Museum of the Game ®

International Arcade Museum® — Killer List of Videogames®

Pac-Mania

Description

A 3-D version of the original classic. A bounce button allows Pac-Man to jump over ghosts. Additionally, there are more ghosts, some of which also have the capability to jump whenever Pac-Man jumps.

Pac-Mania was produced by Namco in 1987.

Namco released 310 machines in our database under this trade name, starting in 1977. Namco was based in Japan.

Other machines made by Namco during the time period Pac-Mania was produced include: Vs. Super Xevious, Toy Pop, Thunder Ceptor II, Thunder Ceptor, Super Sky Kid, Blazer, Dragon Spirit, Final Lap, Galaga '88, and Quester

Specs

Name	Pac-Mania
Developer	Namco (Japan)
Year	1987
Type	Videogame
KLOV/MOG #	8961
Class	Wide Release
Genre	Labyrinth/Maze
Monitor	Orientation: Vertical Type: Raster: Standard Resolution Color: Color
Conversion Class	Namco System 1 JAMMA
Dipswitch Settings	Pac-Mania Dipswitch Settings (user contributed)
# Simultaneous Players	1
# Maximum Players	2
Game Play	Alternating
Control Panel Layout	Single Player
Controls	Joystick: 4-way (up, down, left, right) Buttons: 1 - Bounce
Sound	Amplified Either (Mono or Stereo)
Cabinet Styles	Upright/Standard - 258 lbs

Video Clips

Pac-Mania shortplay by Ivan Paduano

Game Introduction

In this 3-D sequel, Pac-Man gets to eat and run from ghosts in four different mazes, each complete with its own theme music and name. Some of the levels include the LEGO-like Block Town, the original maze Pac-Man's Park, the closed-off top Sand Box Land, and the extremely large Jungly Steps which looks like a bunch of steps.

Play may be started on any of the first three mazes (not available on the Japanese version). Pac-Man can jump over ghosts, but in addition to the original four ghosts, up to four more have been added, depending upon the level. Sue has returned, but she is now colored purple and is aggressive. A green ghost, Funky, has the ability to jump on higher levels, where there are always two Funkies. There is also a silver ghost called Spunky who has the same ability to jump, but unlike Funky, Pac-Man cannot jump over him.

Another new feature in this game is the appearance of special items in addition to the fruit bonuses cherries, strawberries, oranges, apples, bananas, apricots, bells, and keys. These items include candy, hamburgers, ice cream cones, coffee, and two special kinds of power pills. The pills, which appear in addition to the traditional power pills, give Pac-Man more points for eating ghosts and give him extra speed, both of which come in very handy during gameplay.

Pac-Mania KLOV/IAM 5 Point User Score: 1.80 (2 votes)

Fun Factor: 1.65

Overall Like	1.50
Fun (Social)	0.50
Fun (Solo)	1.50
Collector Desire	2.50

Technical Rating: 1.96

Gameplay	2.00
Graphics	3.00
Originality	1.00
Sound/Music	1.00

Personal Impressions and Technical Impressions each account for half of the total score. Within the Personal Impressions category, Like carries a little more weight than the other factors.

Images

Game Logo

Trivia

By sheer coincidence, the Pac-Man TV series, which ran from 1982 to 1983, has a segment called "Pac-Mania".

Miscellaneous

Licensed to Atari Games for US manufacture and distribution.

There are some differences between the Japanese and U.S. versions of the game. The Pac-Man and ghosts floating around the logo in the title screen was added for the U.S. version. Also, Block Town originally had two levels in the Japanese version the U.S. version only has one. Also in the U.S. version, the two additional ghosts, Common and Gray Common were renamed "Funky" and "Spunky" respectively. For this reason, in the Sand Box Land intro, one of the lines says "Funkys at play". In the Japanese version, it says "Commons are playing outside".

VAPS Arcade/Coin-Op Pac-Mania Census

There are 15,211 members of the Video Arcade Preservation Society / Vintage Arcade Preservation Society, 9,644 whom participate in our arcade census project of games owned, wanted, or for sale. Census data currently includes 166,563 machines (6,981 unique titles).

Very Common - There are 97 known instances of this machine owned by Pac-Mania collectors who are active members. Of these, 59 of them are original dedicated machines. 2 of them are conversions in which game circuit boards (and possibly cabinet graphics) have been placed in (and on) another game cabinet. 36 of them are only circuit boards which a collector could put into a generic case if desired.

For Sale - There are 3 active VAPS members with a Pac-Mania machines for sale. There are 2 active VAPS members with a Pac-Mania circuit boards for sale.

Wanted - There are 2 active VAPS members currently looking for Pac-Mania. There are 3 active VAPS members looking for Pac-Mania boards sets.

This game ranks a 28 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census ownership records.

This game ranks a 8 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census want list records.

Rarity and Popularity independently are not necessarily indications of value. [More Information]

Flyers

Technical

The game's hardware is a Namco System 1 board. It uses a three 6809 processors, a 63701 MCU, and many custom ICs. For sound it uses a Namco 8 channel stereo wavedata PSG, a YM3012 DAC, and a YM2151 FM sound chip.

Legacy

Manuals

Pinout and DIP Switch Settings - Pac-Mania Manual — **Pinout and DIP Switch Settings**
(9 pages, 1.4 MB File)

Pac-Mania Schematic Package - Pac-Mania Manual — **Pac-Mania Schematic Package**
(20 pages, 1.5 MB File)

Operators Manual - Pac-Mania Manual — **Operators Manual**
(70 pages, 7.4 MB File)

Additional References (logged in members often see more)

3D Model (External): Dedicated (10eb5941cfa6433bb0540991eede176)

eBay Listings

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