98-475: Pac-Man, originally called Puck Man in Japan, is a 1980 maze video game developed and released by Namco for arcades . In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. The player controls Pac-Man , who must eat all the dots inside an enclosed maze while avoiding four colored ghosts. Eating large flashing dots called "Power Pellets" causes
196-411: A Pac-Man telephone. There were more than 500 Pac-Man related products. 7-Eleven sold Pac-Man themed merchandise at its stores since the game's initial popularity in the 1980s. This has included collectible Slurpee and Big Gulp cups. In 2023, 7-Eleven included Pac-Man in its Spring 2023 marketing material including at Speedway and Stripes banner locations, and sold more merchandise around
294-509: A "splendidly reproduced" version of the arcade game, noting a difference in maze layouts for the television screen. It considered the Atari 2600 version to have "much weaker graphics", but to still be one of the best games for that console. In both cases the reviewer felt that the joystick controls were harder to use than those of the arcade machine, and that "attempts to make quick turns are often frustrated". Guinness World Records has awarded
392-612: A 1986 interview he said that this was only half-true, and that the Pac-Man character was also based on him rounding out and simplifying the Japanese character "kuchi" ( 口 ), meaning "mouth". The four ghosts were made to be cute, colorful and appealing, using bright, pastel colors and expressive blue eyes. Iwatani had used this idea before in Cutie Q , which features similar ghost-like characters, and decided to incorporate it into Pac-Man . He
490-462: A Pac-Man-like character is the main villain. In the 2010 film Scott Pilgrim vs. the World , the titular character makes reference to the original Japanese name. The 2018 film Relaxer uses Pac-Man as a strong plot element in the story of a 1999 couch-bound man who attempts to beat the game (and encounters the famous Level 256 glitch) before the year 2000 problem occurs. Various attempts for
588-551: A bonus game, alongside the arcade versions of Dig Dug and Galaga . In 2014, Pac-Man was included in the compilation title Pac-Man Museum for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC, alongside several other Pac-Man games. The NES version is one of 30 games included in the NES Classic Edition . Upon its North American debut at AMOA 1980, the game initially received a mild response. Play Meter magazine previewed
686-408: A ceremonial role in the company's management. In 2005, Namco merged with Bandai to form Bandai Namco Holdings , Japan's third-largest video game developer by revenue and the seventh in the world. Nakamura retained an honorary position in its video game division Namco Bandai Games , now known as Bandai Namco Entertainment. Up to that point, Nakamura was Japan's 68th richest person. He was awarded
784-488: A certain amount of time, blue-colored ghosts flash white before turning back into their normal forms. Eating a certain number of dots in a level causes a bonus item—usually a fruit—to appear underneath the center box; the item can be eaten for bonus points. To the sides of the maze are two "warp tunnels", which allow Pac-Man and the ghosts to travel to the opposite side of the screen. Ghosts become slower when entering and exiting these tunnels. The game increases in difficulty as
882-529: A circular "Cross Ring" that attached to the d-pad to restrict it to four-directional movement. In 2001, Namco released a port of Pac-Man for various Japanese mobile phones , being one of the company's first mobile game releases. The Famicom version of the game was re-released for the Game Boy Advance in 2004 as part of the Famicom Mini series, released to commemorate the 25th anniversary of
980-472: A creature that protected children from monsters by devouring them. Frank Fogleman, the co-founder of Gremlin Industries , believes that the maze-chase gameplay of Pac-Man was inspired by Sega 's Head On (1979), a similar arcade game that was popular in Japan. Iwatani has often claimed that the character of Pac-Man was designed after the shape of a pizza with a missing slice while he was at lunch; in
1078-456: A degree in shipbuilding. Nakamura would found his own company in 1955, Nakamura Seisakusho, Ltd., which produced pop-cork guns and coin-operated mechanical rides for Japanese department store rooftops. In 1974, Nakamura purchased the Japanese division of Atari from Nolan Bushnell , seeing it as a perfect opportunity to get into the market, and were allowed to release the company's games in Japan. His company would be renamed to "Namco" in 1977, and
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#17327725390081176-449: A feature film based on Pac-Man have been planned since the peak of the original game's popularity. Following the release of Ms. Pac-Man , a feature film was being developed, but never reached an agreement. In 2008, a live-action film based on the series was in development at Crystal Sky . In 2022, plans for a live-action Pac-Man film were revived at Wayfarer Studios, based on an idea by Chuck Williams. Maze video game Maze game
1274-402: A hit single, " Pac-Man Fever ", by Buckner & Garcia . The character of Pac-Man has become the official mascot of Bandai Namco Entertainment . The game remains one of the highest-grossing and best-selling games, generating more than $ 14 billion in revenue (as of 2016) and 43 million units in sales combined, and has an enduring commercial and cultural legacy, commonly listed as one of
