Ms. Pac-Man (2600) Review

Date purchased: Sept. 24, 2017
Price paid: $3.99
Dates played: May 19, 2024
Playtime: 1h 51m
Date reviewed: May 19, 2024
Date posted: May 19, 2024
Rating: 8/10

I made it past the level where the fruit is banana, at which point it alternates between the last two maze layouts and has a random fruit. I also made it past the banana level on the three easier modes, getting over 100,000 points on each of them -- I was wondering if the score would roll over at 100,000 (it doesn't, and I wasn't going to keep going until I got to 1,000,000), so I suicided on the easiest mode to end it.

This obviously isn't as good as the arcade version. It has four different layouts (I can't remember how many the arcade version has), changing after every two levels, and 7 fruits. It adds three easier modes, having 1, 2, or 3 ghosts. The biggest omission is the lack of cut scenes. While not as bad as the 2600 port of Pac-Man, there is a decent amount of flickering when at least two sprites are on the same row.

While I've never been a huge fan of Pac-Man games, I do enjoy them in short bursts. This is a decent port and if you own a VCS/2600, it's definitely worth picking up if you like Pac-Man games.