 Ms. Pac-man 5200 release Developer/US publisher: Atari Ms. Pac-man 400/800 release Developer/US publisher: Atari Those who bought the new Atari systems during the era of the crash may have infinitely regretted their purchases, but at least they got the only decent home conversions of the Pac games at the time. Ms. Pac was very much like the arcade version for these systems except the playfield was horizantal.  Pac &
PalArcade release Developer: Namco US publisher: Atari The Pac-man sequel no one ever speaks of. Atari apparently released it to the States in an extremely limited amount of arcades. After playing it, it's obvious why. Pac doesn't eat anything in this game. He just runs around flipping over cards to unlock doors where, with the "help" of an annoying little monster named Pal, he collects a few items. The monsters are still around, and this time there are no power pellets Pac can use for defense. Instead, there are a couple strange powerups that give Pac abilities from other Namco games, which he can use to stun the monsters. Even though each level had the same layout (didn't Namco learn anything from Ms. Pac-man?), the game was just too complicated to be any fun. Professor Pac-man Arcade release Developer/US publisher: Bally Midway This was an ambitious project by Midway, a typical quiz game with Pac-man graphics. Midway hoped to have these machines in bars all over America, and they planned to update the machines often with new questions. The game was a spectacular failure. 400 machines were made, and nobody played them. Pac-man Intellivision release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft  Pac-manIBM PC release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Pac-man C64 release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Pac-man Vic-20 release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Pac-man Apple Computer release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Pac-man TI-99/4A release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Pac-man Sinclair Spectrum release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft And here we hit the period of Atari's nutty third-party phase. Here is where Pac gets its first release on the home computer systems, which were becoming all the rage... way back in the day when Bill Gates was just getting started with his plans to screw Steve Jobs and then the rest of the known planet. Back when 640k really was all the memory anyone would ever need. Where was I?  Jr.
Pac-manArcade release Developer/US publisher: Midway Finally, Midway gives the unauthorized Pac-man sequels a rest after this one. Yet another family member is being pursued by monsters, this one being Pac Jr. This was a very difficult game with large mazes that wouldn't fit on the screen; they scrolled horizantally. Even with two extra power pellets, the monsters were just too hard to avoid, expecially since there were no escape tunnels. Yet another Pac clone that didn't make it very far. Clyde once again sits this game out and another orange monster named Tim takes his place, for no known reason. The game also introduced Yum-Yum, a monster Jr. falls in love with. In the intermissions, we see them run away from their parents, who don't approve of the forbidden love. It's all really cute. Too bad it's impossible to see them all, along with the 5 maze layouts.  Pac LandArcade release Developer: Namco US publisher: None Pac Land was not only a side-scroller with awkward controls that no one played... it was actually one of the first games of its kind... An action platform game involving the rescue of a princess that has an ending. So it did serve a purpose of inspiring much better games down the road like Super Mario Bros. Pac, Ms Pac, and their baby appear, along with several clones of the monsters, who've apparently taken over the entire city.  Pac Land Arcade release Developer: Namco/Midway US Publisher: Bally Midway The already-incredibly-gay arcade game becomes even more gay when Midway "Americanizes" it by altering the graphics to resemble the Hanna Barbera cartoon that was playing at the time. Pac-man's outfit changed, the monsters got hats, and other stuff... but the gameplay (if you can call it that) was left intact. Pac-man Intellivision release Developer/US publisher: INTV INTV puts out another version of Pac-man for the Intellivision. Why? Who knows... Ms. Pac-man IBM PC release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Ms. Pac-man C64 release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft  Ms. Pac-manVic-20 release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Ms. Pac-man Apple Computer release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Ms. Pac-man TI-99/4A release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft Ms. Pac-man Spectrum release Developer/US publisher: Atarisoft The Atarisoft legacy (?) continues with their mass release of Ms. Pac-man. Jr. Pac-man 2600 release Developer/US publisher: Atari A decent 2600 conversion of the less-than-decent coin-op. Looked and played similar to the 2600 Ms. Pac-man, with a vertically-scrolling playfield.  Pac-manFamicon release Developer: Namcot US publisher: not for a while One would think the 8-bit Family Computer should be perfectly capable of recreating the Pac-man experience flawlessly. Alas... the gameplay was there, but the graphics were washed out and flickery. But keep in mind that the Famicon was brand new at the time... Nintendo couldn't even fit all the levels of their own Donkey Kong game on a single cartridge back then... Pac-man MSX release Developer: Namcot US publisher: none The MSX has to be the weirdest case of a game system developed in America, having had little success outside of Japan... anyway, as required by Namco law, it got a version of Pac-man.   Pac
LandFamicon release Developer: Namcot US publisher: none The Famicon gets another Pac-man translation in its infant stage. This game was never released in the US. Trust me, once you see it, it becomes obvious why.
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