1372-423: A job with his experience. His father owned a shotgun repair business in a Tokyo department store. In the wake of Japan's economic recovery, Nakamura founded his own company on June 1, 1955, "Nakamura Seisakusho, Ltd.". Beginning with US$ 3,000, he purchased two mechanical rocking horse rides that had to be installed on the roof of a department store due to stiff competition. Each day, Nakamura would clean and repair
1470-404: A more complicated strategy to zero in on him, and Pokey ("Clyde") alternates between chasing him and running away. (The ghosts' Japanese names are おいかけ, chase ; まちぶせ, ambush ; きまぐれ, fickle ; and おとぼけ, playing dumb , respectively.) To break up the tension of constantly being pursued, humorous intermissions between Pac-Man and Blinky were added. The sound effects were among the last things added to
1568-432: A non-violent, cheerful video game that appealed mostly to women, as he believed that attracting women and couples into arcades would potentially make them appear to be much more family friendly in tone. Iwatani began thinking of things that women liked to do in their time; he decided to center his game around eating, basing this on women liking to eat desserts and other sweets. His game was initially called Pakkuman , based on
1666-486: A response to the country's vast market and enthusiasm for arcade games. With the business struggling, Atari Japan was closed in 1974 and put up for auction — Nakamura saw this as the perfect opportunity to get into the video game market and purchased it for US$ 500,000, beating rival Sega 's offer of US$ 50,000. Atari Japan president Hideyuki Nakajima was then promoted as vice president of Nakamura Manufacturing. In 1976, Bushnell sent Nakamura Breakout , which Nakamura saw as
1764-631: A result. These include Taxman (1981) and Snack Attack (1982) for the Apple II, Jawbreaker (1981) for the Atari 8-bit computers, Scarfman (1981) for the TRS-80, and K.C. Munchkin! (1981) for the Odyssey². Namco produced several other maze games, including Rally-X (1980), Dig Dug (1982), Exvania (1992), and Tinkle Pit (1994). Atari sued Philips for creating K.C. Munchkin in
1862-512: A similar style of between-level intermissions in 1979. Pac-Man was a turning point for the arcade video game industry, which had previously been dominated by space shoot 'em ups since Space Invaders (1978). Pac-Man popularized a genre of "character-led" action games , leading to a wave of character action games involving player characters in 1981, such as Nintendo 's prototypical platform game Donkey Kong , Konami 's Frogger and Universal Entertainment 's Lady Bug . Pac-Man
1960-437: A small video game development group within the company and ordered them to study several NEC -produced microcomputers to potentially create games with. One of the first people assigned to this division was a 24-year-old employee named Toru Iwatani . He created Namco's first video game Gee Bee in 1978, which while unsuccessful helped the company gain a stronger foothold in the quickly-growing video game industry. He assisted in
2058-497: A sure-fire hit — to his disappointment, his company was only allowed to distribute the game and was forbidden from exclusive manufacturing rights. Nakamura, in response, requested for as many units possible. Following his company's distribution of Breakout in Japan, Nakamura noticed a surge of counterfeit units across the country. After some investigation, he had found that a yakuza clan had been creating them, and met with their leader to request they cease production. In response,
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#17327725390082156-437: A surplus amount of PDA-80 microcomputers from NEC and instructed his employees to analyze the hardware to intentionally create video games. Namco's first in-house game was Gee Bee (1978), designed by Toru Iwatani . Namco's first major success in arcades was Galaxian (1979), credited as one of the first video games to use RGB . The game's success led to Nakamura approaching Midway Games to release some of their games in
2254-399: A techno album which consists mostly of samples from the game. The character appears in the music video for Bloodhound Gang 's " Mope ", released in 2000. Here, the character is portrayed as a cocaine addict. On July 20, 2020, Gorillaz and Schoolboy Q , released a track entitled " Pac-Man " as a part of Gorillaz' Song Machine series to commemorate the game's 40th anniversary , with
2352-465: A total of 2.5 million copies sold as of 2008. More than one million copies of the group's Pac-Man Fever album (1982) were sold. In 1982, "Weird Al" Yankovic recorded a parody of " Taxman " by the Beatles as "Pac-Man". It was eventually released in 2017 as part of Squeeze Box: The Complete Works of "Weird Al" Yankovic . In 1992, Aphex Twin (with the name Power-Pill) released Pac-Man ,
2450-614: A total of more than $ 12 billion in revenue. Pac-Man was awarded "Best Commercial Arcade Game" at the 1982 Arcade Awards . Pac-Man also won the Video Software Dealers Association 's VSDA Award for Best Videogame. In 2001, Pac-Man was voted the greatest video game of all time by a Dixons poll in the UK. The Killer List of Videogames listed Pac-Man as the most popular game of all time. The list aggregator site Playthatgame currently ranks Pac-Man as
2548-688: A version for the Nintendo Famicom in 1984 as one of the console's first third-party titles, as well as a port for the MSX computer. The Famicom version was later released in North America for the Nintendo Entertainment System by Tengen , a subsidiary of Atari Games . Tengen produced an unlicensed version of the game in a black cartridge shell, released during a time when Tengen and Nintendo were in disagreements over
