This page contains the meat of story, but if you're like me, you probably like the free breadsticks better.

When we left this story, the Pac in Time purple-worded introduction had just ended. Or so we thought.



ARRRRRRGH!

How lost can you really be when you're on a one way path with a fence beside it? There's probably a tourist information booth thirteen feet in the other direction. Hey, why is Pac-Man in "the mountains" at all? Only time travel has taken place, and I'm quite sure Pac-Man's house isn't on a mountain at the title screen. Even if it was, and I just have bad depth perception, or it isn't, and a reverse volcanic eruption occured sending rock and magma into the earth, Pac-Man still ought to know his way around to the castle that's

RIGHT OVER THERE.


Pac-Man does a simply marvelous job avoiding those fiendish traps, by the way, because I never encountered any of them. And it's not like there's more than one way to go. Since passage to the next identical area requires that you find EVERY dot, you see all there is to be seen, bore yourself, and slap replay value across the face with a dead fish, all at the same time. You're very talented.

The Pac-Man sprites are fweedee rendered, but I don't know why. Certainly not because it looks good, at any rate. Not that it's even noticable beyond the many varieties of yellow displayed. Not that it was necessary for a simple collection of shapes like Pacman. Pacman's probably even easier to draw than Khar-Bei, and would certainly have won the contest I pretended existed on that other page, but since no one wants to draw Pacman, the point is rendered mut. Therefore, rendered Pacman. I talk to myself.


Pac-man's past is supposed to be dangerous, but I don't recall the older and wiser Pac-Man's self defense capabilities including anything so powerful as fireballs. This must be some of that "danger to self" kind of thing. The game makes you jump through hoops to get this, though. I mean that as in you actually have to jump through a hoop, because that would just be an idiotic line to use otherwise. If you go through again, you lose the power.


I... HAD... THE POWER! This will be important later.

Apparently 1975 was a time that's not only without Pac-Man knowledge, but civilization altogether. Every person in the world being turned against Pac-Man, whom they've never heard of, seemed to be a major plot point, yet all through the game you never meet one of them.

There are ghosts around, of course, but even those don't number so many, so if they do represent people who once lived, I dare say whatever species that might have been was on the way to destruction anyhow. Still, Pac-Man being in such a degenerated, weakened state should be more succeptable to their terror than usual, yes? No. In the original Pac-Man game, the Man could take one hit, and the ghosts always came back. Here, Pac-Man can take many hits, and the ghosts don't regenerate. Additionally, power-pellets outnumber the ghosts at around a 321 contact ratio. Perhaps the best part, is the annoying seven point six eight second invincibility music that plays three times whenever Pac-Man accidentally takes one. And despite the distractful blinking which comes with it, it's not even real invincibility. Non-ghosts are non-affected. Worse, there are so many of the pellets, it's possible to take a second one before the first one stops. You can try to avoid it, which may very well be the game's greatest challenge.


No, no! I've beaten all the ghosts! I don't want it! Must... avoid... annoying music!


DAH! DEW DEW DEWDEW DEWDEW DEHDEH DEW! DEWDEW DADA DEHDEH DEHDEWDEWDEW!
Alright, so it's not as sleep-deprivingly haunting as the first level Widget music, but I didn't even mention that on that page, so let's just act as if it is. It would have to be pretty awful to make me long to hear the regular music again.

Mmm-hmm. The same repetetive music you'd expect from a company who got famous off of games placed in rooms too crowded for audio output to be heard plays constantly (all of it variations on the power pellet music, by the way), not even breaking when you lose a life or complete a section, for 10 LEVELS. 10 long, boring, stupid levels with the same graphics and everything. Not even a palette-swapped background are we spared. While mixing up the level types like every successful game and reducing tedium might hurt the story progression, I dare say it needed a beating anyway. All these levels, and the game doesn't even give you a password after every one of them. It has that Code Name: Viper attitude of "you'll get one if I feel like giving you one." Furthermore, you'll probably miss it when you do get one. Compare the normal level end display with the password accompanyment.

Fortunately, I have savestates.

Pac-Man also always smiles. You saw how his family reacted when he was zapped away. I'd be happy to be away from them, too. However, after a few levels of this game, I'd be miserable again. Pac-Man, however, keeps smiling. In fact, the goal of the game is very much to get back to the family, and not even to shout at them or play mean-spirited pranks once you get there or anything. So I must stay with my initial theory of Pac-Man being a twit. I'll get over it. After some more thought (somebody has to do it), it occurred to me that Pac-Man has been heavily medicated since his last game. With its theme of exploiting Pac-Man's emotional issues for fun and profit, I'm not surprised. You taunt Pac-Man from a safe distance with a slingshot, and he can't do a thing about it, other than scream incomprehensible noises at everything. Pacman really gives autistics a black eye. Don't think that I'm saying Pac-Man is autistic, and ruins their reputation. I'm saying that Pac-Man walks around punching autism sufferers in their eyes. Hopefully me saying that will ruin his reputation.



