Pac-Man, which first appeared in 1981 as an unauthorized version of the game.Ī wide variety of Pac-Man merchandise have been marketed with the character’s image. The Pac-Man video game was so immensely popular that within a year there were spin-offs being created and released, some of them unauthorized. This was one of the first examples of a non-interactive video game “cutscene”.Ī perfect score on the original Pac-Man arcade game is 3,333,360 points, achieved when the player obtains the maximum score on the first 255 levels by eating every dot, energizer, fruit and blue ghost without losing a man, then uses all six men to obtain the maximum possible number of points on level 256.

The game features short animated sequences between levels, showing Pac-Man being chased by the ghosts. Blinky constantly chases Pac-Man, Pinky attempts to ambush him, Inky is randomised depending on Pac-Man’s position and Clyde will get close to the player then attempt to flee to the bottom left corner, potentially cutting off escape routes. The ghosts are called Blinky (red), Pinky (pink), Inky (light blue), and Clyde (orange) and they each have their own personalities based on AI routines.

The game was made challenging by a group of four “ghosts” on each level that tried to catch and consume Pac-Man – the roles of predator and prey were temporarily reversed when Pac-Man ate special “power pills” placed in the maze. In Japanese slang, paku paku describes the snapping of a mouth open and shut, and thus the central character, resembling a small pizza with a slice cut out for the mouth, was given the name Pac-Man. By paying careful attention to themes, design, and colours, Iwatani hoped that Namco could market an arcade game that would appeal to females. The lead designer was Iwatani Tohru, who intended to create a game that did not emphasize violence.

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