2646-935: A way of temporarily turning the tables on pursuers. While the character in a maze would have a limited view, the player is able to see much or all of the maze. Maze chase games are a specific subset of the overheard perspective. They're listed in a separate section. 1973 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1999 2003 2008 2009 2014 Differentiated from more diversified first-person party-based RPGs , dungeon crawlers , first-person shooters , and walking sims by their primary emphasis on navigation of largely abstracted maze environments often with little to no texture mapping or in-game objects and props. 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1987 1988 1989 1991 1993 1994 1995 1996 1998 2001 2017 This subgenre
2744-556: A year later would release its first video game produced in-house. Under Nakamura's leadership, Namco would become one of the most dominant video game companies in Japan, alongside Nintendo , Sega and Konami . Nakamura purchased Japanese film studio Nikkatsu in 1993 and be involved with many of their films, being credited for several of them. He also led Namco to begin maintaining arcade centers and amusement parks across Japan and soon overseas, such as Wonder Eggs in Tokyo, and to purchase
2842-404: Is a video game genre description first used by journalists during the 1980s to describe any game in which the entire playing field is a maze . Quick player action is required to escape monsters, outrace an opponent, or navigate the maze within a time limit. After the release of Namco's Pac-Man in 1980, many maze games followed its conventions of completing a level by traversing all paths and
2940-569: Is a hidden extra in the arcade game Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga - Class of 1981 (2001). A similar cabinet was released in 2005 that featured Pac-Man as the centerpiece. Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures (1993) and Pac-Man World 2 (2002) have Pac-Man as an unlockable extra. Alongside the Xbox 360 remake Pac-Man Championship Edition , it was ported to the Nintendo 3DS in 2012 as part of Pac-Man & Galaga Dimensions . The 2010 Wii game Pac-Man Party and its 2011 3DS remake include Pac-Man as
3038-532: Is exemplified by Namco 's Pac-Man (1980), where the goal is to clear a maze of dots while being pursued. Pac-Man spawned many sequels and clones which, in Japan, are often called "dot eat games". Some other maze chases don't feature dots, and the goal is to clear the maze of the pursuers themselves (e.g., Pengo , Guzzler , Jungler ). 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 Masaya Nakamura (businessman) Masaya Nakamura ( 中村 雅哉 , Nakamura Masaya , December 24, 1925 – January 22, 2017)
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3136-716: Is named for a cosmetic resemblance to the character, in the mathematical study of the Mandelbrot set . The game's popularity has led to "Pac-Man" being adopted as a nickname, such as by boxer Manny Pacquiao and the American football player Adam Jones . In 2012, the Pac-Man was inducted into the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City. This addition was part of an initial selection (Wave 1) of fourteen video games . On August 21, 2016, in
3234-581: Is often considered "the father of Pac-Man", and credited as one of the instrumental people behind Japan's video game industry. According to RePlay magazine, many considered Nakamura to be "the single most important person in coin-op" by 1990. Nakamura had also pushed Namco to be one of the first third-party developers for the Nintendo Family Computer , which was soaring in popularity. In 1985, Warner Communications split Atari into two companies and sold off each of their shares. Nakamura
3332-501: Is the best-selling arcade game of all time, with total estimated earnings ranging from 10 billion coins and $ 3.5 billion ($ 7.7 billion adjusted for inflation) to $ 6 billion ( $ 19 billion adjusted for inflation) in arcades. Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man also topped the US RePlay cocktail arcade cabinet charts for 23 months, from February 1982 through 1983 up until February 1984 . The Atari 2600 version of
3430-431: The 2016 Summer Olympics closing ceremony , during a video which showcases Tokyo as the host of the 2020 Summer Olympics , a small segment shows Pac-Man and the ghosts racing and eating dots on a running track . A wide variety of Pac-Man merchandise have been marketed with the character's image. By 1982, Midway had about 95-105 licensees selling Pac-Man merchandise, including major companies, such as AT&T selling
3528-690: The Atari 8-bit computer version sold 42,359 copies in 1986 and 1990, Thunder Mountain's 1986 budget release for home computers received a Diamond certification from the Software Publishers Association in 1989 for selling over 500,000 copies, and mobile phone ports have sold over 30 million paid downloads as of 2010. II Computing also listed the Atarisoft port tenth on the magazine's list of top Apple II games as of late 1985, based on sales and market-share data. As of 2016, all versions of Pac-Man are estimated to have grossed
3626-740: The Game Link Cable peripheral. A version for the Game Gear was released a year later, which likewise enabled support for multiplayer. In celebration of the game's 20th anniversary in 1999, Namco re-released the Game Boy version for the Game Boy Color , bundled with Pac-Attack and titled Pac-Man: Special Color Edition . The same year, Namco and SNK co-published a port for the Neo Geo Pocket Color , which came with
