Pac-Man
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Creepy Pac-Man skeleton will give you nightmares
We're not sure what the fascination with fantasy skeletons is, but if you've ever wondered what Bugs Bunny, Wile E. Coyote, and even Hello Kitty look like without skin, you're about to find out. The artistic talent involved has turned to the gaming world now, crafting this rather disturbing Pac-Man skull. Man, he really has some big choppers, but at least it looks like he's been taking care of them.We'd like to see some more video game characters done up in skeleton form, starting with Mario of course. Who would you want to "bone up" on?
Pac-Man invades Namco Museum Remix on Wii
You remember Namco Bandai's Galaga, don't you? The very mention of it should conjure images of a lone spacecraft darting through unrelenting waves of giant insects, with bullets whizzing by and an unusually pleased Pac-Man rolling past. Oh, you don't remember him being there? That's because you haven't seen Namco Museum Rehash Remix for the Wii yet -- the "Remix" part referring to the inclusion of gluttonous gaming icon, Pac-Man, into every one of the revamped titles.The image above is from Galaga Remix, a point-and-shooter (yes, really) that forms part of the five Wii-vitalized games included in Namco Museum Remix. Others detailed by IGN are: Pac 'n Roll Remix -- Much like the early DS game, Pac-Man has to roll his obese body to the end of the level while overcoming enemies, obstacles and a self-image problem. Pac-Motos Remix -- Pac-Man knocks his opponents out of dangerous arenas. He'll eat them later. Rally-X Remix -- It's a 3-D version of Rally-X, only with Pac-Man driving the car (miraculously sans arms and legs). Gator Panic Remix -- Whack-a-Mole, but with gators. And Pac-Man. Galaxian, Dig Dug, Mappy, Xevious, Gaplus, Super Pac-Man, Pac & Pal, Pac-Mania and Cute Q will also be included, though they'll all have to make due without a "remix." Namco Museum Remix releases on Wii this Fall.%Gallery-3298%[Via Wii Fanboy]
Namco goes insane after too many Namco Museum releases
The major complaint about Namco's Museum series of retro compilations is that they're just too faithful to their arcade counterparts. People don't want exact arcade translations anymore, they want games remade unrecognizably in 3D! They want Pac-Man randomly inserted into every game!At least, that seems to be Namco Bandai's thinking. Either that or they weren't sure how else to rerelease games they're already selling on the Virtual Console. The result is Namco Museum Remix, a set of Namco classics, now with more waggle, depth, and Pac! The remixed games include Galaga, Pac-Motos, Rally-X, Gator Panic, and Pac 'n Roll, which is apparently a classic now despite not even being two years old. For that matter, Gator Panic seems to be based on a cell phone game which is itself based on the Whack-a-Mole like redemption game, and we have no idea what Pac-Motos was originally. Interesting what passes for "classics" these days!In addition to the remixes, the collection includes Cutie Q, Dig Dug, Galaxian, Gaplus, Mappy, Pac & Pal, Pac-Mania, Super Pac-Man, and Xevious. We poke fun at Namco for selling the same games over and over again, but this is an okay selection of somewhat less common stuff! Sorry to everyone who bought NES Xevious on the Virtual Console.Check out our gallery of screens from the remixed games. Some are faithful, like Rally-X, and others are completely incomprehensible, like the image at the top of this post, which is supposed to be Galaga.%Gallery-3280%
Pac-Man + tennis = love
Sure, Virtua Tennis 3 had some strange gimmicks ... like collecting giant pieces of fruit whilst avoiding deadly bouldering tennis balls. But Namco's upcoming Smash Court Tennis looks to out-do quite possibly every tennis game ever made with this utterly brilliant duo of retro-themed gameplay modes. Above, you'll see the rad flavors of Pac-Man infused into the typically high-brow sport of tennis. After the cut, you'll see some equally cool gameplay inspired by the retro groove of Galaga.These simple additions have made this game suddenly shoot up much higher on our radar. For some "regular" (aka "boring") gameplay, don't forget to check out our previous coverage of the game.
Two ninjas and a Pac-Man walk into a Virtual Console
The first ninja turns to his partner in decapitation and says, "You know, I could sneak in and out of this place like a ghost." The second ninja rolls his eyes and replies, "I could sneak in and out of this place like the ghost of a ghost." Pac-Man looks up, shakes his head and says, "WAKKA WAKKA WAKKA!" Guess you had to be there. With the ice now thoroughly broken, we're free to tell you about this week's American Virtual Console releases: Ninja Gaiden (NES, 500 Wii Points) -- Accompany one Ryu Hayabusa in the quest to avenge his father's death. A deadly blade and a handful of shurikens await those that oppose the Tecmo ninja's will. Ninja Spirit (TG-16, 600 Wii Points) -- Accompany one Moonlight in the quest to, well, avenge his father's death. His adventure imparts significant advice to those hoping to father a ninja of their own. Pac-Man (NES, 500 Wii Points) -- Not having a father to be avenged, Pac-Man fills the emotional void with delicious pellets.
