Pac-Man: What makes it so addictive and successful to the game that was born in Japan after eating a pizza

In the game, your task is to control a greedy yellow spot that must navigate dark labyrinths that change constantly, while eat as many coins as possible while avoiding falling into the claws of a gang that always pursues it.

His enemies are Blinky (Red), Pinky (Rosa), Inky (Cyan) and Clyde (Orange), and together they integrate the gang ghost (ghost band).

“Pac-Man (the character) was designed to represent the central concept of the game, 'eating', in the easiest possible way,” Michiko Kumagai, head of licenses for the iconic character in Bandai Namco, the distribution company of the game, explains to the BBC.

“Like the McDonald's arches, it has become an internationally recognized symbol. In a glance, anyone can instinctively understand what Pac-Man means and that is why he has managed to reach such a broad audience.”

Originally called Puckman in Japan, a reference to the Japanese phrase “Paku Paku Taberu”, which means swallowing something with a voracious sound that makes you click your jaw, Pac-Man is the most successful currency game of all time, according to the book of Guinness records.

The character remains a lasting symbol even today, with the franchise generating an estimated income of US $ 14,000 million, both in recreational machines and in dozens of relaunches for domestic consoles.

The game has appeared in all types of platforms, from the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) to the Xbox 360.

Pac-Man, as a character, has also accumulated cameos in recent years in great-budget animated children's films, such as Ralph the Deserter and Pixels. And last month, Bandai Namco launched labyrinth of shadows, a game that offers a new version of the popular Pac-Man.

“Pac-Man is one of the icons of the birth of conventional video games,” says Peter Etchells, professor of scientific communication at the University of Bath Spa, in England. “Its playability and design had an elegant simplicity that, in my opinion, captivated the imagination of many players.”

It is not necessary to be an inveterate player to appreciate the main purpose of the character: you strategically nibble. Its playability is both refreshingly simple and, ultimately, difficult to dominate.

In the original, players could play frantically without knowing much or, like many in the 80s, religiously read a guide on how to win in PAC-MAN that taught to memorize hundreds of complex maze patterns and optimal routes. This tactical preparation prepared you to compete in one of the thousands of PAC-MAN tournaments that have been organized throughout the world.

Etchells states that, contrary to its competitors, this game format was much less focused on the male public and that was one of the main reasons for its great success.

“The creator of Pac-Man, Toru Iwatani, has specifically said that he intended to create a game that everyone could enjoy, especially women,” he adds.

“Pac-Man, and their colorful sequelae as Ms. Pac-Man, 1982, differentiated themselves from the shooting games of the time, mainly aimed at men, such as Asteroids y Space Invadersbecause they focused on a much broader audience. “

Speaking to Washington Post in 2020, the creator of the game, Iwatani, said that he also has deeper links with Japanese culture of what appears to the naked eye.

“I designed the ghosts so that they were simple and adorable. This is inspired by the ancestral Japanese appreciation of the” Wabi-Sabi “, in which people find ephemeral beauty and depth in simplicity. I think that the growing global acceptance of this Japanese aesthetic has made more people also approach Pac-Man.”

In addition to its unique design and its great acceptance between players-hombres and women-from around the world, Pac-Man has also left an indelible mark on the world of science.

Like the tetris, the game has proven to be a useful vehicle for researchers to learn about the limitations of human brains -and even chimpanzees -to solve problems.

A study conducted in 2007 by Dean Mobbs and his colleagues from the Technological Institute of California submitted Pac-Man players to electric shocks every time they were caught by a ghost. “This study used magnetic resonance to observe whether brain activity was modified when ghosts approached too much. And so,” says Tom Garner, a professor of interactive technologies at the Sheffield Hallam University.

And he adds: “The monkeys have also been playing PAC-MAN in recent years. Scientists at Cornell University, discovered a relationship between certain patterns in the ocular movement of the monkeys and their game decisions, while the US National Medicine Library of Medicine of the United States used the PAC-MAN to reveal that macaques can make hierarchical decisions based on strategies, something that was previously believed outside the cognitive scope of non-human animals.

“Video games like Pac-Man have had a substantial impact on the field of scientific research. Pac-Man is a good way to help us better understand how we feel, feel and behave humans.”

According to Garner, the reason why Pac-Man was and remains so loved by so many is the way he uses the theory of Embodiment (or corporate cognition). “In video games, the idea of corporeality describes a sense of connection between the player and the character that blur the boundaries between the world of game and the real world,” he explains.

“Pac-Man was one of the first video games to put the player in the role of a character, not a vehicle. Pac-Man was represented as a living being, even able to communicate audible pain when Blinky, Pinky, Inky or Clyde reached it. All this created a unique link with the player.”

More than 45 years after its launch, Namco Bandai hopes to publicize PAC-MAN among the younger generations with the newly launched labyrinth of shadows.

The new game is set in a gigantic labyrinth that fuses science fiction and medieval aesthetics, where a mysterious figure called Espadachín N.8 is guided by an orb known as Puck, a Gothic and cyborg version of the original PAC-MAN design. This couple can also briefly transform into a Transformers -style warrior robot called Gaia, which allows players to overcome riddles that would otherwise be overwhelming.

The producer of Labyrinth of Shadows, Seigo Aizawa, was a child fan of a child and believes that the new game can keep some of the peculiarities of the original.

“I think that one of the main reasons why the world fell in love with Pac-Man is that it was one of the first games to give their characters true personality,” he says. Each ghost had a different behavior. Like Blinky, the relentless red ghost that chases Pac-Man directly, and Pinky, who prefers ambush from the front. These features were not only described in the Arcade machine, but were integrated into the gameplay through AI and the unique movement patterns of each ghost.

Despite all the plans to maintain the relevance of PAC-MAN, it is the nostalgia factor that maintains its popularity, believes the academic Etchells. Specifically, he affirms, nostalgia for an era of video games that no longer exists in the same way: the culture of game rooms.

“It is a reminder of the days of childhood that we spend playing with friends and rivals between the bustle and the neon of the Maquinitas,” he says. Whatever the reason for its enduring attraction, Pac-Man remains an icon of pop culture, as well as the definitive proof that we can only achieve success when we stop fleeing from our ghosts and began to face them without fear.

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