3724-615: The Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition 2008 , awarded in 2010. In 2009, Guinness World Records listed Pac-Man as the most recognizable video game character in the United States, recognized by 94% of the population, above Mario who was recognized by 93% of the population. In 2015, The Strong National Museum of Play inducted Pac-Man to its World Video Game Hall of Fame . The Pac-Man character and game series became an icon of video game culture during
3822-498: The Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 as part of its Arcade Archives series, marking the first two Namco games to be included as part of the series. Pac-Man is included in many Namco compilations , including Namco Museum Vol. 1 (1995), Namco Museum 64 (1999), Namco Museum Battle Collection (2005), Namco Museum DS (2007), Namco Museum Essentials (2009), and Namco Museum Megamix (2010). In 1996, it
3920-551: The Pac-Man series eight records in Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition 2008 , including "Most Successful Coin-Operated Game". On June 3, 2010, at the NLGD Festival of Games, the game's creator, Toru Iwatani, officially received the certificate from Guinness World Records for Pac-Man having had the most "coin-operated arcade machines" installed worldwide: 293,822. The record was set and recognized in 2005 and mentioned in
4018-407: The greatest video games of all time . Pac-Man is an action maze chase video game; the player controls the eponymous character through an enclosed maze. The objective of the game is to eat all of the dots placed in the maze while avoiding four colored ghosts—Blinky (red), Pinky (pink), Inky (cyan), and Clyde (orange)—who pursue Pac-Man. When Pac-Man eats all of the dots, the player advances to
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4116-623: The " Order of the Rising Sun , Gold Rays with Rosette" by the Japanese government at the 2007 Spring Conferment of Decorations for his contributions to the Japanese entertainment industry,. and was one of the inaugural inductees in the International Video Game Hall of Fame in 2010 as one of the five video game pioneers, acknowledging his induction via a video feed. He was inducted alongside Pac-Man to coincide with
4214-475: The "P" in Puck Man to an "F". Masaya Nakamura chose to rename it to Pac-Man , as he felt it was closer to the game's original Japanese title of Pakkuman . In Europe, the game was released under both titles. After Puck Man was ruled out but before Pac-Man was decided upon, early American promotional material used the name Snapper . When Namco presented Pac-Man and Rally-X to potential distributors at
4312-431: The #53rd top game of all-time & game of the year. Pac-Man is considered by many to be one of the most influential video games of all time. The game established the maze chase game genre, was the first video game to make use of power-ups , and the individual ghosts have deterministic artificial intelligence (AI) that reacts to player actions. Pac-Man is considered one of the first video games to have demonstrated
4410-505: The 1980 AMOA tradeshow in November, executives believed that Rally-X would be the best-selling game of that year. According to Play Meter magazine, both Pac-Man and Rally-X received mild attention at the show. Namco had initially approached Atari to distribute Pac-Man , but Atari refused the offer. Midway Manufacturing subsequently agreed to distribute both Pac-Man and Rally-X in North America, announcing their acquisition of
4508-466: The 1980s . The game has inspired various real-life recreations, involving real people or robots. One event called Pac-Manhattan set a Guinness World Record for "Largest Pac-Man Game" in 2004. The business term " Pac-Man defense " in mergers and acquisitions refers to a hostile takeover target that attempts to reverse the situation and instead acquire its attempted acquirer, a reference to Pac-Man ' s energizers. The "Pac-Man renormalization "
4606-562: The 1980s, including Galaga (1981), Ms. Pac-Man (1982), Dig Dug (1982), Pole Position (1982), Xevious (1983) and The Tower of Druaga (1984). Unlike rival companies, notably Nintendo, Nakamura tested each of Namco's video games before they were released, sometimes for up to 23 hours at a time. Nakamura is considered to have been one of the first to identify the potential of "screen addiction" due to how much younger people would play Pac-Man and his company's other games. Because of his vision in developing arcade games, Nakamura
4704-513: The 1990s, notably Ridge Racer (1993) and Tekken (1994). After Namco purchased Japanese film studio Nikkatsu in 1993, Nakamura became involved with in film production and credited as executive producer in a number of their films. He was recognized by the Japanese Minister of International Trade and Industry in 1997 for his contributions to the advancement of computer entertainment. Nakamura helped assist Tetsuya Takahashi with
4802-574: The Aladdin's Castle chain from Bally . Nakamura would also assist in the formation of Japanese developer Monolith Soft , and become the chairman of the Japan Amusement Machine and Marketing Association (JAMMA). In 2002, he would step down as Namco's CEO, instead taking on a ceremonial role in the company's management. After Namco merged with Bandai in 2005 to form Bandai Namco Holdings , Nakamura would retain an honorary position in
