
Despite the seemingly random nature of the enemies, their movements are strictly deterministic, which players have used to their advantage. The enemies in Pac-Man are known variously as "monsters" and "ghosts". In later stages, the enemies go straight to flashing, bypassing blue, which means that they can only be eaten for a short amount of time, although they still reverse direction when a power pellet is eaten in even later stages, the ghosts do not become edible (i.e., they do not change color and still make Pac-Man lose a life on contact), but they still reverse direction. Blue enemies flash white to signal that they are about to become dangerous again and the length of time for which the enemies remain vulnerable varies from one stage to the next, generally becoming shorter as the game progresses. When an enemy is eaten, its eyes remain and return to the center box where it is regenerated in its normal color. The enemies turn deep blue, reverse direction and usually move more slowly. Near the corners of the maze are four larger, flashing dots known as Power Pellets that provide Pac-Man with the temporary ability to eat the enemies. Pac-Man is awarded a single bonus life at 10,000 points by default-DIP switches inside the machine can change the required points or disable the bonus life altogether. When all lives have been lost, the game ends. Whenever Pac-Man occupies the same tile as an enemy, he is considered to have collided with that ghost. If an enemy touches Pac-Man, he loses a life. Four enemies (Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde) roam the maze, trying to catch Pac-Man. Between some stages, one of three intermission animations plays. When all pac-dots are eaten, Pac-Man is taken to the next stage. The player controls Pac-Man through a maze, eating pac-dots (also called biscuits or just dots). It is part of the collection of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Pac-Man is one of the longest running video game franchises from the golden age of video arcade games. According to the Davie-Brown Index, Pac-Man has the highest brand awareness of any video game character among American consumers, recognized by 94 percent of them. The character has appeared in more than 30 officially licensed game spin-offs, as well as in numerous unauthorized clones and bootlegs. It is also one of the highest-grossing video games of all time, having generated more than $2.5 billion in quarters by the 1990s. Pac-Man is often credited with being a landmark in video game history and is among the most famous arcade games of all time. Pac-Man succeeded by creating a new genre. The most visible minority were sports games that were mostly derivatives of Pong. When Pac-Man was released, the most popular arcade video games were space shooters, in particular, Space Invaders and Asteroids.
WHEN WAS PAC MAN CREATED LICENSE
Arcade game pac man 1980 namco midway license for us release.Pac-Man was popular in the 1980s and 1990s and is still played in the 2010s.
WHEN WAS PAC MAN CREATED SERIES
Upon its release, the game-and, subsequently, Pac-Man derivatives-became a social phenomenon that yielded high sales of merchandise and inspired a legacy in other media, such as the Pac-Man animated television series and the top-ten hit single " Pac-Man Fever". Immensely popular from its original release to the present day, Pac-Man is considered one of the classics of the medium, and an icon of 1980s popular culture. It was licensed for distribution in the United States by Midway and released in October 1980. It was created by Japanese video game designer Toru Iwatani. The colors also helped represent the ghosts' differing personalities.Pac-Man ( Japanese: パックマン, Hepburn: Pakkuman), stylized as PAC-MAN, is an arcade game developed by Namco and first released in Japan in May 1980.

The choice to make them all different colors was once again about appealing to women, as he told Wegotone. This again helped separate Pac-Man from the games that stereotypically appealed to men, which often included fierce and terrifying monsters.įor these wholesome ghosts, Iwatani was inspired by the likes of Obake no Q-Taro and Casper The Friendly Ghost. He told GameSpot that the idea was to create antagonists who were more cute than scary. The ghosts, however, were not based on food shapes. The said symbol is a square, but he made it round. Yet during the talk with Susan Lammers, he also says part of the design came from the Japanese symbol for mouth (aka Kuchi).

In an interview with GameInformer, he said, "I was eating a whole pizza while I was thinking about making a game themed after 'eating.' It was then that I came up with Pac-Man’s game design after looking at the pie with a slice taken from it." Toru Iwatani has always claimed that he came up with the design for Pac-Man while eating pizza.
