Super Pac-Man, the Video Game by Namco

Type of the machine : Video Game
Super Pac-Man © 1982 Namco.

Super Pac-Man is a 1- or a 2-player game where you are in control of the legendary Pac-Man. As in the original "Pac-Man" game, the goal is to clear each maze, but this time, instead of dots, the maze consists of prizes which are locked away behind gates. There are two ways to acces the prizes. You can eat the keys which open a particular gate, and not always the gate which is closest to that key. Or you can crash through the gate after you eat a super pill and become Super Pac-Man. You are not required to eat all of the keys in order to complete the stage.

Four power pills are in maze and allow Pac-Man to turn the tables on the ghosts and eat them for a short time. When the ghosts begin to flash, time is running out and they will switch back, so beware.

New in this game is the super pill. There are two super pills in the maze which allow Pac-Man to become Super Pac-Man for a limited period of time. While in Super form, Pac-Man can crash through the maze gates, fly over the ghosts and avoid being killed (or eat them when they're blue), and travel at super speed whenever the player presses and holds the speed button. When the super power is about to run out, Pac-Man flashes white and then returns to his normal form. You can extend the duration of super time by eating a regular power pill. The super time will then be extended by the duration of the ghosts' blue time.

Pac-Man loses one life whenever a ghost catches him when the ghost is not blue and Pac-Man is not in Super form. At the default settings, you start with a set number of lives ('Lives' dip switch), and bonus lives can be awarded to you as you reach or pass certain preselected point values ('Extra Lives' dip switch).

The tunnel is a great way to put some space between you and any ghosts that are on your tail since they can only move half as fast as you when they are in it. In Super Pac-Man, the ghosts are also slowed down by traveling through the passage directly beneath the ghost pen.

Occasionally, a star will appear in the middle of the screen with a picture on the left, and a rotating picture on the right. You may eat the star at any time for bonus points, but if you manage to eat the star with the right picture matches the left one, you will receive a larger bonus.

As your skill level increases, the ghosts speed up their pursuit of Pac-Man and they stay blue for shorter and shorter periods of time after he eats a power pill until, in the high stages, they do not turn blue at all.

Super Pac-Man also features bonus stages in Stage 3, Stage 7, and every fourth stage thereafter, where there are no ghosts, a time limit, and Pac-Man is in Super form throughout the stage. Your goal is to eat all of the prizes in the given time limit. You are awarded the remaining time in the counter as points for successfully eating everything. With each Bonus stage, the walls and gates change color.

Super Pac-Man ramains true to the intermission formula established in "Pac-Man". These intermissions are more like the simple humorous anecdotes found in the original game, than the episodic stories told by the intermissions in "Ms. Pac-Man" and "Jr. Pac-Man". Super Pac-Man features four intermissions :

1) Pac-Man enters from the left side of the screen, followed closely by the ghosts. When Pac-Man exits the screen to the right, the ghosts stop. Super Pac-Man appears high up from the rights and the ghosts helplessly watch as Super Pac-Man flies over their heads and exits to the left. This intermission is played after Stage 2.

2) As a tribute to the first intermission from the original game, Pac-Man enters from the right, and is followed by what appears to be a super version of Blinky. After they exit to the left, a super Blinky reappears from the left in his blue form, and is now followed by an even larger version of Super Pac-Man. This intermission is played after Stage 6.

3) Pac-Man enters from the left side of the screen, followed closely by the ghosts. Before Pac-Man makes it all the way to the right, he simply disappears, leaving the ghosts stunned and puzzled. As the ghosts look around for Pac-Man's whereabouts, Clyde looks up and notices the extremely large version of Super Pac-Man falling from the sky, instantly scaring all of the ghosts blue before this super-duper Pac-Man squashes them. This intermission is played after Stage 11, which is the third Bonus Stage.

4) The extra-large Super Pac-Man enters from the left side of the screen, followed by a pack of 32 ghosts, 8 of each color. After exiting to the right, four scared (blue) super ghosts reappear from the right. Much to their misfortune, they are being chased by 32 normal-sized Pac-Men. This intermission is played after Stage 16 and every 4th stage thereafter.

CAST OF CHARACTERS :

* Pac-Man - Once again, you control the little yellow hero as you guide him through the maze and onto victory. Pac-Man's goal is to gobble up every target item. He must avoid contact with the ghosts unless they are blue as a result of Pac-Man eating a power pill, or when Pac-Man is in Super form as a result of eating a super pill. Pac-Man moves faster when he's not eating targets than when he is. He is also capable of turning around corners faster than the ghosts, so make as many turns as possible when the ghosts are on his tail.

