back in 1983, a new game of challenge and speed swept over the entire world: Pac-man.
Before you think this is another, "ooh, I like Pac-man and there's nothing you can do about it" article, I looked into it, so if you ever need to write a paper for Pac-man, make sure credit goes to me, or else I’ll sue you. That’s right, I went there. . .
Anyway, for the second time in history, Japanese mint had to reprint more yen because of this video game phenomenon alone. By the way, Pac man was originally released in Japan, because Japan gets all the good stuff before us. They make our stuff and think they're better than us. . .maybe they are. . .or maybe we dropped 2 huge bombs on them and make them make our stuff, and now WE'RE the bad guys! Gimme a break...
Pac-man at the time was gobbling more kid’s hours than sleep, and us kids know we love our sleep. Sleep illegal activities.
Anyways, Pac-man, or for you hardcore fans that would bash me if i didn’t call him, PUCK-MAN, was created by the man we know fondly as tohru iwatani (or rather never heard of him and don;t care), inspired by, legend has it, over a pizza missing a slice. Isn’t pizza an Italian dish? Never mind, they take everything anyway. . .hence Pac-man's shape: a circle with a big mouth.
Anybody who’s anybody who's an arcade kinda person would know how ridiculously addicting this game was. That’s why it ate so many quarters, people couldn’t get enough of Pac-man. So, it would seem, America had Pac-man fever. Get it? Pac-Man Fever because it was so hot? Okay, I'll stop....
Anything from toys to blankets, underwear and plates, Pac-man was everywhere.
They even made a candy that would make jason43 go, "this tastes like minty ass"!(read article:ROBOT WARS cards by Fleer) Well, as time would make it, Pac-man fever died down, and the phenomenon known as Pac-man faded. But before it did, one man, Billy Mitchell,Wouldn't let it die through the night. In 1999, he walked into a Laundromat, yes a Laundromat, took A quarter, just one little quater, also known as a "one-night stand" in the arcade culture (Well, not really, but the analogy fits. So sue me...) and started to play Pac-man.
He went on to play for six hours, beating Pac-man, all 255 levels, at a score of 3,333,360 points. That was the last glory of Pac-man. of course, it would have been around longer if the angry house wives would have just left there kids alone, but they had to speak up and go, "we believe that our children are spending too much time in arcades (and we cant get laid or complain about anything else that is as easy as this)", believe it or not, it would be taken to court and, guess who'd win, the judge would rule in their favor.
One of the biggest reasons why we no longer have arcades near every drug-store is the same culprit to bring down Pac-man. I miss Pac-man myself, but if you are fortunate enough to be by an old arcade machine with Puck-man or Pac-man over it's board, be gratified, play a little and reminisce about the good ol'days when you had to sneak quarters from your mom's purse just so you could play PAC-MAN! of course, now you are like, 35, so it would be a little weird if you had to steal silvers from your mom. ahh, what the hell, steal on!
