry to hear that. This game is so very nostalgic. I had the little countertop version. Played that for hours, to the point where it got so damn fast it was actually impossible to control (from an 8 year old's POV)
      • and the ghosts had no personalities at all

        You never noticed that the ghosts chase you differently?

        The original Pacman was all about A*. That's a pathfinding algorithm (google it, there's lots of material on the web), and it can be weighted so that it not only finds the shortest path to a target, but also takes other things into considerations like the easiest terrain etc. So with Pacman, if memory serves me right, one ghost would just wander around randomly, and the other three ghosts used A* algorithm

    • the intermission shows

      Hey, I wonder. Did Pac-man introduce the cutscene to the gameplaying world, or was there another before it?

      • Did Pac-man introduce the cutscene to the gameplaying world

        No.

        Space Invaders Part II (Taito 1979) has a cut-scene between levels...
        A mothership grabs your "base" and flies around the screen as you "scream" SOS!
    • "And to invest each of the ghosts with a personality, and even make them chase differently, that's just genius."

      Definitely. The way the different ghosts chase you are basically axioms in modern video game AI. You have a chaser, a cut-off, a predictor and a completely random type of enemy. The idea being someone cuts off your back door, another your front door, another guessing your escape route and finally one making up for standard deviation. It's really brilliant and keeps the game-play unique and ch

  • Correct (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "It's also *hard*, proving that challenging games are what people have always been looking for."

    Yes. One game out of thousands proves your point.

    No.

  • I like the anorexic version (Score:5, Funny)

    by winkydink ( 650484 ) * <sv.dude@gmail.com> on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:10PM (#12503917) Homepage Journal
    It's where you move a really skinny Ms Pacman around and force her to eat the dots.

  • Memories... (Score:5, Funny)

    by HungWeiLo ( 250320 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:10PM (#12503919)
    Pacman was my final project for my c++ class in school. And given how anal these types of classes are, I had something like:

    Object
    |-> MovableObject
    |-> Enemy
    |-> Ghost
    |-> AttackingGhost

    AHHH!!

  • So Ms. Pac-Man would be? (Score:3, Funny)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:11PM (#12503927) Homepage Journal
    of legal drinking age?

  • Oh yeah, real safe. (Score:5, Funny)

    by HunterZero ( 102709 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:11PM (#12503930) Homepage
    Sure, he might be safe to you. But to some of us, those who have lived in the pellet villages, the terrible sound of "Wakka wakka wakka" makes us run as the impending consumption of the village begins. I have been there my friends, hiding in the dark corners hoping not to be seen, watching as poor power pellets are gobbled up before my eyes.

    At night, I can sometimes still hear the screams.
  • I thought I was a small child when I first saw Packman, but it looks like I have been at least 13 years old.

    Great game though.

    Too bad I won't see a Free implementation of the game in my lifetime though, unless I am lucky to live to be 103 (and no new copyright term extensions happen).

  • True Story of Pacman (Score:5, Funny)

    by Dante Shamest ( 813622 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:14PM (#12503967)
    Folks, you have been deceived.

    The true story of Pacman has been exposed [vgcats.com].

  • Obligatory Pac Man quote (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:15PM (#12503973)
    Computer games don't affect kids, I mean if Pac Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms, munching pills and listening to repetitive music.
    -- Marcus Brigstocke

  • I got Slashdot Fever! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Tackhead ( 54550 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:16PM (#12503987)
    I got a pocket full of mod points and I'm haded to the web site,
    I don't have a lot of karma but I'm burnin' everything tonight,
    I got a callus on my finger and my shoulder's hurtin' too,
    Gonna hit the F5 'cuz my balls have done turned blue,

    CHORUS:
    I got Slashdot fever (Slashdot fever!)
    It's drivin' my crazy (drivin' me crazy!)
    Slashdot fever (Slashdot fever!)
    Goin' outa my mind! (goin' outa my mind...)

    I've got all the servers down, plus Roblimo's priv-key,
    I don't R the F'in A; it's dupe that links to Roland P.
    I got Goatse in my back door and through the other side,
    'Cuz FreeBSD is dead, and Stephen King just died!

    (Chorus)

    I'm gonna post to the left and troll to the right,
    Say the Dems are too slow, and the 'pubs are outa sight,

    (Guitar solo)

    Now I got 'em on the run and I'm lookin' for the high score,
    Wish the "Funny" counted lots, as I'm just another karma whore,
    I'm really cookin' now, moddin' everything in sight,
    All my points are gone, I'll metamod tomorrow night,

    I got Slashdot fever (Slashdot fever!)
    It's drivin' my crazy (drivin' me crazy!)
    Slashdot fever (Slashdot fever!)
    Goin' outa my mind! (goin' outa my mind...)

  • Its old news, but relevant - a link to the story of Billy Mitchell, who achieved a "perfect game" in Pac Man.

    UGeek [geek.com]

  • Pac Cel! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by generic-man ( 33649 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:27PM (#12504065) Homepage Journal
    If you have Excel 97 or later (sorry, not OpenOffice) then you can play Pacelman [geocities.jp]. It's Pac-Man written in Excel complete with sound effects!

    Imagine being able to run one 25-year-old program entirely within another 20+-year-old program. That's computing with power.