4900-597: The CEO of Tengen . In 1989, Namco had to renew the preferential terms they had for being one of Nintendo's first third-party licensees — when Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi refused to renew them, Nakamura grew furious and publicly denounced Nintendo for monopolistic practices, boasting that his company would shift all home console development to the Sega Mega Drive . In 1990, Nakamura resigned as president of Namco, passing it on to Tadashi Manabe and assume his role as
4998-658: The Famicom; this version was released in North America and Europe under the Classic NES Series label. Namco Networks released Pac-Man for BREW mobile devices in 2005. The arcade original was released for the Xbox Live Arcade service in 2006, featuring achievements and online leaderboards. In 2009 a version for iOS devices was published; this release was rebranded as Pac-Man + Tournaments in 2013, featuring new mazes and leaderboards. The NES version
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#17327725390085096-553: The Ghostly Adventures aired on Disney XD from June 15, 2013 to May 25, 2015. The original Pac-Man game plays a key role in the plot of Ernest Cline 's video game-themed science fiction novel Ready Player One . The Buckner & Garcia song " Pac-Man Fever " (1981) went to No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, and received a Gold certification for more than 1 million records sold by 1982, and
5194-559: The Japanese character for mouth, kuchi ( Japanese : 口 ). The in-game characters were made to be cute and colorful to appeal to younger players. The original Japanese title of Puck Man was derived from the Japanese phrase paku paku taberu , which refers to gobbling something up; the title was changed to Pac-Man for the North American release. Pac-Man was a widespread critical and commercial success, leading to several sequels, merchandise, and two television series, as well as
5292-467: The Japanese onomatopoeia term "paku paku taberu", referencing the mouth movement of opening and closing in succession. The game that later became Pac-Man began development in early 1979 and took a year and five months to complete, the longest for a video game up to that point. Iwatani enlisted the help of nine other Namco employees to assist in production, including composer Toshio Kai, programmer Shigeo Funaki, and hardware engineer Shigeichi Ishimura. Care
5390-451: The US by 1982. Pac-Man related merchandise products included bumper stickers , jewellery , accessories (such as a $ 20,000 Ms. Pac-Man choker with 14 karat gold), bicycles , breakfast cereals , popsicles , t-shirts , toys and pasta. Lego released an exclusive set of a PAC-MAN arcade machine for their Lego Icons line. A Lego version of PAC-MAN, Clyde, and Blinky are featured on
5488-428: The US, before it caught on upon release there. Some arcades purchased entire rows of Pac-Man cabinets. It became a nationwide success. Upon release in 1980, it was earning about $ 8.1 million per week in the United States. Within one year, more than 100,000 arcade units had been sold which grossed more than $ 1 billion in quarters . It overtook Atari 's Asteroids (1979) as the best-selling arcade game in
5586-553: The United States, which they agreed to. Pac-Man (1980) became Namco's biggest success, selling over 400,000 arcade units in the United States alone and becoming one of the highest-grossing video games of all time. It was designed by one of Namco's new hires, Toru Iwatani , with Nakamura suggesting the game be named after the sound the character made while eating, "paku paku". In a 1983 interview, Nakamura said that he "never thought it would be this big". Under Nakamura's leadership, Namco would produce several successful games throughout
5684-429: The annual Game Machine charts, dethroning Space Invaders (1978) which had topped the annual charts for two years in a row and leading to a shift in the Japanese market away from space shooters towards action games featuring comical characters. Pac-Man was Japan's fourth highest-grossing arcade game of 1981. In North America, Midway had limited expectations prior to release, initially manufacturing 5,000 units for
5782-464: The case Atari, Inc. v. North American Philips Consumer Electronics Corp. , leading to Munchkin being pulled from store shelves under court order. No major competitors emerged to challenge Pac-Man in the maze subgenre. Pac-Man inspired 3D variants of the concept, such as Monster Maze (1982), Spectre (1982), and early first-person shooters such as MIDI Maze (1987; which had similar character designs). John Romero credited Pac-Man as
5880-520: The company chairman. Manabe resigned in 1992 due to health problems, leading to Nakamura returning as his role of president until 2002. Nakamura became chairman of the Japan Amusement Machine and Marketing Association (JAMMA), and led Namco to begin construction and maintenance of large-scale amusement parks across Japan, such as Wonder Eggs in Tokyo and Namja Town in Sunshine City. Namco would establish several high-profile franchises throughout
5978-422: The company's video game branch. Nakamura is credited as a pioneer in the video game industry for his accomplishments, and one of the most important figures in video game history. In 2007, he was awarded the " Order of the Rising Sun , Gold Rays with Rosette" by the Japanese government for his contributions to video games, and was inducted into the International Video Game Hall of Fame in 2010. His influence on
