Pac-Man Museum Plus Review: yellow balls, mazes and ghosts

Although 2021 has already closed its doors for a few months, Bandai Namco does not seem to be of the idea of ​​interrupting the celebrations for the forty years – now forty-two – of PAC-MAN, the yellow circle symbol of arcade gaming and all-round videogames. After the muted debut of PAC-MAN Mega Tunnel Battle (to learn more, refer to the review of Pac-Man Mega Tunnel Battle) and the exploit of PAC-MAN 99 (here is our review of Pac-Man 99 ), two rather curious battle royale experiments, the Tokyo publisher returns today to walk a much less daring path, namely that of the nostalgic collection, churning out PAC-MAN Museum Plus, padded and embellished version of the PAC-MAN Museum released eight years ago. Composed of fourteen titles among the various that have underpinned the long life of the franchise, the collection lands on PC, old and new consoles without the attention that it would be right to expect from an operation of this kind, bringing with it the main flaws of the last edition and making very little effort to enhance the rich – albeit qualitatively fluctuating – heritage inserted within it.

Fourteen in one

To tell the truth we are talking about shortcomings that unfortunately almost all the works have in common “museum-worthy“baked by Bandai Namco so far – for example the recent Namco Museum Archives. The heaviest, as always, concerns the total absence of contents aimed at framing not only the series as a whole, but also the individual games in the selection, from both a historical and artistic point of view.

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Just like in the original PAC-MAN Museum, in Plus you will not find written information that is really useful to deepen the birth and evolution of the ravenous ball eater, nor graphic material or videos that can facilitate that leap into the past that should then be the beating heart of every self-respecting amarcord collection. Without the slightest contextualization, the chosen play experiences simply find themselves placed at random within the walls of a virtual room themed in the style of an Eighties arcade, whose furnishings can still be customized through the collectibles that the software makes available. Changing cabinets, tables and juke box discs is certainly not a who knows how stimulating activity: fortunately, cosmetic trappings aside, it is possible immediately to insert your tokens in the coin-op on duty and, as per old habits, to start to wander through labyrinths swallowing tons of pills, ghosts and fruit. It being understood that not all the episodes of the compilation are immediately usable, whereas some, the most extravagant, require to be unlocked by trying their hand at a certain number of times in the games with slightly more “classic” mechanics.

And here we are at the real, substantially only element of interest of PAC-MAN Museum Plus, that is to say the fourteen PAC-MANs of the old guard selected for the occasion. Now, it must be said that not all of them have passed the test of time in a brilliant way and indeed we doubt that some of them can find space among the preferences of even the most hardened pac-fans.

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We are referring above all to Pac-Land, a side-scrolling platform sincerely in bad shape already at the time of its debut in arcade form, a product even more, today, completely anachronistic; as well as Pac-Man Battle Royale, a challenge for up to four players that, beyond the antiquarian value, now can only pale in front of the most modern multiplayer iterations. It is then necessary to admit that the same PAC-MAN leader, catapulted by force of things among the pixels of the living room screens, nowadays loses a little of its natural bar appeal, as well as Super PAC-MAN and Pac & Pal, followers that are not very different. from the traditional two-dimensional formula.

To find something more delicious you have to rely on the exponents of the brand who try to deviate, each in their own way, from the tracks of “Pacmanian” habits. Not so much Pac-Mania, which limits itself to making the levels isometric and gives the protagonist the ability to leap, nor Pac-Attack, one of the many Tetris-like in the history of the video game.

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The fun grows instead by starting titles such as Pac-Man Arrangement – here present in double version: original (1996) and modernized (2005) – that between unconventional stages, teleportation panels, arrows to shoot and new objects manages to move the competition with a certain effectiveness, or the bright and frenetic Pac-Man Championship Edition, undoubtedly the highlight of the entire package from a purely recreational point of view. Sui generis experiences are then provided to us by Pac Motos, an adaptation in waka waka sauce of the homonymous “thrusting” arcade dated 1985, and by Pac’N Roll Remix, in which Pac-Man becomes a rotating sphere ready to whirl along scenarios in three dimensions. The offer is closed by Pac-In-Time, a nice platform game from the SNES era with a lot of bland storytelling, and PAC-MAN 256, a chapter born on mobile that, conceptually joking with the legend of the infamous glitched level of the founder PAC-MAN , proposes a potentially infinite survival race.