Pac & Pal

released on Jul 30, 1983
by Namco

Pac & Pal is an arcade game that was released by Namco on July 30, 1983 exclusively in Japan. It runs on Namco Super Pac-Man hardware, and the object of the game is for Pac-Man to eat all the items before he is caught by the ghosts. Most of the items are fruits from the original Pac-Man game, with a few new additions. Their value varies, starting with cherries at 50 points, and ending with keys from 700 to 5000 points. The items had to first be unlocked by turning over cards distributed around the maze (instead of eating keys like in Super Pac-Man). Very few cabinets still exist today, and this is possibly one of the rarest Pac-Man titles to find in playable format outside Japan.


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It's just pac-man but shit, I can't tell what I'm doing half the time and the game is just janky as hell

I don't even know what's happening.

yeah I was never a fan of this one

the most notable thing about it is how I thought the green ghost was named miku but her name is actually miru so now it doesn’t even have that going for it

One of the recent reviews for this game said it feels like a weird Rom Hack: yes. It is absolutely a weird rom hack, and the worst part is that its not a particularly fun deviation from Pac-Man. Just a weird one.

Feels like a weird ROM hack of Pac-Man. Feels similar to Super Pac-Man. Not really better or worse than those.

[PAC-MAN Museum+ 3/14]

Huh. They really went and made Super PAC-MAN again. Though there are a few differences and additions here. The unlockable gates shtick unfortunately remains, but there are two new mechanics here to set itself apart. Pac & Pal is just fine, like its precursor.

Firstly is Miru (no, Museum+, I am not calling her Mil), who is a harmless ghost(?) that steals any uneaten fruit and cashes them in so that they're out of your hair. This seems like a detriment at first, and it technically is if you're trying to score high, but in the later rounds, when you're just trying to progress, having one less fruit to worry about can genuinely be pretty helpful. Then there's the special items; these replace the normal Power Pellets from the previous two games with an item that lets PAC-MAN fire a ghost-stunning beam. The differing animations the ghosts have when stunned are very cute and a great detail, and it's neat that some of them are nods to Namco's other arcade games from the same time like Galaga and Rally-X, but these items aren't as generally useful as the Power Pellet. Not helped by the fact that you only get two power-ups per round in this one, compared to four in the original PAC-MAN and six in Super.

This game and Super are basically the same in my mind, because they're the exact same game. Super only really gets a slight edge because the super Power Pellets are fun to use.