Do you consider Jr. Pac-Man to be in the Pac-Man Canon or is it the bastard son?

[treismac]

Namco (wisely) opened its arms to the first unauthorized sequel to Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, by Bally Midway, but never let poor Jr. into the Pac family. If my personal experience reflects the greater story, Jr. Pac-Man never really made much of an impact at the arcades. According to Wikipedia, it was only ported to the 2600, DOS, and Commodore 64 with no consoles/computers with Japanese roots, predictably, ever seeing a port. So I'm wondering if any of you have fond memories of Jr. Pac-Man and, as regards the thread title and poll, do you consider Jr. Pac-Man canon?

[Clownzilla]

The only PacMan that I actually have fond memories of is Baby Pacman. Seeing an arcade machine\pinball machine combo was pure magic when I was a child.

[Rickstilwell1]

Definitely canon. Just because it didn't get many ports doesn't mean anything. Pac 'n Pal never got any home ports.

[davidbrit2]

Jr. Pac Man is excellent, and surprisingly tough. You have to use very different strategies with the wide maze that's devoid of tunnels. I'd love to see a wide-screen version of the game that displays the whole maze at once.

Also, the 2600 version is pretty mindblowing. I'd say it's second only to Millipede for technically impressive arcade ports.

[sloan]

It also was ported to 5200 and has since made it to the 7800. Both great ports of Jr.

[Tanooki]

Just because Namco wasn't happy with it doesn't seem to qualify it not being canon. Midway made Ms PacMan too, and they don't spit all over that one, and I really don't care for pick n choose politics so it's really an all or nothing thing on the arcade level. I could see the argument against Prof Pacman on the Astrocade, but Jr Pac Man seems like fair game.

[Urzu402]

Pacman Jr is the result of an affair between Ms Pacman and KC Munchkin.

[BlastProcessing402]

I have fond memories of playing "Pacman Jr" (as I misremembered it for years), one time in the arcade, but I've never once given an iota of though to the canon of the Pac series.