Pac & Pal (1983)

Look: 7/10 I took a bit of a step back chronologically to play this one cuz I somehow missed it, I assume cuz it doesn't have pac-man explicitly in the name? It's your usual Pac-Man affair when it comes to the Look. I think I'm biased toward Ms Pac Man's colors, due to nostalgia, but this one's colors were quite nice too.... Kinda. I like the look of the power-ups tho? Oh, and maybe I just didn't get far enough but I wish there were the cute little interlude scenes. At this point in the game, the enemies were becoming faster than you so you couldn't necessarily flee away, so I started losing my momentum. I figured it was a good opportunity to take a screenshot, since it's hard to screenshot in these fast-paced arcade games.

Sound: 8/10 I like how delicate and relatively quiet the music is, especially compared to most 80s arcade games. This was critical for me, cuz I'm still recovering from my concussion heh. Cute jingle during hi score entry too.

Play: 8/10 At first I was skeptical cuz I didn't really enjoy the powerup additions of Super Pac-Man, but I kept trying... again and again. I definitely feel the powerups were better executed in this one. And I was real proud of how far I got! I usually consider myself bad at games ha, but felt pretty good at this one. The powerups helped me feel like I had a way to "fight back," which I always appreciate: I've gotten to the point where I can't get into platformers where your only defense is to wait and avoid, I need a way to fight back! Heh. One negative is, I wish they included the "wraparound" feature for the mazes (maybe some of the later layouts do?). And I can't claim I love the seemingly randomized "card" feature, especially with it usually opening doors across the way, but I did like how the image on the card was what it opened the door for and I liked how Pal can steal your stuff unless you catch up to Pal ha. Added a cute little touch that didn't have a huge cost (you still can clear the level, just not get as many points). Only frustration with Pal was sometimes, when it was real fast-paced and crowded, I would think she's an enemy and waste time fleeing from her ha. Well-balanced imo, surprised this got so much hate. Super Pac-Man deserved that hate more so, imo

Feel: 8/10 Quite addictive in the end. I actually lost all 3 lives twice, and yet still replayed it, which is quite rare with games--so I have to give it that. Still, I can't deny it's essentially the usual Pac-Man format (which I've never had a huge love for), simply with better-done power-ups than Super Pac-Man. Very good for a Pac-Man game, and without the bias I have for Ms Pac-Man from nostalgia heh.

Attachment: 8/10 As per usual, my initial goal was just to beat the pre-existing MAME Machine hi score (30k Score), and hit game over twice. On my third playthrough, with just one life, I just kept going! Surpassed 30,000 then 40,000 etc. Sign of a good game, even if maze action arcade games aren't my favorite genre. I am quite proud of how far I got with that third playthrough, most of it with just one life left heh (turns out it was 2 lives cuz you have one more life after all the extra Pacs are gone). Apparently it was Round 10 (the hi score part tells you)

My husband is only letting me do 20 minutes of screen time at a time, then ice/rest in a dark room to help with this concussion heh. I snuck a bit longer for this one :) mwahaha. It was a nice, fun surprise and I thank Reset_Tears for turning me on to it! I definitely could see this as a pick-up-and-play for get-togethers, especially since most people don't know this Pac-Man sequel, and one I will show my brothers.

Completion: Round 10, Score 65, 780 Playtime: ~40 mins