* Super Pac-Man - After eating a super pill, Pac-Man becomes large and in charge. In Super form, he can eat through gates without the use of a key, fly over ghosts without colliding with them (the ghosts actually change in appearance, becoming squat or thin depending on the direction they are moving; this ability does not prevent Super Pac-Man from eating blue ghosts), moving faster when the Super Speed button is held down, and extending the duration of his super power by eating a normal power pill. When Pac-Man super power is about to expire, he flashes white just like the ghosts do when they are about to change back to normal.

* Ghosts - Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde are back. Basically, they behave the same. Blinky follows you more closely than any of the other ghosts, shadowing your trail, Pinky tries to stay one step ahead of you by second-guessing which way you will go and trapping you, Inky usually turns away if you take him head on, and Clyde does his own thing for the most part. In this game, their behavior is a tad more random than in the first game, so patterns cannot be relied upon. Also new in Super Pac-Man, they will exhibit a "stutter" behavior from time to time where they seem to shake in one spot briefly before continuing on. This can sometimes save you if you are being chased, or it can mess you up if you are following behind a ghost too closely.

* Scared Ghosts - As in the original game, if Pac-Man eats a power pill, the ghosts will turn blue for a short period of time. The higher the stage, the shorter that time becomes, until the ghosts don't turn blue at all (but they do change direction). Eating ghosts scores big points (see Scoring below), but watch out when they start flashing because they're about to change back to their normal state.

* Power Pills - A carry-over from the original "Pac-Man" game. These four large white blinking dots in the corners of the maze allow Pac-Man to temporarily chase and eat the ghosts until they begin to flash and turn back to normal. In this game, eating a power pill while in Super form extends Super time into the ghosts' blue time.

* Super Pills - These two green pills grow and shrink in size close to the middle of the maze. When Pac-Man eats one of these, he grows to Super size and gains the power to crash through barriers, fly over ghosts, and use super speed.

* Keys - The ultimate prize in the original game becomes an intregal tool in this game. Eat the keys to open the gates that block your access to the prizes. You don't have to eat all of the keys to complete the stage. The maze contains 15 keys in all.

* Gates - The doors that block Pac-Man from eating the prizes he needs to eat in order to complete the stage. There are 37 gates in all.

* Prizes - Unlike in the original game, where you had to eat dots and collect the prizes for bonus points, you must eat all of prizes to complete the stage. The maze contains 31 prizes in all.

* Bonus Star - Once Pac-Man has eaten roughly half of the prizes in the maze, a bonus star will appear with one picture to the left, and a rapidly changing picture to the right. Eat the star for bonus points, or try to eat the star when the pictures match for an even higher bonus. Try to eat the star when the pictures on either side match and are the same as the current stage's main prize (for example, apples in Stage 1) to score the maximum possilbe bonus points.

* Tunnel - By going through one end of the tunnel, Pac-Man and the ghosts can cross over to the other side of the screen. Any ghost who goes through the tunnel will move at half speed. This speed decrease also occurs under the ghost pen now.

Game ID : SP

Main CPU : M6809 (@ 1.536 Mhz)
Sound CPU : M6809 (@ 1.536 Mhz)
Sound Chips : Namco 8-channel WSG

Screen orientation : Vertical
Video resolution : 224 x 288 pixels
Screen refresh : 60.61 Hz
Palette colors : 32

Players : 2
Control : 4-way joystick
Buttons : 1 (SUPER SPEED) - only works while Pac-Man is Super-sized.

Released in October 1982.

Also licensed to Bally Midway for US manufacture and distribution (November 1982).

In this new Pac-Man game, the game-play mechanics have altered radically - instead of eating dots, the player is required to eat a key, which unlocks a section of the maze containing some kind of food. Once all the food is eaten, the player advances to the next level. The new game-play mechanics were considered by many to be confusing, and too much of a change from the original two games ("Pac-Man" and Ms. Pac-Man). Ultimately, Super Pac Man proved to be the least successful game in the original series, being outsold that year by "Pac-Man Plus", a slightly updated version of the original game. In spite of this, the game's A.I. was celebrated as being one of the best of that era, and in the eyes of many fans, was the best out of any Pac-Man game.

