Is Pac-Man Jr. harder than Ms. Pac-Man?

[javeryh]

I think I'm pretty good at Ms. Pacman - I can usually get over 100,000 points on one quarter (no laughing if this, in fact, sucks ass).  I just started playing Pac-Man Jr. recently for the first time (local arcade never had it I guess) and I'm awful.  It seems as though it is harder than Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man and the ghosts are way more aggressive.  Is it my imagination?

[MoonDog]

I tried it for the first time a few months ago and I could barely clear the first level.  I'm not a very good pac man player, but I thought that was a bit ridiculuous.  Then I got my frontend going and noticed on the control panel image that unlike the other pac man games, this one has a button and it makes you go FAST!  It is now one of my favorite games.  I think the ghosts are much smarter than previous versions, but I'm not the best source to comment.  I changed the configuration so it is always fast and if you press the button it goes slow because I was getting tired of holding the button down.  I never use normal (slow) speed in that game anyway.

[blacktiger]

I must suck at Ms pac cause my high score was 88k.  I tried jr pac-man and it is way more difficult with the screen moving.  Only played it one time at an operators warehouse.  He wanted like 700 for it but is was in a dedicated mappy type cab.  It just sold on Ebay for over 700$ a week ago.

[Mr. Dude]

I think Jr is a lot harder than ms pac-man as well.  I suck at all the pac-man games too.  My high score in Ms pac-man is only like 40K.... but I play without the speedup hack if that makes it any better.

[Gunstar Hero]

Yes it is.

The scrolling maze and no side doors made things complicated, plus the bonus items screw you by making big dots that slow you down and if they hit your power pellet it explodes.

Still, it's pretty fun.

[whammoed]

this one has a button and it makes you go FAST!

Wow! news to me.  Its on my cab too.  I'm going to play it tonight!

[javeryh]

this one has a button and it makes you go FAST!

Wow! news to me.  Its on my cab too.  I'm going to play it tonight!

That's a double WOW     - I never knew this.  I can't wait to try it tonight!!

[Gunstar Hero]

Freaky!

I see a command in the button config for "speedup cheat" but it says none and won't let me assign a button to it!

[MoonDog]

Freaky!

I see a command in the button config for "speedup cheat" but it says none and won't let me assign a button to it!

The speedup for Jr. is not a cheat.  By default button 1 will speedup both Jr. and ghosts.  If you enable that cheat you essentially reverse button 1.  That way you go really fast UNLESS you press the button, rather than really fast WHEN you press the button.  I HIGHLY recommend enabling that "cheat" because as you get used to controlling the little guy in hyper mode you won't want to have to keep your finger on the button the whole time.

Something I found funny was the "fruit" once you get to one of the levels...
trike,kite,drum,balloon,train,kitty,beer?
It might be a rootbeer float, but it looks like a nice glass of beer.

[whammoed]

Freaky!

I see a command in the button config for "speedup cheat" but it says none and won't let me assign a button to it!

Heres the scoop:  Only works with lef Ctrl key for player 1.  You cannot remap this function.  Does not work at all for player 2 in cocktail mode.  
This doesn't work on my machine at all because I have remapped my button to not use any Ctrl Alt or Shift keys.

Is this a bug?  How did it behave in the arcade?

[paigeoliver]

It didn't exist in the arcades.  The Jr. Pac speedup cheats are modern cheats. Some versions of mame have the speedup where it only speeds up Jr. and not the ghosts, which is how it is on my machine.

Super Pac-Man was the one that actually had a speedup button on the panel.

[whammoed]

It didn't exist in the arcades.  The Jr. Pac speedup cheats are modern cheats. Some versions of mame have the speedup where it only speeds up Jr. and not the ghosts, which is how it is on my machine.

Super Pac-Man was the one that actually had a speedup button on the panel.

On klov and when I google, the control panel for jr pac has a button on each side of the joy.  What were the buttons for?  Are the ones we have pictures of all conversions from super pac or something?

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[MoonDog]

It didn't exist in the arcades.  The Jr. Pac speedup cheats are modern cheats. Some versions of mame have the speedup where it only speeds up Jr. and not the ghosts, which is how it is on my machine.

Super Pac-Man was the one that actually had a speedup button on the panel.

I stand corrected.  I assumed this was part of the original since the CP pic shows buttons.  On KLOV there are two cabinets shown for Jr. Pac-Man and only one of them appears to have buttons.  That one just so happens to match the Super Pac-Man cabinet so maybe it was a conversion as whammoed suggested.

That being said and assuming you don't use the speedup cheat, I'd say it is MUCH harder than Ms. Pac-Man.

[javeryh]

OK, I just tried it and it is definitely a cheat and not something originally in the game.  This makes it less fun, IMO because it takes a lot of the skill out of it...

[paigeoliver]

Yeah, that is just a Super Pac conversion and the operator chose to keep the buttons rather than trying to fill in the holes. Plexi was really really rare on games back then, so a lot of 83' era conversions tend to have surplus buttons on them.

[whammoed]

Yeah, that is just a Super Pac conversion and the operator chose to keep the buttons rather than trying to fill in the holes. Plexi was really really rare on games back then, so a lot of 83' era conversions tend to have surplus buttons on them.

That must have been confusing/frustrating for people playing that game:
What the @#$% do these $%#& buttons do!