Five things you never knew about Pac-Man

[Red]

http://blog.games.yahoo.com/blog/443-five-things-you-never-knew-about-pac-man

[CrazyKongFan]

The part in the article about the ghosts targets isn't right though...Clyde isn't random. If Pac-Man is more than 8 tiles away, his target is the same as Blinky, which is Pac-Man. If he's closer than 8 tiles, his target becomes the bottom left corner.

[Sarak000]

Very interesting read.  Some things in there I never knew.  Thanks for posting.

[Gray_Area]

"I thought about something that may attract girls," says Iwatani. "Maybe boy stories or something to do with fashion. However, girls love to eat desserts. My wife often does! So the verb ‘eat' gave me a hint to create this game."

Not very PC.

And this is downright weird:

"I wanted to have a shelter and it would move up and down," he says. "When the ghost comes, the ghost would be pinched by the shelter which would disfigure the ghost."

Missing piece of the puzzle...of his mind maybe?

[DaveMMR]

"I thought about something that may attract girls," says Iwatani. "Maybe boy stories or something to do with fashion. However, girls love to eat desserts. My wife often does! So the verb ‘eat' gave me a hint to create this game."

Not very PC.

Yeah but it was the 80's when he thought this.  The "PC-Police" had yet to be self-appointed back then.

Besides, it's true.  Have you never seen The Golden Girls?

[rockin_rick]

Here's a link to a great page regarding the movement of the ghosts, among many other things.

http://home.comcast.net/~jpittman2/pacman/pacmandossier.html


Rick

[boardjunkie]

Two of my favorite things.....Sifl and Olly, and Pacman....

 

[boardjunkie]

I like this one too courtesy of the Bloodhound Gang.....

[LeedsFan]

I was really surprised at that last part about the ghosts nearly being all one colour. How ridiculous would that have been? If all the ghosts were red then there'd be no point in giving them names. And you'd lose where each ghost was in the maze so any unique behaviour they have would be irrelevant.

I mean seriously... they go to all that trouble to program and design a game and then some scatty mare with no clue about game design orders him to change a vital piece of the games character. If that decision had stood then I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have ever heard about Pacman.

[Gray_Area]

I was really surprised at that last part about the ghosts nearly being all one colour. How ridiculous would that have been? If all the ghosts were red then there'd be no point in giving them names. And you'd lose where each ghost was in the maze so any unique behaviour they have would be irrelevant.

I mean seriously... they go to all that trouble to program and design a game and then some scatty mare with no clue about game design orders him to change a vital piece of the games character. If that decision had stood then I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have ever heard about Pacman.

Many games of the time had one color for baddies. Like Amidar (though that's not the only reason it's boring....). Iwatani saw the 'future' in variety.

[erictrumpet]

Many games of the time had one color for baddies. Like Amidar (though that's not the only reason it's boring....). Iwatani saw the 'future' in variety.

Wow, was there ever a time when using COLOR was considered innovative game design?? Gotta love the classics. Thank you MAME for keeping them alive! (No sarcasm here, I really mean it!)

Eric.

[boardjunkie]

Many games of the time had one color for baddies. Like Amidar (though that's not the only reason it's boring....). Iwatani saw the 'future' in variety.

Wow, was there ever a time when using COLOR was considered innovative game design?? Gotta love the classics. Thank you MAME for keeping them alive! (No sarcasm here, I really mean it!)

Eric.

Yes....1979-1980. The color in Berzerk was actually an afterthought. The game was programmed for monochrome (B/W) monitors and then Galaxian came out with RGB color. They had to make it color to be cometitive, so the programmers came up with something called "buffer system color". Since it was kind of a kludge, the programmers referred to it as "bullsh!t color".
http://hiwaay.net/~lkseitz/cvg/berzerk.html