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#17327725390086076-539: The country, and surpassed the film Star Wars: A New Hope (1977) with more than $ 1 billion in revenue. Pac-Man was the United States' highest-grossing arcade game of 1981 , and second highest game of 1982 . By 1982, it was estimated to have had 30 million active players across the United States. The game's success was partly driven by its popularity among female audiences, becoming "the first commercial videogame to involve large numbers of women as players" according to Midway's Stan Jarocki, with Pac-Man being
6174-558: The favorite coin-op game among female gamers through 1982. Among the nine arcade games covered by How to Win Video Games (1982), Pac-Man was the only one with females accounting for a majority of players. The number of arcade units sold had tripled to 400,000 by 1982, receiving an estimated total of between seven billion coins and $ 6 billion. In a 1983 interview, Nakamura said that though he did expect Pac-Man to be successful, "I never thought it would be this big." Pac-Man
6272-494: The flickering effect of the ghosts. However, it was a commercial success, selling over seven million copies. Atari released versions for the Intellivision , VIC-20 , Commodore 64 , Apple II , IBM PC compatibles , TI-99/4A , ZX Spectrum , and the Atari 8-bit computers . A port for the Atari 5200 was released in 1983, a version that is considered as a significant improvement over the Atari 2600 version. Namco released
6370-623: The formation of Japanese developer Monolith Soft in 1999, where Namco would publish their Xenosaga series. The same year on April 1, Nakamura was appointed chairman of the Multimedia Content Development Association (MCDA). Following the unveil of the Xbox , Nakamura formed an alliance with Microsoft to produce games for the console, with Namco becoming one of the first Japanese developers to support it. Nakamura stepped down as CEO of Namco in 2002, taking on
6468-442: The four corners of the maze are large flashing "energizers" or "power pellets". When Pac-Man eats one, the ghosts turn blue with a dizzied expression and reverse direction. Pac-Man can eat blue ghosts for bonus points; when a ghost is eaten, its eyes make their way back to the center box in the maze, where the ghost "regenerates" and resumes its normal activity. Eating multiple blue ghosts in succession increases their point value. After
6566-410: The game and called it "a cute game which appears to grow on players, something which cute games are not prone to do," saying that there's "more to the game than at first appears" but criticized the sound as a drawback, saying it is "good for awhile, then becomes annoying." Upon release, the game exceeded expectations with wide critical and commercial success. When it was first released in Japan, Pac-Man
6664-420: The game as well as rebranding some of its products after the ghosts. This included its house blend coffee (Clyde's Coffee Blend), two Slurpee flavors (Blinky's Cherry & Inky's Blueberry Raz), and a special limited time only cappuccino flavor (Pinky's Strawberry White Chocolate Cappuccino), the latter of which came out pink to match the ghost. Pac-Man themed merchandise sales had exceeded $ 1 billion in
6762-592: The game sold over 8 million copies, making it the console's best-selling title . In addition, Coleco 's tabletop mini-arcade unit sold over 1.5 million units in 1982, the Pac-Man Nelsonic Game Watch sold more than 500,000 units the same year, the Family Computer (Famicom) version and its 2004 Game Boy Advance re-release sold a combined 598,000 copies in Japan, the Atari 5200 version sold 35,011 cartridges between 1986 and 1988,
6860-428: The game that had the biggest influence on his career; Wolfenstein 3D includes a Pac-Man level from a first-person perspective. Many post- Pac-Man titles include power-ups that briefly turn the tables on the enemy. The game's artificial intelligence inspired programmers who later worked for companies like Bethesda . Reviewing home console versions in 1982, Games magazine called the Atari 5200 implementation
6958-524: The game was done in June, followed by a nationwide release in July. Eyeing the game's success in Japan, Namco initialized plans to bring the game to the international market, particularly the United States. Before showing the game to distributors, Namco America made a number of changes, such as altering the names of the ghosts. Another was the game's title, as executives at Namco were worried that vandals would change
7056-556: The game, created by Toshio Kai. In a design session, Iwatani noisily ate fruit and made gurgling noises to describe to Kai how he wanted the eating effect to sound. Upon completion, the game was titled Puck Man , based on the working title and the titular character's distinct hockey puck-like shape. Location testing for Puck Man began on May 22, 1980, in Shibuya, Tokyo. Non-gamers responded well to it, finding it easy to learn, while arcade regulars were not impressed. A private showing for
7154-523: The ghosts be red and thus indistinguishable from one another. Iwatani believed that the ghosts should be different colors, and he received unanimous support from his colleagues for this idea. The ghosts were programmed to have their own distinct personalities, so as to keep the game from becoming too boring or impossibly difficult to play. Each ghost's name gives a hint to its strategy for tracking down Pac-Man: Shadow ("Blinky") always chases Pac-Man, Speedy ("Pinky") tries to get ahead of him, Bashful ("Inky") uses
