Atari's Jr. Pac-Man - overlooked classic

[kevin_psx]

Forget Pac-Man. Trashy port. Or Ms. Pac-Man. Kiddy game. Jr. Pac-Man is the best Pac-Man ever made for the ole 2600 VCS.

Fast pace
5 different mazes!
Scrolling background -on atari???
Smart ghosts that don't wander aimlessly
Even catchy little music tunes from the primitive noise chip!!!

This is the only version that matches the difficulty and feel of the arcade. I love it!

http://www.atariguide.com//sss/mini-jrpacman.gif

[ubersaurus]

I can't help but wonder if it's TOO hard, though. When I was younger I could never get anywhere in Jr. Pac-Man. Whereas in Ms. Pac-Man, I could at least get to pretzel.

[NE146]

I wouldn't call it overlooked though... especially seeing all the general gushing over it you always see at Atariage.

I think there is a speed hack for it too. In the same way the arcade game became 100% more playable when speeding up jr. Pac, they did the same to the 2600 version. Dunno where it is though.

[Cryomancer]

I seem to have memories of BEATING this game a child. is it beatable and was a leet or am I just remembering it all wrong?

[Arcade Antics]

I seem to have memories of BEATING this game a child. is it beatable and was a leet or am I just remembering it all wrong?
Remembering it incorrectly. It goes on forever, like all Pac-Man games. :)

Great game, but definitely not overlooked. And that's a good thing.

[kevin_psx]

Even when a kid I thought Ms. Pac-man was too easy. Could play for hours - screen after screen. The Ms.Pac-Man Arcade is more balanced - 5 or 6 screens max.

[dcescott]

When I got it I was amazed at the gameplay. In comparison to Pac Man and Ms Pac Man for the 2600 you wonder why the programmers didn't take their time. I know that there was pressure because of Colecovision, Intellivision, Vectrex and others trying to lure consumers in this lucrative market. So I'm sure the executives were pressuring the programmers to slam out game after game.
Thats one thing I hated as a kid (I'm 33 now). The arcade's games were more appealing and great to play. Then when the home version of your favorite game came out on your 2600, you were greatly disappointed. I never played Jr. Pac Man until 3 years ago, I couldn't believe how hard it was but the overall game was sooo much better than a lot of other games that came out. It was a red label so it was released mid to late 80's right? Nintendo and SMS was the competition. Gee I wonder what it would have been like if they slowed down enough I made games like that in the late 70's!

[NE146]

Even when a kid I thought Ms. Pac-man was too easy. Could play for hours - screen after screen.

Yknow the last time I saw someone say it turns out they were playing the one ghost variation LOL ;)

But, I believe you by default :) but you must be really really good... because I've played a lot of Pac & ms Pac in my life and in the 2600 version after the banana stage the red ghost is pretty darn fast and eventually just catches me by sheer chance/bad luck.

My max is only around 180k on the 2600 version and that definitely wasn't hours and hours. Although of course I've seen some crazy scores on 2600 MsPac by others like over there at Twin Galaxies.. holy crap :P

[boatofcar]

Even when a kid I thought Ms. Pac-man was too easy. Could play for hours - screen after screen.

Yknow the last time I saw someone say it turns out they were playing the one ghost variation LOL ;)

But, I believe you by default :) but you must be really really good... because I've played a lot of Pac & ms Pac in my life and in the 2600 version after the banana stage the red ghost is pretty darn fast and eventually just catches me by sheer chance/bad luck.

My max is only around 180k on the 2600 version and that definitely wasn't hours and hours. Although of course I've seen some crazy scores on 2600 MsPac by others like over there at Twin Galaxies.. holy crap :P

Not that anyone would ever exaggerate....not on the internet.... ;)

[kainemaxwell]

Played this for the first time when I got into emulation a few years back. Still enjoy playing it to this day. So much fun and so much better then the other 2 Atari 2600 Pac-Man titles!

