Kim's Top 10 PAC-MAN video games!
but before we dive into the games just wanted to let everyone know that this is just my opinion, you can make your own list. With that said I got into the Pac-Man games because of the PS2 game, Pac-Man World 2. It was a fun 3D adventure with an optional arcade area that was filled with retro games. After that I played a few of the Namco Museums and my mom bought me a Super Pac-Man Plug n Play. So I'm pretty up to date with Pac-Lore. I even own the Pac-Man World Re-Pac. I was in a Ms. Pac-Man video. I get baked and play Ms. Pac-Man every weekend.
okay but let's just get to the pacs
10. Pac-Land
Pac-Land, a game that kinda sucks. Don't get me wrong, a platformer that scrolls is pretty cool and considering this is one of the earliest games to do that is cool too... but it's the worst Smash Bros stage for a reason. This game is hard as bricks.
9. Pac-Mania
i love his game. what if Pac-Man was lego? good first level. Also you can jump. making this game have a tiny bit more strategy than just being good at moving.
this game does a lot for the series. for one, it has sue and clyde as two different ghosts and not just a renamed orange ghost like in ms. pac-man. no clyde is the orange and sue is the purple. Plus we get the green ghost funky and the grey ghost spunky. the further you go the more challenging the game gets. eventually it gets too hard to just jump over the ghost since the game will start throwing jumping ghosts at you. it's just pure joy.
8. Pac-Man World Rally
You might be thinking, does this really count as a Pac-Man game and not just a Mario Kart clone? Well I would concede to that pointless distinction, but in this game you do collect dots and fruit and you can eat ghosts.
This game isn't the best kart game ever, go play Diddy Kong Racing or Crash Team Racing or one of the Sonic racing games, but the blending of Pac-Man mechanics and Mario Kart mechanics work pretty well. Just think of Mario Kart Double Dash but with shitty AI and short cuts locked behind fruit gates, kinda like the fruit doors in Pac-Man World 1.
One thing that's kinda cool about the game is its boost mechanic. If you're a bad guy, it gives you this angel ghost dude that can protect you from getting hit by a bomb (this game's version of koopa shells)
7. Pac-Attack
this one is like tetris but yknow pacman. i love it. (fun fact: i have a tetris tattoo.)
thanks to pac-mania and the pac-man minecraft dlc i now imagine these gerters, these vanilla looking blocks, are what mazes are made out of. i love the fairy, it's a good call back to pac-land. fairies are cool they make me think of the wizard of oz and DnD and maybe zelda too and yugioh kinda. i guess tinkerbell too but pixies are not fairies. if only there was some sort of fairy themed cartoon but i can't remember. ah yes the breezies from my little pony gives fairy vibes. just a spirit of nature.
if you want the most out of this game you have to play multiplayer or play the puzzle mode. it pretty neat. the puzzles are easy and the battle mode is pretty good.
6. Pac-Man Championship Edition 2
this game kinda sucks but i respect the vision
the quest mode and the bosses are pretty cool.
i just personally think the 3d action cgi animation ruins the flow of the game. it stops all movement when you were a game about twitch movement.
if you're gonna get this game get it on the switch, the switch port has an exclusive 2 player mode and it's actually really good.
5. Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness
this game rule
the soundtrack alone is worth the play through. that cleopactra theme is great
the story is short and silly. you have to get these crystals and beat a witch and a green pacman looking monster. i love witches. the puzzle are good. the bonus stages are neat. the game is just good ps1 fun
4. Pac-Man World 3
look at this game. it's just pretty.
what can i say about this game that hasn't been said before? it's tonally different from the last two world games, yeah.
but i wouldn't say it's bad. pac-man is happy go lucky and the world isn't that edgy. it has the aesthetics of a shadow the hedgehog or ratchet and clank, but the follow through is just pac-man bouncing through some scenic spots.
3. Pac-Man Championship Edition DX
this might be the best pac-man game ever. you'll hear me say that a lot. but it's got twitch action and rewards you for turning corners with more speed.
this game is better than regular pac-man. it's better than championship edition 1. it's better than championship edition 2. I never played shadow labyrinth but i can say it's probably better than that game too (i actually looked up gameplay of shadow labyrinth and not only is it a metroid clone but it is secretly championship edition 3, maybe this is the best pac-man game ever made)
2. Pac-Man World 2
this is the best pac-man game period. it's such a hard ps2 game near the end. the music is so good. the way it has a pac-man retro collection in it tied to collecting coins in a platformer is so good. Like it's a collectable like a mario star or jiggy or sonic emblem but instead of unlocking more level it unlocks more games to play when you want to take a break from playing the game you're already playing.
i hope the remake is good
my favorite level is the ice skating level (but man is it a bitch to 100% this level)
1. Ms. Pac-Man
if i had to come up with a thematic through line between all the pac-man game it would be decisiveness. every game in this series will reward or severely punish you based on your movement. if you falter in your judgement for a split second it can be the make or break for beating your high score or getting cornered and chomped.
for this reason alone i have to say that Ms. Pac-Man is a better game than Pac-Man. Pac-Man is a good game, dare I say a perfect game. But with one maze layout and predictable enemy AI, it is a solved game. People have tore the original apart. We know everything about the ghosts movement, people wrote books on it, patterns make their way to the internet as simple infographics.
Ms. Pac-man shakes that up. Ms. Pac-Man not only changes layout over time but the ghosts are a bit more random. Not completely unpredictable however. Veteran players know anytime you see an “L” shape in a Ms. Pac-Man maze that you can funnel the ghosts behind you pretty easily like the first Pac-Man
sadly ms. pac is no longer being used as a character these days. but the og game is so good. if you want to know more i'll link you a video by jonii (older video and newer video). i even do a voice over in the "how to say miss" video here
but to make a long story short, namco doesn't completely own the code or rights to the game ms. pac-man. and at games does. so to avoid any mess they just act like ms. pac doesn't exist and we have a new character called pac-mom. i guess it doesn't matter. we can just make fan games. but something feels so off about Ms. Pac only having one real 3D adventure game and an okay 3D maze game (i mean it's fine, Quest for the Golden Maze is like the same energy as Pac-Man Adventures in Time)
I guess I just wish someone loved Ms. Pac-Man as much as I do. I want a sassy feminist 3D platformer protagonist. Oh well guess we have indie games :3