To celebrate the 25th anniversary of its circular superstar, Namco announced this week that Pac-Man was 2004's best-selling mobile game, "on several of the world's leading mobile network operators, including Vodafone in the United Kingdom". The company claims that there have been 'millions' of downloads throughout Europe, Africa and the MIddle East, although is reluctant to be drawn on specific figures.
What's driving these sales is an almost unique mix of nostalgia, brand familiarity, ease-of-use and ease-of-portability. Pac-Man will work on any Java phone, from low-end entry models to the highest spec devices - and everyone knows how to play. But there's more to the lasting appeal of the game than that. Countless psychologists, theologists and cultural commentators have attempted to explain its popularity, and few have managed to extract all its qualities. I like this general overview from Salon.com, but my favourite explanation can be found in an article entitled The Theology of Pac-Man, which asserts that Pac-Man is popular because it symbolises the Christian view of life.
Meanwhile, Namco has promised to send me a handset filled with their current mobile conversions including Mr Driller, Galaxians and Galaga, and I'm going to post short reviews soon. I'm also currently campaigning for them to bring Gaplus and Rally X to Java, but I don't think they're taking me very seriously.
Anyway, here are some Pac-Man facts from Namco's press release. You probably know all of these.
In it's initial year of release over 100,000 PAC-MAN arcade cabinets were sold.
Estimates place the total number of times PAC-MAN has been played at over ten billion
In the original Japanese arcade version, the Ghosts were called Akabei, Pinky, Aosuke, and Guzuta
In the American (and European) versions, the Ghosts were renamed Binky, Inky, Pinky and Clyde
It took until 1999 for the perfect game of PAC-MAN to be played. Florida resident Billy Mitchell cleared every screen, ate all four ghosts with every power-pill, got every power-up and cleared all 256 screens, scoring 3,333,360 points. With one life
PAC-MAN moves 20% faster on areas with no dots
