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News PAC-MAN Museum + - Announcement Trailer (Coming May 27, 2022 to NSW, PS4, Xbox, Steam) [Release Date Trailer Added!]

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The English account also acknowledge Ms. Pac-Man


It's a very weird situation... Considering if Pac-Land, Pac-In-Time (and Pac 'n Roll, if keeps the DS story cutscenes) are unaltered in the collection.. I don't understand the need of Pac-Mom replacement
 
VolcanicDynamo said:
Oh wow, those are some great catches! I'll have to take a listen to the Pac In Time soundtrack when I get the chance. And SNES Pac-Attack! I know the two are pretty similar, and hey, one less emulator to have to optimize, but it's neat to see the other version released for once.

It's a cute nod for sure!

...but what if......... 👀
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Oh. I only ever played it on PC, you can't see anything around you in the SNES version.
 
Speaking of Ms. Pac-Man, let's talk Pac-Man Arrangement!

No, not the arcade classic. That PSP game with the same name that's also in this compilation!

It had an ad-hoc 2 player multiplayer mode in the original PSP release. Player 2...was our girl Ms. Pac-Man! Even in single player mode you see her in the credits. There was also a Japanese exclusive plus version with tweaked graphics and sound referencing other Namco arcade games - had a four player mode too! But every subsequent release took it out, and plus never made it out of Japan.

I understand having to not have Ms. Pac-Man due to the GCC rights issues, but I'd take, like, a Green Pac-Man or something over nothing.
Crusters said:
Oh. I only ever played it on PC, you can't see anything around you in the SNES version.
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SNES Pac in Time at least has unique levels. May be worth trying even if you do prefer the PC version!
 
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AgeEighty said:
Namco holds the rights to Ms. Pac-Man the character, just not to the game. There shouldn't be any issues with other games featuring her.
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If that is the case, then who or what the fuck is Pac-Mom? Where does she come from? What is her purpose? If there is no problem using the Ms. Pac-Man character, why invent a new character to replace her for the statues in the arcade? And if she's not a replacement to Ms. Pac-Man, then who is this random original character that seems to be made brand new for a compilation of a bunch of older titles?
 
VolcanicDynamo said:
If that is the case, then who or what the fuck is Pac-Mom? Where does she come from? What is her purpose? If there is no problem using the Ms. Pac-Man character, why invent a new character to replace her for the statues in the arcade? And if she's not a replacement to Ms. Pac-Man, then who is this random original character that seems to be made brand new for a compilation of a bunch of older titles?
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Personally I think you're reading too much into her presence. She's just a character they made to be in this game's arcade hub. It's no great mystery. Why do you even think she's a "replacement"?
 
AgeEighty said:
Personally I think you're reading too much into her presence. She's just a character they made to be in this game's arcade hub. It's no great mystery. Why do you even think she's a "replacement"?
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It's just...weird? All the other statues for all the other characters shown so far are legacy characters - makes sense, this is a compilation celebrating all the Pac-Man games. Then there's this one brand new character that's being used in all the advertising (even as one of the preorder bonus statues!) as part of the ensemble where the Ms. Pac-Man character would go, and...well, yeah, it's a bit odd and it sticks out a little bit.

And if she's not the only character they made up for the statues, then screw it, I'm ready for the wacky new Pac-People they got cooking up for us.

...that being said, I also wouldn't keep this line of thought up if it wasn't, like, fun or interesting to talk about, lol. This isn't me going, "How dare Bandai Namco make a new character for a statue in their new Pac-Man compilation, no buy," it's, "Huh, cool compilation, gonna get it, but that's a pretty weird detail. Given the rights issues, the usage of Ms. Pac-Man has been very specific, and Pac-Mom adds an extra wrinkle to it. Let's go into that."
 
VolcanicDynamo said:
It's just...weird? All the other statues for all the other characters shown so far are legacy characters - makes sense, this is a compilation celebrating all the Pac-Man games. Then there's this one brand new character that's being used in all the advertising (even as one of the preorder bonus statues!) as part of the ensemble where the Ms. Pac-Man character would go, and...well, yeah, it's a bit odd and it sticks out a little bit.

And if she's not the only character they made up for the statues, then screw it, I'm ready for the wacky new Pac-People they got cooking up for us.

