Pac-Mania

Pac-Mania is an isometric maze arcade game that was developed and released by Namco in 1987. It is the ninth title in the Pac-Man series and was the last one developed for arcades up until the release of Pac-Man Arrangement in 1996. Development was directed by Pac-Man creator Toru Iwatani. It was licensed to Atari Games for release in North America.

Pac-Mania is an isometric maze game. The player controls Pac-Man, who must eat all of the pellets in each stage while avoiding the five colored ghosts - Blinky, Pinky, Inky, Clyde, and Sue. Eating large Power Pellets will cause the ghosts to turn blue and flee, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points and send them to the house in the middle of the stage. Clearing the stage of pellets will allow Pac-Man to move to the next.

New to this game is the ability to jump over the ghosts, allowing Pac-Man to evade capture by the ghosts. Later areas of the game will introduce two new ghosts - the green ghost Funky and the steel gray ghost Spunky - which also have the ability to jump. While Pac-Man can still jump over Funky, it is impossible to jump over Spunky. Eating a certain number of pellets will cause a bonus items to appear in the middle of the stage, which Pac-Man can eat up for points. Some of these items will increase Pac-Man's movement speed or double the point values of blue ghosts.

Pac-Mania gained a highly-positive critical reception for its uniqueness and gameplay. It was nominated for "Best Coin-Op Conversion of the Year" at the Golden Joystick Awards in 1987, although it lost to Taito's Operation Wolf. The game sold 1,412 arcade cabinets in North America by the end of 1987, grossing around $2.82 million ($6.22 million adjusted for inflation). Pac-Mania was ported to several home consoles and computers, including the Atari ST, MSX2, Sega Genesis, and Nintendo Entertainment System, the last of which being published by Tengen. Several Pac-Man and Namco video game collections also included the game. Ports for the Wii Virtual Console, iOS, and mobile phones were also produced.