[Cryomancer]

I seem to have memories of BEATING this game a child. is it beatable and was a leet or am I just remembering it all wrong?
Remembering it incorrectly. It goes on forever, like all Pac-Man games. :)

Great game, but definitely not overlooked. And that's a good thing.

Does it ever reset or the score roll over or something? I have this amazing sense of accomplishment on that memory, fuzzy as it is.

[Leo_A]

Cryomancer, your memory is wrong. :)

[chrisbid]

its a good game, but the controls are a tad wonky compared to ms pac man

[KingCobra]

I was really hoping that the Namco Museum 50th Anv. would've had Jr and Super as maybe an unlockable :/ but once again Namco has of late been sucking the BIG one!

What is your problem Namco!? :angry: and you know what you get for that? MAME! LOL

[Damon Plus]

My favourite Pac-Man game, it impressed so much is the only game I´ve bought for the system.

BTW, it has 7 stages, not five.

[k8track]

Forget Pac-Man. Trashy port. Or Ms. Pac-Man. Kiddy game. Jr. Pac-Man is the best Pac-Man ever made for the ole 2600 VCS.

I'll agree with you on some points but respectfully disagree with you on others.

Original 2600 Pac-Man? I really did hate it at the time, preferring the far superior 5200 version. But I've kind of gained a weird, perverse affection for it over the years--it's become iconic, after all, and you always hear sound samples from it in various other things. I think what made me turn around a bit was the cool NUON version of "2600 Pac-Man"... it made it seem so legitimate and cool.

I'm afraid I must disagree with you on the 2600 Ms. Pac-Man being a "kiddy" game--it still rocks to this day.

Jr. Pac for the 2600 is indeed one of the great classics for the system (I wouldn't call it "overlooked", though--overlooked classics in my book would be games like Entombed, Name This Game, and Infiltrate). The action is fast and intense, and with four ghosts, extremely hard. The music is by far my favorite part--I'm a big fan of video game music in general, and the tunes on this cart are catchy and wonderful--very true to the arcade.

But--in my opinion, it isn't the best Pac-Man game for the VCS. There is a version of Pac-Man by Ebivision, which is supposed to be quite excellent, but only a very few exist and the ROM is not floating around anywhere, and I've never seen it myself. However, they turned that game into Pesco and released it, which was subsequently hacked back into an outstanding version called "Hack 'Em", which, in my opinion, is THE definitive version of Pac-Man for the VCS, and can certainly hold its own against any other console's version as well.

This version has everything! It's got the original Pac-Man AND Pac-Man Plus, with the Hangly Man maze variations. It's got the original maze with original colors (and green for Pac-Man Plus), and all the original fruit. The sound effects are awesome, you see the points when you eat the ghosts, and it even has the intermissions! Just imagine if Atari had released this at the time.

Check it out here:
http://www.atariage.com/hack_page.html?SystemID=2600&SoftwareHackID=294

[NE146]

Original 2600 Pac-Man? I really did hate it at the time, preferring the far superior 5200 version. But I've kind of gained a weird, perverse affection for it over the years--it's become iconic, after all, and you always hear sound samples from it in various other things.

I'm sure you've checked this out already, but for those who haven't there is a great original 2600 Pacman hack (by the same guy who did Hanglyman Pesco hack). Except he juiced it up with different colored ghosts, new colors, Intermissions, sounds, and made pacman able to face up and down amongst other things. Get it from the end of this thread from Nukey Shay :)

http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=54937

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v48/b2stoys/pac.jpg


I'm afraid I must disagree with you on the 2600 Ms. Pac-Man being a "kiddy" game--it still rocks to this day.

Ditto. Still one of my all time favorite 2600 games :)

[Lord Helmet]

I have played both Hack-Em and Ebi's Pac-Man. No contest, Hack-em is waaaayyyyy better. It is IMHO one of the best 2600 games available, and shows just what the 2600 is capeable of as far as a classic arcade port.