  • Four Ways in Which My Life Is Just Like Pac-Mans (Score:5, Funny)

    by Spoonito ( 849497 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:33PM (#12504116)
    FOUR WAYS IN WHICH MY LIFE IS JUST LIKE PAC-MAN'S
    by John Crownover

    1. Ever-present wail of sirens
    2. Relentlessly pursued by ghosts
    3. Four special pills daily keep ghosts at bay
    4. Occasionally eat some fruit

    (from www.mcsweeneys.net)

  • One of my first memories (Score:3, Insightful)

    by CrazyJim1 ( 809850 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:35PM (#12504132) Journal
    Was when I was 3 years old and my dad hoisted me up to the pac man machine. First thing I did was eat a ghost, and died. I realized then that video games like to rip you off by suprising you with dangers. I also thought that a better video game than pacman could be made by adding buttons that did something.
    • Weird. I had a similar experience as you. When I was 3 years old, my Dad beat the piss out of me for lipping off to him. I didn't eat a ghost, but I did die of brain lesions only to be resucitated later by paramedics. That's when I realized that life rips you off by shitting all over you. To that end, I have devoted my life to becoming a world class game designer, in the hopes that I can create world peace by bringing people together with rap music and tekken-like third person action mmorpgs.
    • My dad used to be a translator. Namco / Midway hired him to interpret for Toru Iwatani when he visited the states, back in the early nineties. I remember my dad came back from that job, showed us his card, and told us he beat the creator at a game of Ms. Pac Man.

      my brother and I immediately fell on our knees. We knew our dad was good, but that good? Then my dad said toru said he doesn't really play the games all that much
  • It's also *hard*, proving that challenging games are what people have always been looking for

    Yup. I hang out on the Gamecube boards on IGN a lot, and they LOVE Ikaruga. It's a REALLY hard space-shooter type game. Also Viewtiful Joe (can be very difficult on adult setting). And the XBox people seem to love the murderous Ninja Gaiden.

  • The memories (Score:4, Funny)

    by zaphod123 ( 219697 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @06:47PM (#12504228) Homepage
    If I had a quarter for everytime that I played Pac Man...

  • Billy Mitchell Would be proud (Score:5, Interesting)

    by 1967mustangman ( 883255 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @07:06PM (#12504376)
    And for those who don't know who Billy Mitchell is......... Billy Mitchell, 33, of Fort Lauderdale scored a perfect 3,333,360 points on a PacMan machine in Weirs Beach, New Hampshire. The perfect score is achieved by playing for six hours, through 256 levels of PacMan, eating every dot, energizer, blue ghost, and piece of fruit on every single level, without dying once. After the 256th level, the game freezes.

    • To clarify (Score:5, Interesting)

      by DogDude ( 805747 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @07:45PM (#12504647)
      Just to clarify... that machine is in a place called Funspot, which is in Weir's Beach (called "the wee-ahs" by the locals). Funspot should be a landmark for every geek, since they're famous as being one of the largest arcades in the country, even to this day. The coolest thing... they keep EVERY game that has come out (including pinball machines), and in working condition. It's absolutely incredible. If you remember an old video game or pinball machine that you loved as a kid, chances are there's a working original version at Funspot. Definitely a road trip destination for any true geek.

  • I Wonder About the Classics (Score:5, Insightful)

    by puppetman ( 131489 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @07:23PM (#12504499) Homepage

    People wax on poetically about all the classic video games (Pac Man, Donkey Kong, Defender, Space Invaders, etc), but I suspect their popularity was due to their novelty rather than their appeal.

    They were fun, colorful, but there's too much meaning being attached to them. It appealed to the future-nerds (myself included).

    If you had the option of being trapped on a deserted island for a year with one video game (and the hardware and electricity to play it), would it be Pac Man (all safe and colorful), or Empire Earth II in all it's glory and challenge?
  • I recently picked up a copy of Namco Museum for the X Boxfor $15.00 at Target. It has Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Dig-Dug, Galaxian, Galalga, Pole Position 1 and 2, and a couple of variants of them that I hadn't seen before. My 18 year old daughter is nuts over it. The 23 year old wishes it had Moon Patrol, a Williams game not Namco, sadly.

  • We Salute You (Score:3, Funny)

    by TheStupidOne ( 872664 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @08:49PM (#12505105)

    Real Video Game Heros!

    Today we salute you, Mr. Moving Half-Eaten Pie. For 25 years you have been trapped in a box, forced to eat pellets all day and run from ghosts. But when you get a hold of one of those Power Pellets, you let those ghosts know who's boss

    SUPERNATURAL MUNCHER~

    So today, we raise an ice cold Bud to you, oh champion of the arcade, for you are, the baddest moving cheese wheel ever.

  • Flash version of Pac Man (Score:3, Informative)

    by Kaimelar ( 121741 ) on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @09:05PM (#12505229) Homepage
    All these posts, and not one link so that I can immediately satisfy my craving to munch dots and run away from ghosts?

    http://www.ebaumsworld.com/pacman.html [ebaumsworld.com]

  • Old video games rule. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by EvilStein ( 414640 ) <spamNO@SPAMpbp.net> on Wednesday May 11, 2005 @10:34PM (#12505787)
    "Sinistar" is still one of the best games out there. Hard as hell, action packed, and a great way to eat through quarters. heh.

    Actually, "Gauntlet" was the best way to eat through quarters - until you realize that the levels start to repeat themselves.

    How many Pac-Man levels were there, anyway? :)
  • "If video games affected us as kids, we'd be running around darkened corridors, scoffing white pills and listening to repetitive electronic music."
    - unknown (mainly because I CBA looking for it...)

  • poor guy (Score:3, Funny)

    by PsiPsiStar ( 95676 ) on Thursday May 12, 2005 @12:42AM (#12506510)
    "Pac-Man Turns 25"

    But he still lost his hair a long time ago. :(

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