7252-443: The ghosts to temporarily turn blue, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points. Game development began in early 1979, directed by Toru Iwatani with a nine-man team. Iwatani wanted to create a game that could appeal to women as well as men, because most video games of the time had themes of war or sports. Although the inspiration for the Pac-Man character was the image of a pizza with a slice removed, Iwatani has said he rounded out
7350-481: The industry would have him considered "the father of Pac-Man". Nakamura died on January 22, 2017, at age 91, which was announced a week later by Bandai Namco out of respect for his family's privacy. Masaya Nakamura was born on December 24, 1925, in Tokyo. He graduated from the Yokohama Institute of Technology in 1948 with a degree in shipbuilding, however following World War II he was unable to secure
7448-451: The issue — Nakamura claimed that Bushnell was drunk and unable to listen to him, leading to him having his company produce Breakout units without Atari's permission. Breakout was an unprecedented success for his company, becoming one of the most successful video game manufacturers in Asia alongside Sega and Taito. This would lead to Atari taking legal action in the 1970s. Nakamura's company
7546-605: The latter's stance on quality control for its consoles; this version was re-released by Namco as an official title in 1993, featuring a new cartridge label and box. The Famicom version was released for the Famicom Disk System in 1990 as a budget title for the Disk Writer kiosks in retail stores. The same year, Namco released a port of Pac-Man for the Game Boy , which allowed for two-player co-operative play via
7644-505: The man said he would "suppress" Nakamura's competitors and make him Japan's largest video game developer. Nakamura declined, fearing it would lead to the downfall of both his company and the industry as a whole. As a counter-measure, Nakamura requested additional Breakout units from Atari as soon as possible. Nakamura flew to London to meet with Bushnell at the Music Operators Association (MOA) tradeshow to discuss
7742-475: The manufacturing rights on November 22 and releasing them in December. Pac-Man was ported to several home video game systems and personal computers; the most infamous of these is the 1982 Atari 2600 conversion , designed by Tod Frye and published by Atari, Inc. This version of the game was widely criticized for its inaccurate portrayal of the arcade version and for its peculiar design choices, most notably
7840-460: The music video depicting the band's frontman, 2-D , playing a Gorillaz-themed Pac-Man arcade game. The Pac-Man character appears in the film Pixels (2015), with Denis Akiyama playing series creator Toru Iwatani. Iwatani makes a cameo at the beginning of the film as an arcade technician. Pac-Man is referenced and makes an appearance in the 2017 film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and
7938-572: The next level. Levels are indicated by fruit icons at the bottom of the screen. In between levels are short cutscenes featuring Pac-Man and Blinky in humorous, comical situations. If Pac-Man is caught by a ghost, he loses a life; the game ends when all lives are lost. Each of the four ghosts has its own unique artificial intelligence (A.I.), or "personality": Blinky gives direct chase to Pac-Man; Pinky and Inky try to position themselves in front of Pac-Man, usually by cornering him; and Clyde switches between chasing Pac-Man and fleeing from him. Placed near
8036-541: The player progresses: the ghosts become faster, and the energizers' effect decreases in duration, eventually disappearing entirely. An integer overflow causes the 256th level to load improperly, rendering it impossible to complete. This is known as a kill screen . After acquiring the struggling Japanese division of Atari in 1974, video game developer Namco began producing its own video games in-house, as opposed to licensing them from other developers and distributing them in Japan. Company president Masaya Nakamura created
8134-417: The potential of characters in the medium ; its title character was the first original gaming mascot , it increased the appeal of video games with female audiences , and it was gaming's first broad licensing success. It is often cited as the first game with cutscenes (in the form of brief comical interludes about Pac-Man and Blinky chasing each other), though actually Space Invaders Part II employed
8232-521: The production of two sequels, Bomb Bee and Cutie Q , both released in 1979. The Japanese video game industry had surged in popularity with games such as Space Invaders and Breakout , which led to the market being flooded with similar titles from other manufacturers in an attempt to cash in on the success. Iwatani felt that arcade games only appealed to men for their crude graphics and violence, and that arcades in general were seen as seedy environments. For his next project, Iwatani chose to create
8330-655: The rides if needed, and greeted the mothers of the children when they arrived. His company was renamed to "Nakamura Manufacturing Co., Limited." in 1959. Following this, Nakamura would make a deal with the Mitsukoshi department store chain in the early 1960s to install a ride on the rooftop of one of their stores. This ride, named the "Roadaway Race", was popular with children and led to Mitsukoshi commissioning Nakamura and his company to install similar rides for all of their stores. Nakamura's company would continue to design similar mechanical games for other stores — one such game
