Ms. Pac-Man (ARC)
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- For other games in the series, see Pac-Man.
Ms. Pac-Man is the first sequel to Pac-Man (ARC), created not by Namco but by General Computer Corporation. The latter company consisted of various Americans who got their start programming an unofficial conversion kit for Missile Command (ARC), with their eyes soon turning to the original Pac-Man as well. Following an unexpected legal victory (of sorts) against Atari, they contacted Midway (who distributed Pac-Man in America at the time) and told them that they were working on a then-unofficial conversion for their game as well. After receiving their blessing, GCC worked with both Midway and Namco to rework their original idea - Crazy Otto - into Ms. Pac-Man.
Being built on the original game's hardware, Ms. Pac-Man reuses its fundamental gameplay: the title character must eat all the dots in a maze while evading four ghosts, temporarily gaining the power to chomp them by consuming larger "Power Pellets," and finding bonus fruits that intermittently appear for extra points. However, GCC added and altered many facets of the game in an effort to improve on it: there are now four mazes instead of just one, fruits wander around the maze instead of appearing in a set area every time, and each intermission now has a unique song. Said intermissions also tell a concrete (if simple) story concerning the development of Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man's relationship.
Contents
Screenshots
Music
Much like Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man's music is fairly short, simple, and chirpy. In an oral history published by Fast Company in 2017, Mike Horowitz states the following:
Rode came up with his songs while sitting at a piano, provisionally titling his work "Sonata for Unaccompanied Video Game." (This occurred while the game was still Crazy Otto and survived unaltered in the final product.)
Recording
| # | Title | Composer | Arranger | Length | Listen | Download |
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| 01 | Start Music | Chris Rode | Chris Rode | 0:04 | Download | |
| 02 | Act 1: They Meet | Chris Rode | Chris Rode | 0:08 | Download | |
| 03 | Act 2: The Chase | Chris Rode | Chris Rode | 0:21 | Download | |
| 04 | Act 3: Junior | Chris Rode | Chris Rode | 0:04 | Download | |
| 05 | Miss | Mike Horowitz | Mike Horowitz | 0:01 | Download |
Credits
- Ripper: N/A
- Recorder: Theand
- Game Credits:
- Uncredited Music Composer: Chris Rode
- Uncredited Sound Effect Composer: Mike Horowitz
(Sources: Steve Golson's GDC postmortem, Fast Company oral history)
The game does not have any credits, direct or indirect. However, various developers have explained that Chris Rode was responsible for the game's music.
In addition, as mentioned earlier, Mike Horowitz states that he created all of the sound effects in Fast Company's oral history. Given that both he and fellow developer Steve Golson were specific in stating what Rode composed - the game start jingle and the three intermission songs - then it can be inferred that they considered the death jingle a sound effect, meaning it was Horowitz's work.
Game Rip
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No rip has been made for Ms. Pac-Man thus far. Since the game is built on Pac-Man's hardware, it is also incompatible with the VGM format.
Audio Devices
As with Pac-Man, the cabinet uses an early 3-channel Namco WSG clocked at 96 kHz to play audio.
Releases
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Links
- https://www.mobygames.com/game/576/ms-pac-man - MobyGames.
- https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/arcade/583976-ms-pac-man - GameFAQs.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ms._Pac-Man - Wikipedia.