...that being said, I also wouldn't keep this line of thought up if it wasn't, like, fun or interesting to talk about, lol. This isn't me going, "How dare Bandai Namco make a new character for a statue in their new Pac-Man compilation, no buy," it's, "Huh, cool compilation, gonna get it, but that's a pretty weird detail. Given the rights issues, the usage of Ms. Pac-Man has been very specific, and Pac-Mom adds an extra wrinkle to it. Let's go into that."
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I mean, what do you think was the thought process at Namco? "It's absolutely critical that we have a female Pac character as a trophy in our game, but oh crap we can't put in Ms. Pac-Man, so we'll just make up a new one with a completely different relationship to Pac-Man and use her instead and fans won't be the wiser"? What fans do they think would be upset at not having Ms. but would be assuaged by just having any lady pac at all?

If they can't use Ms., they just... won't use her. There's no need to replace her. At least not in the hub world.
 
AgeEighty said:
If they can't use Ms., they just... won't use her. There's no need to replace her. At least not in the hub world.
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But... they did? Assuming that there's no other newly created characters, which is what we know so far, and Ms. Pac-man is absent, that's exactly what this appears to be until we have more info.
 
totofogo said:
But... they did? Assuming that there's no other newly created characters, which is what we know so far, and Ms. Pac-man is absent, that's exactly what this appears to be until we have more info.
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That just doesn't make any sense at all. It would be like doing a Mario game where they just randomly replace Wario with like... "Mar-evil" or something, who doesn't look like Mario or have any relationship to Wario. There's no reason to even call attention to the fact that Ms. isn't in the game. There doesn't need to be anyone in her place. Fans would notice, and be more cranky about, a replacement than just no Ms. at all. Namco's not stupid enough to think otherwise.

And we only have one screenshot to go off of as far as I know; we don't "know" anything about what other trophies are in the game. One ss doesn't tell us anything.
 
AgeEighty said:
That just doesn't make any sense at all. It would be like doing a Mario game where they just randomly replace Wario with like... "Mar-evil" or something, who doesn't look like Mario or have any relationship to Wario. There's no reason to even call attention to the fact that Ms. isn't in the game. There doesn't need to be anyone in her place. Fans would notice, and be more cranky about, a replacement than just no Ms. at all. Namco's not stupid enough to think otherwise.

And we only have one screenshot to go off of as far as I know; we don't "know" anything about what other trophies are in the game. One ss doesn't tell us anything.
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So is pac-mom not a new character created for this compilation? That was my understanding
 
totofogo said:
So is pac-mom not a new character created for this compilation? That was my understanding
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Huh? I said she is. But that doesn't mean she's a "replacement" for Ms. Pac-Man. For all we know there are a bunch of other new Pac characters in there as trophies.
 
AgeEighty said:
Huh? I said she is. But that doesn't mean she's a "replacement" for Ms. Pac-Man. For all we know there are a bunch of other new Pac characters in there as trophies.
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this ignores the consistent disuse of the character since the atgames acquisitions of the original game though

there is a clear trend of namco trying not to use ms. pac-man or replacing her outright with other characters. pac-mom is just the latest in a long line of those, and being the only clear example of that in this collection it's really not a stretch to piece together what happened
 
AgeEighty said:
Oh? In what other contexts have they "replaced her outright with other characters"?
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the video i linked outlines it but they outright stopped using the character, and every situation where they otherwise would have included her instead includes a legally distinct new character

when they had the indie creators program, she was off limits and there's examples of a new character named pac-man girl
when the pac-store came around, ms. pac-man wasn't featured on any merch and instead a new character named pac-marie took what would've been her place

there's a clear point in time where they stopped using her, and it all lines up with the lawsuit surrounding the orignal game
 
Boyfriend said:
the video i linked outlines it but they outright stopped using the character, and every situation where they otherwise would have included her instead includes a legally distinct new character
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I watched the video, and I think it seems like a stretch. In all those cases there's nothing to say they are "situations where they otherwise would have included her". Who is the judge of that, exactly?

I don't know what the legal situation with Ms. is, but neither do any of us. And there are examples of Namco calling attention to her. Plus, if they had some kind of plan to "replace" her, why would they use "Pac-Man Girl" in some situations and "Pac-Mom" in others? They'd just invent one character and use her everywhere.
 
AgeEighty said:
I watched the video, and I think it seems like a stretch. In all those cases there's nothing to say they are "situations where they otherwise would have included her". Who is the judge of that, exactly?