How to make a million ... in Pac-Man
Tie that scarf around your head, put on your sweatbands, stock up on energy drinks. Major Nelson wants to help your Pac-Man game for the Xbox Live World Championship, and he's offering a downloadable PDF guide. Most of it involves memorizing patterns -- lots of patterns -- but if you're into a challenge, this 33-page book from 1982 may be up your alley. And before you laugh at someone making a book that long on Pac-Man, just take a gander at the sizes of some of the obscure guides on GameFAQs.[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]
Scoring a million in Pac-Man is cake
If you want to be a real competitor in the the Pac-Man World Championship you'll need to be scoring millions of points. Can't score in the millions? Don't worry, scoring a million points in Pac-Man is a cake walk, piece of pie, and much easier than baking french bread ... really. That is, if you read the Pac-Man strategy guide "Break A Million at Pac-Man" which is based off the 1982 book. What you say? You can't find the book and dislike the 80's? No problem, because Major Nelson posted the strategy guide in PDF form online, so you can learn not only basic Pac-Man strategies, but each level's patterns and simple memory aids to help you earn your millions points. See, scoring a million points isn't all that hard.
Today's typing impaired video: Pac-Man instant messenger
Poor Pac-Man. With those giant oversized mitts of his, how can he get anything done? It almost makes having hands pretty useless. In fact, who gave Pac-Man hands anyhow? Is that a holdover from the Saturday morning cartoon?Major Nelson should know a phone call is more personal anyhow. Pass the power pills and dish out some justice, Paccy.
And now, the 6 Pac-Man contest winners...
After giving a single copy of Pac-Man away yesterday, today we have 6 lucky winners from the 309 commenters. The winning numbers, provided by Random.org, are: 253, 171, 166, 246, 32, 121. Which means that NYBOY07, Nukie, Jared Brown, DjDATZ, Riley420 and Justin A should expect an email sent to them with their redeem code for Pac-Man on Monday. Congrats to the winners and thanks to everyone for participating. Keep your eyes on X3F for future contests and giveaways. Thanks to Uncle Gamer and Gamerscoreblog for supplying us the six codes.
X3F has more Pac-Man to give away
Update: This contest is now over. For a list of winners, click here.Were your hopes dashed earlier today when we revealed the winner of yesterday's Pac-Man giveaway? Were your spirits crushed? If you answered yes to either of these questions, then we have a nice fat ray of sunshine for you! We've scored 6 additional copies of Pac-Man to give away and we're not wasting any time. The rules are the same as yesterday. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post. Tomorrow, we'll select 6 winners at random. We'd like to thank Gamerscore Blog and Uncle Gamer for hooking us up with these fresh download codes. Also, if you're still not happy with the improved odds that 6 copies bring to the table, you can hit up Xbox MVP, Mordeux, who has three copies to give away. There's so much free Pac-Man floating around, it's insane.What are you waiting for? Get commenting!General contest stuff: Only one entry per person. Winners will be chosen at random using a number generator at Random.org. Winners will be contacted via email with individual download codes.
And the X3F Pac-Man winner is ...
Alright, folks, all the entries are in for yesterday's Pac-Man giveaway and it's time to select a winner. As promised, we have chosen the winner at random and that winner is (drum roll, please) doggity! Doggity wins the contest with his incredibly applicable comment, "I love free stuff!" Congratulations doggity, your download code for Pac-Man is on the way. If you didn't win the contest -- and there were a lot of you -- don't fret. It looks like the folks at Gamerscore Blog and Uncle Gamer heeded our call for more free stuff, and we have secured 6 more copies of Pac-Man to give away. We'll host another giveaway later today, so stay tuned!
Free Pac-Man tournament theme available
In honor of a certain Pac-Man tournament that kicked off this week, you can download a free Pac-Man tournament theme from the XBLM. But we're a little embarrassed to say that we couldn't specifically nail down where you can download it other than by clicking on a rotating advertising banner. So, you may have to dig around the Marketplace until you find a Pac-Man ad. We guess it was a little too hard for the XBLM gods to put the theme in the gamer pictures and themes new releases section. Oh well, it's pretty interesting, free, and therefore worth all the XBLM detective work. So give it a download ... if you can find it.
Because we love you, free Pac-Man from X3F
We enjoy nothing more than giving away free stuff. Well, we might enjoy late night walks on the beach just a little bit more, but that's beside the point. The point is this, Godfree over at Gamertag Radio was nice enough to hook us up with a free download of Pac-Man for Xbox Live Arcade. In celebration of the upcoming Pac-Man World Championship, we're giving it away to one lucky commenter. Yeah, we know. It's a retro game and we only have one copy, but it's free! All you have to do is leave a comment on this post. Tomorrow, we'll pick a comment at random and email the download code to the author. Couldn't be simpler. If the odds of winning our single copy frighten you, don't forget that The Xbox Domain is giving away 5 copies. Good luck.General contest stuff: Only one entry per person. Winner will be chosen at random using a number generator at Random.org. Winner will be contacted via email with the download code.