8428-472: The time; this technological accomplishment allowed Iwatani to greatly enhance his game with bright pastel colors, which he felt would help attract players. The idea for energizers was a concept Iwatani borrowed from Popeye the Sailor , a cartoon character that temporarily acquires superhuman strength after eating a can of spinach; it is believed that Iwatani was partly inspired by a Japanese children's story about
8526-456: The top of the machine, with a minifigure playing a miniature version of the machine. The Pac-Man animated television series produced by Hanna–Barbera aired on ABC from 1982 to 1983. It was the highest-rated Saturday morning cartoon show in the US during late 1982. A computer-generated animated series produced by Bandai Namco Games , 41 Entertainment , Arad Productions , OLM Digital and Sprite Animation Studios titled Pac-Man and
8624-591: The video game, Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy . The game, the character, and the ghosts all appear in the film Wreck-It Ralph , as well as the sequel Ralph Breaks the Internet . In Sword Art Online The Movie: Ordinal Scale , Kirito and his friends beat a virtual reality game called PAC-Man 2026 , which is loosely based on Pac-Man 256 . In the Japanese tokusatsu film Kamen Rider Heisei Generations: Dr. Pac-Man vs. Ex-Aid & Ghost with Legend Riders ,
8722-436: Was Periscope (1965), claimed to be the first game he designed himself. By the early 1970s, Nakamura and his company had shifted away from mechanical amusement rides to coin-operated arcades games. Many of these were racing games that used electro-mechanical projection technology, such as Racer (1970), Formula-X (1975) and F-1 (1976). In 1972, Nakamura visited the Japanese branch of Atari, formed by Nolan Bushnell as
8820-407: Was a Japanese businessman and the founder of Namco . He was the company's president up until 2002, where he took a ceremonial role in its management. Following the formation of Bandai Namco Holdings , Nakamura would retain an honorary position in the video game division, Bandai Namco Entertainment . Born in Tokyo, Nakamura graduated from the Yokohama Institute of Technology in 1948, having earned
8918-453: Was given 60% of the shares for Atari Games , the arcade division, and gave Nakamura the right to distribute its games in Japan, such as Marble Madness and Hard Drivin' . He had hoped the acquisition would develop a strong relation between the two companies like it once had in the 1970s, however he instead had a distaste towards it and sold off his stake to Hideyuki Nakajima in 1987, who would resign as president of Namco America and become
9016-401: Was initially only a modest success; Namco's own Galaxian (1979) had quickly outdone the game in popularity because its predominately male player base was familiar with its shooting gameplay as opposed to Pac-Man ' s cute characters and maze-chase theme. Pac-Man eventually became very successful in Japan, where it went on to be Japan's highest-grossing arcade game of 1980 according to
9114-481: Was inspired by the television series Casper the Friendly Ghost and the manga Obake no Q-Taro . Ghosts were chosen as the game's main antagonists because they were used as villainous characters in animation. The idea for the fruit bonuses was based on graphics displayed on slot machines, which often use symbols such as cherries and bells. Originally, Namco president Masaya Nakamura had requested that all of
9212-451: Was one of the first popular non-shooting action games, defining key elements of the genre such as "parallel visual processing" which requires simultaneously keeping track of multiple entities, including the player's location, the enemies, and the energizers. Maze games became popular on home computers after the release of Pac-Man . Some of them appeared before official ports and garnered more attention from consumers, and sometimes lawyers, as
9310-635: Was re-released for arcades as part of Namco Classic Collection Vol. 2 , alongside Dig Dug , Rally-X and special "Arrangement" remakes of all three titles. Microsoft included Pac-Man in Microsoft Return of Arcade (1995) as a way to help attract video game companies to its Windows 95 operating system. Namco released the game in the third volume of Namco History in Japan in 1998. The 2001 Game Boy Advance compilation Pac-Man Collection compiles Pac-Man , Pac-Mania , Pac-Attack and Pac-Man Arrangement onto one cartridge. Pac-Man
9408-648: Was released for the Wii Virtual Console in 2007. A Roku version was released in 2011, alongside a port of the Game Boy release for the 3DS Virtual Console . Pac-Man was one of four titles released under the Arcade Game Series brand, which was published for the Xbox One , PlayStation 4 and PC in 2016. In 2021, according to Nintendo Direct , it was announced that Hamster Corporation would release Pac-Man , along with Xevious , for
9506-568: Was renamed to Namco in 1977, an acronym of their older name. Nakamura would also open up a division in the United States as requested by Nakajima, Namco America, located a few blocks away from the Atari headquarters in Sunnyvale, California — Nakajima would become the president of the company. Impressed by the success of the Atari Japan acquisition, Nakamura was interested in his company creating his own arcade games in-house. He purchased
9604-407: Was taken to make the game appeal to a "non-violent" audience, particularly women, with its usage of simple gameplay and cute, attractive character designs. When the game was being developed, Namco was underway with designing Galaxian , which used a then-revolutionary RGB color display, allowing sprites to use several colors at once instead of using colored strips of cellophane that was commonplace at
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