The alien spaceship "Galaxian" makes an appearance in this game as the main prize of Stage 15 (the fourth Bonus Stage).

A Super Pac-Man unit appears in the 1983 movie 'Joysticks'.

Key : 50 points
Eating a gate (when Super-sized) : 200 points
Food items : 10 x stage (max. 160) points
1st blue monster : 200 points
2nd blue monster : 400 points
3rd blue monster : 800 points
4th blue monster : 1,600 points
Star, when slot machine items do not match : 200 to 1,600 points (value doubles after each bonus stage)
Star, when slot machine items match but different from level : 2,000 points
Star, when slot machine items match but same as level : 5,000 points
Bonus points awarded after bonus round is complete. Bonus counts down from 20,000 by 100's.

* Try to group the ghosts together, and lure as many as possible at once behind you before collecting a power pill.

* Note that in this game, you can kill the ghosts in their home, so on the early stages you can kill all 4, then collect another powerpill and kill them in their base as soon as they regenerate. This gives you another few seconds breathing space as well. This is generally not recommended unless Pac-Man is in Super form at the time.

* At the early parts of each level, concentrate on picking up as many keys as possible before collecting any prizes. This way you open up a lot of the maze, saving grief later on.

* When you are in Super form, collecting a normal powerpill extends your Super time. The super pill does last longer than a normal power pill.

* When you are in Super form, try and break through any remaining doors to save you from having to collect all the keys.

* Don't worry about the bonus star in the center - it's not worth wasting time waiting to try and match the items as you score far more points in general play on later levels.

* Although the maze layout is always the same, the keys on later levels open different doors, so you can't rely on the same patterns on each screen.

* All stages whose numbers are one less than a multiple of 4 (Stage 3, Stage 7, Stage 11, etc) serve as Bonus Stages. In these stages, Pac-Man is Super-sized throughout the entire stage, and there are no ghosts. These are the stages to take full advantage of the Super Speed button. Complete each Bonus Stage before time runs out; the remaining time is awarded to you as points.

* Easter Egg :
1) Enter service mode.
2) Keep Button 1 pressed and enter the following sequence : Right, Down(x2), Left(x4), Up.
'(c) (p) 1982 NAMCO LTD.' will be added at the bottom of the screen.

1. Pac-Man (1980)
2. Ms. Pac-Man (1981)
3. Super Pac-Man (1982)
4. Pac-Man Plus (1982)
5. Jr. Pac-Man (1983)
6. Pac & Pal (1983)
7. Pac-Land (1984)
8. Pac-Mania (1987)
9. Pac-In-Time (1994, Nintendo Super Famicom)
10. Pac-Man 2 - The New Adventures (1994, Nintendo Super Famicom and Sega Mega Drive)
11. Pac-Man VR (1996)
12. Pac-Man World (1999, Sony PlayStation)
13. Pac-Man - Adventures in Time (2000, PC CD-ROM)
14. Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness (2000, Sony PlayStation)
15. Ms. Pac-Man - Quest for the Golden Maze (2001, PC CD-ROM)
16. Pac-Man All-Stars (2002, PC CD-ROM)
17. Pac-Man Fever (2002, Sony PlayStation 2)
18. Pac-Man World 2 (2002, Sony PlayStation 2, Nintendo GameCube, and Microsoft XBOX; 2004, PC CD-ROM)
19. Pac-Man vs. (2003, Nintendo GameCube)
20. Ms. Pac-Man - Maze Madness (2004, Nintendo GameBoy Advance)
21. Pac-Man World 3 (2005, Sony PSP, Sony PlayStation 2, Nintendo GameCube, Microsoft XBOX, PC CD-ROM, and Nintendo DS)
22. Pac'n Roll (2005, Nintendo DS)
23. Pac-Pix (2005, Nintendo DS)

Designed by : Toru Iwatani

Consoles :

Sony PlayStation (1996, "Namco Museum Vol.2")
Nintendo Game Boy Color (1999, "Ms. Pac-Man - Special Color Edition")
Nintendo Wii (2007, "Namco Museum Remix")

Computers :

Atari 800 (1984)
Commodore C64 (1988)
PC [MS-DOS] (1988)

Others :

Super Pac-Man TV game (2006 - Jakks Pacific)
Mobile Phones (2006)
Arcade Gold featuring Pac-Man (2007 - Jakks Pacific)
Retro Arcade featuring Pac-Man (2008 - Jakks Pacific)

Game's rom.
Machine's picture.