Win Pac-Man, play game, be happy
The kind hearted souls over at The Xbox Domain are caring enough to give away five download codes for XBLA game Pac-Man. Why? Because there is a certain Pac-Man world championship taking place soon and they want you to join in on the fun. Simply post a comment on their news post before April 27th and you'll automatically be entered for the codes. Good luck fellow fanboys and may the wakka, wakka, wakka be with you!
XBLA Pac-Man world championship next week!
Fancy yourself to be pretty good at Pac-Man? Are you really good, like "best in the world" good? Microsoft and Namco Bandai have announced the Xbox 360 Pac-Man World Championship. The initial tournament period will begin on April 25th and last through May 9th. On April 25th the Xbox Live Arcade leaderboards for Pac-Man will be reset and registered gamers will compete for high score. The 9 highest scoring players from around the world will be flown to New York City on June 5th for the final round. Additionally, Pac-Man fans in the US and Canada can compete in the Pac-Man FANatic contest, in which participants will create videos demonstrating why they are the biggest Pac-Man fans around. The winner of the FANatic contest will also be flown to New York as a wildcard entrant (where we imagine he will be instantly eliminated by much more skilled players). We're hoping along with Joystiq that some of the best video entries will wind up on Marketplace.The winner of this grand finale will be crowned by the creator of Pac-Man himself, Toru Iwatani.More details and a few caveats after the break.
XBLA Pac-Man World Championship begins next week!
First announced at the Tokyo Game Show, Microsoft has just released the details of their first-ever Xbox 360 Pac-Man World Championship. In short, beginning next Wednesday, April 25th, the Xbox Live Arcade Pac-Man leaderboards will be erased to provide a clean slate for the tournament. On that date, at 12:01am GMT gamers can visit www.xboxlivetournament.com to register and review rules before they start playing. The top nine players will be flown to New York City for the finals on June 5, with the winner being crowned the Xbox 360 Pac-Man World Champion by series creator, Toru Iwatani. (We suspect they've already got a crown pre-sized for Billy Mitchell.)During a phone briefing with Microsoft's Jeff Bell, corporate vice president of Global Marketing, we asked about the Xbox 360's oft-maligned D-pad. Repeatedly. While Mr. Bell didn't seem to be as acutely aware of the D-pad's tragic shortcomings as many of us are, he did make it clear that, regardless of what controller you use to make it to the championship (MadCatz XBLA stick, perhaps), once there you'll be required to use the Xbox 360 gamepad. If you don't have the gaming chops -- or if that D-pad precludes any you may have had -- don't worry. There's one last chance for you to make it to the finals in New York City: the Pac-Man FANatic contest.
VC Friday: Gods and cavemen
And to think, people say bad things happen on Friday the 13th! Well, that's certainly not true if you're waiting for the news on today's Virtual Console additions. It's a good week to love classic games ... and we know a lot of people who are going to screech with delight at the chance to grab ActRaiser. So what do you think of the Virtual Console so far? Has it delivered, despite any grumbling about pricing? The good stuff just seems to keep coming!Available today: ActRaiser (SNES) -- 800 Wii points Bonk's Revenge (TurboGrafx) -- 600 Wii points Pac-Man (NES) -- 500 Wii points
Pac-Man VS coming to DS via Namco Museum
The GBA connector, one of Nintendo's experiments with integrating its portable and home consoles, spawned only a handful of games: Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, Four Swords Adventures and Pac-Man VS. The latter title had one character play as Pac-Man viewing the classic screen (via the Game Boy) while the other three played as the ghosts in an isometric view on the TV.Namco is revisiting Pac-Man VS in its Namco Museum collection for the DS. The game sports single pack multiplayer and is priced at $20. Other games in the collection include Dig Dug II, Xevious, Pac-Man, Mappy, Galaxian, Galaga, and Tower of Druaga. We're happy paying $20 just for the multiplayer Pac-Man VS action.[Via Evil Avatar; thanks, Sam!]
Pac-man + Mii = Pac-miin
It doesn't take much ingenuity to create Mii versions of celebrities like The Office cast, of The Big Lebowski, and some Japanese guys we've never heard of, but it takes some true inspiration to make the Pac-man face above, complete with frowning ghost facial hair. For those who doubt such a creation is possible with the Wii's somewhat-limited palette of face-creation options, we've included a video of the process after the jump. As for us, we're off to the barber and then the plastic surgeon to make this Mii-inspired dream a reality.[Thanks Luis Camino]
Alex Ward flips out during MTV interview
Did you play EA's notoriously over-hyped shooter, Black? We mean, did you really play it? Enough to understand the subtle geopolitical message that gelled together the very fabric of the game? Would you say you beat the game? If so, don't tell Alex Ward that. As MTV News' Stephen Totilo found out, using such common terminology for completing a game in the presence of Criterion's creative director is enough to warrant a long-winded rant against Western gamers. Between finding hidden messages in Pac-Man and taking absurd leaps in logic when analyzing the speech habits of Americans, Ward spits fire for just under five minutes of insanity. Totilo attempts to get him back on track regarding the plot (or lack thereof) of Black, but even after a few zingers Ward just keeps on trucking. Let's see. An arrogant British man grandstanding about the stupidity of Americans? Yeah, that's real creative. About as creative as Black.