I don't know what the legal situation with Ms. is, but neither do any of us. And there are examples of Namco calling attention to her. Plus, if they had some kind of plan to "replace" her, why would they use "Pac-Man Girl" in some situations and "Pac-Mom" in others? They'd just invent one character and use her everywhere.
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i mean, we know the legal situation, the lawsuits are public. namco owns ms. pac-man, but does not totally own her original game.

with what was going on with the series around the time, such as the soft reboot attempt with Ghostly Adventures, the style guide has been in such flux and they didn't have any consistency for the IP, but in all these attempts they clearly make a point not to include ms.

except here, in this one specific game, which they are directly creating, which is explicitly using the original 80s style, and they only have one new character to show for it, and the other notable fan favorite is missing from all footage. occam's razor.
 
Boyfriend said:
i mean, we know the legal situation, the lawsuits are public. namco owns ms. pac-man, but does not totally own her original game.

with what was going on with the series around the time, such as the soft reboot attempt with Ghostly Adventures, the style guide has been in such flux and they didn't have any consistency for the IP

except here, in this one specific game, which they are directly creating, which is explicitly using the original 80s style, and they only have one new character to show for it, and the other notable fan favorite is missing from all footage. occam's razor.
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As I said above, we don't know that they only have one new character. That's one screenshot of one page of trophies. Hell, we don't even know there isn't a Ms. trophy. And it still doesn't make sense that they'd create multiple different characters if they were all "replacements" for Ms. Pac-Man.
 
AgeEighty said:
As I said above, we don't know that they only have one new character. That's one screenshot of one page of trophies. Hell, we don't even know there isn't a Ms. trophy. And it still doesn't make sense that they'd create multiple different characters if they were all "replacements" for Ms. Pac-Man.
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they've shown a decent amount of footage of the arcade customization, in-game gacha and various rewards available, and there isn't much that doesn't directly come from the 80s cast

yes, you are technically correct that we have not seen everything the game has to offer, but if this was going to be launching a whole line of pac-man characters why have we only seen one
 
by the way, in case you didn't noticed, Pac-Mom is spotted in the key art playing in the arcade machines (also used for the cover of the game).
CyberWolfJV said:
Key art! 🥰
FEkocoFXoBYh_nI
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And as discussed here, this isn't the first time Ms. Pac-Man is outright replaced with some made-up character, as Pac-Marie was briefly a thing for merchandise.

The weird thing is, beyond the yesterday's tweet, Ms. Pac-Man as a character is present in 3 (or 4) of the games in the collection, so avoiding her is futille lol

---- Oh, on other news, seems we DO have a physical NA release! Up for pre-order on Amazon (Xbox ver)


but Switch and PS4 also are getting it physical prints
 
Boyfriend said:
they've shown a decent amount of footage of the arcade customization, in-game gacha and various rewards available, and there isn't much that doesn't directly come from the 80s cast

yes, you are technically correct that we have not seen everything the game has to offer, but if this was going to be launching a whole line of pac-man characters why have we only seen one
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Because that's the nature of not seeing everything. Did they go through the whole trophy list? Or even more than that one screen and a few others? Do we know how many trophies there are?

I'm not saying Ms. is in there, but I think calling Pac-Mom her "replacement" is a stretch.
 
AgeEighty said:
Because that's the nature of not seeing everything. Did they go through the whole trophy list? Or even more than that one screen and a few others? Do we know how many trophies there are?

I'm not saying Ms. is in there, but I think calling Pac-Mom her "replacement" is a stretch.
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i mean, agree to disagree but at some point you've got to look at the evidence in front of you. we have this single new character taking up the same character role as this other established character who is conspicuously missing, to the point that the new one is even on the box art without any other new characters present.

you can split hairs about "replacement" but she very clearly seems to be taking the position that Ms. would have taken back in the 90s.
 
Boyfriend said:
i mean, agree to disagree but at some point you've got to look at the evidence in front of you. we have this single new character taking up the same character role as this other established character who is conspicuously missing, to the point that the new one is even on the box art without any other new characters present.

you can split hairs about "replacement" but she very clearly seems to be taking the position that Ms. would have taken back in the 90s.
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I don't see it, especially since the roles aren't the same. If they were replacing Ms. they wouldn't make the new character Pac-Man's mom.

You're right, though, agree to disagree.
 
AgeEighty said:
If they were replacing Ms. they wouldn't make the new character Pac-Man's mom.
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I'm fairly sure that's not what they're going for here. Rather, she's Pac-Mom to Pac-Man being "Dad". That makes her a suitable replacement for Ms. Pac Man who was often characterized as the mother / wife figure.
 
totofogo said:
I'm fairly sure that's not what they're going for here. Rather, she's Pac-Mom to Pac-Man being "Dad". That makes her a suitable replacement for Ms. Pac Man who was often characterized as the mother / wife figure.
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Seems like a stretch to me. Mom to who then, bearing in mind that Jr. Pac-Man exists in the same legal limbo as Ms.? Have we seen a "Pac-Child"?
 
