Songs like “Pac-Man Fever” by Buckner & Garcia were written about the game. Pac-Man in Popular MediaĮven the entertainment industry felt Pac-Man’s cultural impact. In the 1980s, the Pac-Man name was ubiquitous throughout American culture. Everything from t-shirts and toys to lunch boxes and board games featured the iconic yellow ghost Pac-Man. Pac-Man and the four ghosts (Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde) he battles in the game have become cultural icons. Merchandising and Licensingīeyond the realm of video games, Pac-Man’s popularity sparked a merchandise and licensing bonanza. Pac-Man quickly became a pop culture icon, starring in movies, comic books, and even his own animated TV show. A larger audience was able to play the game after it was transferred to home consoles. The popularity of Pac-Man wasn’t confined to arcades. Players responded positively to the game’s innovative blend of strategy, skill, and fast-paced action, propelling it to the top of the charts. When Pac-Man eats a power pellet, he becomes temporarily invincible, giving him an advantage over the ghosts and allowing him to rack up more points. To complete levels, players must take control of Pac-Man and guide him through mazes while he devours dots and avoids ghosts of various hues. Playing Pac-Man is easy but quickly becomes engrossing. The game’s simple controls, bright visuals, and upbeat soundtrack made it an instant hit with gamers and ushered in a golden era for arcade video games. Pac-Man first appeared in Japanese arcades in May 1980, and it made its way to North American shores later that year. The resulting video game was Pac-Man, in which a yellow, pizza-shaped protagonist eats his way through levels full of dots and ghosts. Iwatani was motivated to design a game for a demographic outside of the stereotypical male gamers of the era by the idea of food and the image of a pizza with a missing slice. Since its creation in 1980, the game has turned into one of the best-selling franchises out there with a number of sequels, spin-offs, and remakes.Toru Iwatani, a game designer at Namco, is credited with creating Pac-Man. There’s no doubt that Pac-Man changed the video game community vastly. This inspired other video game creators to explore different types of designs, visuals, and characters. In addition, Pac-Man has no assigned gender and the game was designed using abstract and vibrant colors. Not only was Pac-Man one of the first games to have a maze format, it was also one of the first games to successfully stray away from the violent and aggressive stereotype that video games had.Įveryone who entered an arcade to play Pac-Man felt welcomed and comfortable with playing. The influence that Pac-Man has had on the video game industry is tremendous. To achieve this, Mitchell sat in front of the game for six hours straight! Though the game may not sound very hard at first sight, it actually took 20 years for the first person - a man named Billy Mitchell, to finish the game with a perfect score. Lastly, Inky, the blue ghost, is unpredictable as it could either randomly start chasing or ambushing Pac-Man. Pinky, the pink ghost, is supposed to surround and ambush Pac-Man. But once Clyde gets close to Pac-Man, it will wander off and leave Pac-Man alone. Clyde, the orange ghost, will chase Pac-Man in a similar manner as Blinky. The objective of the game is to get Pac-Man, the yellow character, to move around the screen and collect lines of dots, called Pac-Dots, while simultaneously avoiding being killed by four ghosts.Įach ghost in the game has their own behavior: Blinky, the red ghost, has the role of continuously chasing Pac-Man. Pac-Man was created with simplicity on purpose and requires a minimal number of buttons and controls to play. The game was first released in Japan in 1980 with the name “PuckMan”, but as it was later introduced in the United States in October of that year, distributors changed the name to “Pac-Man”. One day, when Iwatani was grabbing a slice of pizza, he noticed the unique shape that was formed, and that shape is now what we see as Pac-Man. Iwatani noticed that it was mainly boys who played at arcades during his days, and he had hoped to make the gaming environment a comfortable setting for girls as well. It’s unbelievable to think about how 40 years later, this maze-inspired arcade game is still so popular.īack in the 1970s, the creator of Pac-Man, Toru Iwatani, wanted to create a game that was different from all the other games that focused on violence, aggression, and shooting. Pac-Man’s 40th anniversary was recently celebrated on May 22. Have you ever wondered about the history of the well-known video game, Pac-Man? Well, it all started with pizza.
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