Pac-Man (NES)

Pac-Man

Platform:	NES
Year:	1984
Developer:	Namco

For other games in the series see Pac-Man.

Pac-Man is an arcade classic developed and published by Namco as an arcade cabinet. In 1984, it made its debut on the NES. Due to the conflicting problems with Namco, Tengen, and Nintendo, the game saw multiple releases on the NES. However, only minor cosmetic changes were made between each version. The game was initially published by Namco in Japan. In 1988, it was brought over to the NES by Tengen, who had been releasing Namco's games in North America. The Tengen release was originally licensed, but became unlicensed due to Atari's legal troubles with Nintendo. Finally, in 1993, Namco had established their North American office by this point and published their own release.

Screenshots

The title screen (Tengen version).

About to start.

The cutscene after the second round.

Got an extra life!

When Pac-Man touches a ghost, he folds into a banana peel!

Game Over.

Music

Pac-Man retains the same memorable music and sound effects from the arcade original, but was obviously scaled down considerably for the weaker audio hardware.

The game's audio was ported over by Namco sound designer Junko Ozawa, who had to program her music in 6502 assembly in Namco's sound driver. While Nobuyuki Ohnogi coded the initial driver, it was later modified by Fukashi Ohmorita to take up less space. However, it is unknown which version of the driver is used in this particular game.

It is unknown if Ozawa had to learn the music by ear or if she referenced the original game's audio files, or possibly a combination of the two.

The song titles are taken from the official soundtrack.

Recording

#	Title	Composer	Arranger	Length	Download
01	Start Music	Toshio Kai	Junko Ozawa	0:05	Download
02	Extend Sound	Shigeichi Ishimura	Junko Ozawa	0:02	Download
03	Coffee Break Music	Toshio Kai	Junko Ozawa	0:11	Download
04	Miss	Toshio Kai	Junko Ozawa	0:03	Download

Credits

Ripper:
Recorder: Doommaster1994
Game Credits:
- Not Credited Composer: Toshio Kai
- Not Credited Composer: Shigeichi Ishimura
- Not Credited Arranger: Junko Ozawa

(Source: Namco staff, game lacks credits.)

Like most early games at the time, the game lacks credits. The arcade version's sound staff has been listed by many official soundtracks, as well as verified by the various Namco sound staff. Toshio Kai did the more musical sounding themes, while Shigeichi Ishimura handled the sound effects. Ishimura was also the game's hardware designer.

Atwiki.jp lists Junko Ozawa as "sound source transplant", meaning she ported the audio from the arcade version's Namco WSG, and converted it to the Famicom's 2A03. They reference this video as the source this YouTube video. The video is an interview that Hamster Corporation did with Yuriko Keino and Yoshito Tomuro about Pac-Mania (ARC), so Keino likely mentioned Ozawa did the NES version. However, it should be translated as to what was said.