AgeEighty said:
I don't see it, especially since the roles aren't the same. If they were replacing Ms. they wouldn't make the new character Pac-Man's mom.
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This might be the big point of disagreement. You're reading "Pac-Mom" as "The mom of Pac-Man." The others, myself included, are reading "Pac-Mom" as "Pac-Man's wife, the mom of Jr. and Baby Pac-Man." Which one is true? Will we also get a Pac-Dad? I guess we'll have to wait and see.

AgeEighty said:
Seems like a stretch to me. Mom to who then, bearing in mind that Jr. Pac-Man exists in the same legal limbo as Ms.? Have we seen a "Pac-Child"?
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And this is where things are weird - we've seen statues of both a Jr. Pac-Man and a Baby Pac-Man in the launch trailer, so clearly Bandai Namco has no qualms with using those characters or some equivalent characters.

I think my whole sticking point for this whole Ms. Pac-Man thing is, if Bandai Namco is allowed to use her or wanted to use her, why not show her? We've had two trailers and a good amount of promotional material. We've seen the rest of the core Pac family of characters represented as statues, including all of them lined up together, but no Ms. Pac-Man - only Pac-Mom. You would assume that Ms. Pac-Man is the most popular and well known family member outside of Pac-Man himself, so why exclude her? They're even drawing attention specifically to Pac-Mom. She's part of the launch bonus, and the only people bound to care about that are hardcore Pac-Man fans who would notice the difference. Why put her there? Could've been Gold Pac-Man E to match Gold Pac-Man D. Could've been another one of the ghosts. But no, it's Pac-Mom.

So here are the possibilities as I see it:
  1. Both Ms. Pac-Man and Pac-Mom coexist as statues. They're avoiding showing Ms. Pac-Man - potentially to not draw attention to the fact that Ms. Pac-Man the game isn't available on the compilation. Come launch day, we'll see both statues in the game. But would not showing the status vs. showing the statue really make a difference? People are already bummed about no Ms. Pac-Man game, a statue wouldn't make much of a difference, especially since Ms. Pac-Man is already a small part of the other games in the compilation.
  2. Pac-Mom is one of many new Pac characters created for the Museum. She is the one they are focusing on for the advertising. But why not show off more? Why place the one brand new character alongside the rest of the Pac Family where Ms. Pac-Man would normally be placed? And furthermore, would fans really care about a bunch of statues of new characters in a nostalgia compilation? Maybe it's just me, but while it's cute, I'd probably just go for the existing iconography.
  3. The Ms. Pac-Man statue is not there at launch. Similar to the original Pac-Man Museum, Ms. Pac-Man will be made available later as DLC, with a Ms. Pac-Man statue added in later as a bonus. Given that AtGames and Bandai Namco don't seem to have the best relationship, this is doubtful, but sure, let's have some fun.
  4. Pac-Mom is the only new Pac character. Bandai Namco, who has tried many times to come up with a "replacement" for Ms. Pac-Man, is once again trying to do so, or this is some elaborate redesign attempt. Pac-Mom is positioned in place of Ms. Pac-Man in both the announcement trailer and launch bonus to compensate for not using Ms. Pac-Man.
Honestly, out of the possibilities, Option 4 sounds the most plausible to me. Regardless of which option is closest to reality, however, I think whatever they choose will say a lot about what Bandai Namco either can do or wants to do with the Ms. Pac-Man character in games.
 
The only way I can see them including Jr. but not Ms. is if some part of the sealed settlement between Bamco and AtGames differentiates them. After all, AtGames has seemed uninterested in doing Jr. cabinets. But Bamco is unlikely to have had an interest in doing things that way given that Jr. and Baby have a lot less cachet than Ms.

I dunno. The whole "Pac-Mom is Pac-Man's wife" thing seems weird. Like, what a strange way to identify her. That's her whole identity? Being a mom, but not to the main character? It only makes logical sense to me in relation to Pac-Man himself.

I guess we'll see, but if Jr. and Baby are in there, I doubt Ms. has been left out. I don't find it strange at all that she didn't happen to have been showcased yet.
 
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I wish we were getting a recreation of Baby Pac-man (the game, not the character lol) in this. I had the pleasure of playing that in a bar a few years back on a somewhat broken machine and really enjoyed the combination of digital + physical game in it. It's a pinball game where you play pac-man up on the monitor.
 
totofogo said:
I wish we were getting a recreation of Baby Pac-man (the game, not the character lol) in this. I had the pleasure of playing that in a bar a few years back on a somewhat broken machine and really enjoyed the combination of digital + physical game in it. It's a pinball game where you play pac-man up on the monitor.
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I had a chance to try out Baby Pac-Man a few times. It was at the short-lived Orlando Pac-Man Cafe, and the Barcade in Manhattan on W24th used to have it, too. It's a strange game, not one I'd choose over the Ms. Pac-Man machine right next to it, but it was very interesting.

While it would never happen, it would be great to see a compilation of all the "lost" GCC/Bally Midway Pac-Man games - Jr., Baby and Professor. Might as well throw Plus and Ms. in there too. Or maybe I'm just giving AtGames too many ideas...

Though honestly I'd prefer a remake of Jr., that would be so much better with widescreen than scrolling...
 
Uuuh.... Ms. Pac-Man is really dead



I guess we'll see if they also will make sprite edits for the other games in the compilation that features her;
 
CyberWolfJV said:
Uuuh.... Ms. Pac-Man is really dead



I guess we'll see if they also will make sprite edits for the other games in the compilation that features her;
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And there it is - as we all suspected, Pac-Mom is our replacement for Ms. Pac-Man. Bummer. Though I gotta say, she looks a lot better with the Pac-Man style eyes as opposed to the weird feminine eyes they gave her (and Baby Pac-Man) in the statues. If we were gonna have the conceit that "Oh, this is Ms. Pac-Man but redesigned", this subtler take is a lot better, though I still miss the design elements they used for JP Ms. Pac-Man's look.

Notably, though, "Ms. Pac-Man" isn't the only one that's affected here, either - they changed Baby Pac-Man, too! She had a red bow and a tuft of hair in the original, and a binky in her mouth.

timthumb.php


...now she has the modern design that's in Pac-Man Museum +. I guess Ms. Pac-Man took the original Baby Pac-Man in the divorce.

At this point, I expect every visual reference to Ms. Pac-Man to be updated to Pac-Mom, and every instance of Pac-Man's kids to be updated to the new looks as well. Not super extensive edits to proportions, but enough to change clothes items and colors. Very curious to see how the intro of Pac-In-Time fares.
 
Just a little bump.. I won't be able to get this at launch sadly, but I'm rather curious about the Ms. Pac-Man vs. Pac-Mom situation... If anyone here gets it next friday, could you please share screenshots on the altered games? The Pac-Man Twitter account has been sharing clips of each game on the lead for release, but they obviously avoided any footage where Ms. Pac-Man would pop up,

Not unlike SEGA avoiding Sonic 3 footage with music on Sonic Origins; that's a trend...
 
I was excited to find out this is coming to Xbox Game Pass day one. I'm looking forward to checking it out. Especially the entries I haven't played before.
 
Would anyone want an ST for the title, or will we just use this thread for discussion? I could whip one up a few days before launch.

I plan on getting the game around launch but I might not have the time to play it day of, since I'll be busy that day.
 
Maronic03 said:
Is this not getting a physical release in Europe? I can't find it on the usual online retailers.
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The NA version seems to be up on Amazon from my end 🤔

VolcanicDynamo said:
Would anyone want an ST for the title, or will we just use this thread for discussion? I could whip one up a few days before launch.

I plan on getting the game around launch but I might not have the time to play it day of, since I'll be busy that day.
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I'd be down for an ST, if you plan to have something special for the introductory post, sure, go ahead!
 
So I got most of the ST text set up. There's no listing for the game on the eShop, which has made information gathering harder, but I'll update things with the official listing later. I'll let this one come in a bit hot - aiming for a Wednesday release? I'll formally request it tomorrow (or I guess later today at this point?).

...I also may or may not have included a full section dedicated to the Ms. PAC-MAN/PAC-MOM situation, lol.
 
VolcanicDynamo said:


PAC-MAN MUSEUM+ is reportedly already released in Japan. I can see the eShop listing on the JP website, which helps for the ST.

Said ST will be up later today. I just need a good ST title...maybe a Pac pun? A Ms. Pac-Man joke? Not sure.
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Pac-Man museum+|OT|The truth behind Puck-Man
 
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