This game is so dangerous, I'm surprised Geraldo hasn't reported live from it. Please excuse my ten month old reference. When it was conceived, it was only five months old. Come to think of it, this game, and therefore the text in it was made in 1995. I think, then, that it is Geraldo's references to Pac in Time that are outdated. So.


Unlike before, there actually are some traps this time. However, they come entirely in the form of violent plants, which you can't blame the ghosts for. Welsh, you can, but you're wrong.

By this point you've surely mastered Pac-Man's four tricks, and are growing tired of them. You'll be glad to know that the next level expands Pac-Man's repretoire, and presents you new ways of using the old devices. But you shouldn't be glad, because that isn't true, and it's only a video game, besides. You'd possibly assume that being required to switch between an amount of skills equal in number to the amount of primary function keys on the controller is for a reason, but it isn't. (while B is reserved for jump, the 'bubble' only works in water, where the others don't, so the surprisingly uncommon sense would have that activate automatically when appropriate, and it doesn't.)

Hey Norm! Anyone who ever told you cookies don't grow on trees...

should really be punished in some way. Forget whether this picture disproves it or not, that's just plain a stupid and corny thing to say.


If you'd like to learn more about cookie trees, read Cookie Monster and the Cookie Tree, by Franz Gorbo and Aldrea Frapwutch from Gargibliod Press


Here's something fascinating. Conjoined trees. Also called Siamese Trees. Alright, forget it. Let's move on.

Our first proof people are against Pac-Man: Not even Tarzan comes out to help.

The introduction and THE TITLE make a big deal about time travel, but it only happens once, and it's only to 1975. Still, with the right locales and a crazy Tim Follin disco soundtrack it could work. Naturally, as we've seen, neither are present. None of the settings belong in any specific time period, modern or otherwise. You'd expect to see Pacman clubbing dinosaurs or hunting the buffalo to near extinction or retrieving the recipe for pizza or SOMETHING. I wish this game could have been that unoriginal. That contains the word "original," and would be a start. I'm surprised that, with all the games which contain ancient Japan levels, with absolutely no explanation we don't get one here where it would have almost made sense (that list includes Claymates, which wasn't even made by Japanese). Namco should have used Forrest Gump technology (or "Roger Rabbit technology," if we must get technical), so that we might see Pacman participating in the Kennedy asassination or winning a shining merit badge by rounding up some Jews for the local Einsatgruppen branch. This game's just boring. And this paragraph really needs to end.


PAC-LAND UBER ALLES

Ehhh.


That's an understatement. This whole game is forgettable. The only people likely to remember it are middle school teachers compiling "summer reading" lists.

If I saw a temple like this, decorated with statues and carvings of me, (and exploits I hadn't even done yet) sure, I'd be afraid; afraid the denizens would hand serve me grapes instead of freshly picked berries after proclaiming me their god. I don't like grapes. Also: what if the collective jungle plantage bears no leaves sufficiently large to fan me with?

If I truly did have reason to fear for my life, I would have enough sense to me to go around such a place. It might not have a back door to eventually come out of, after all. But these things never occur to Pac-Man here, who only goes forward. Huh, they should call him ZAX-Man.

Also: I have a hard enough time believing Pac Man has a heart, don't insult what intelligence I have by implying he has teeth.

It really is a shame that Pac-Man has a two dimensional brain, for the background of every level in this zone would reveal that the correct path would have involved turning left at the entrance.

Ennyway, forgotten temple presents just as much innovation as the last ten levels did. However, now, in addition to nothing interesting, there are now "puzzles" which can only be solved by doing things there's no reason to try doing.


The button combination which initiates this doesn't do anything for twenty levels, and only does maybe twice again after this.


Even when it will happen, 70% of the time pushing against the thing leads to Pac-Man crawling onto it, or in this case, floating above it.


This statue must be made to throw its ball at the blocks below it. However, in previous levels, angering them has only caused pacmin damage. They must be shot ineffectively before they'll release the destructive spheres. Why would I want that?.


I've seen video game monsters use some pretty stupid projectile weapons, but usually it's not pterodactyls with arrows. I guess Kalisto thought fireballs would be unrealistic (from anyone other than Pac-Man, naturally).


Alright, now that's just lazy game-making.


How would you go about passing this obstacle if you were Pac-Man?


If you were PAC-MAN, you would BLOW BUBBLES into it. Keep this in mind just in case you ever are Pac-Man.


Another quiz: If you were Pacman, and you somehow got to believing you could deflect flames with your wooden mallet, would you strike them in front of you...


...or would you turn sideways and wait for them to get where you're standing, receiving injury in the process? As per contract, Pac-Man chooses the option more likely to leave a player thinking they're giving the game too much creative credit and trying something that can't be done. Luckily, after a few minutes, I just started erratically pressing buttons, which eventually made Pacman do this and get the job done. I have a gift for solving puzzles.

By the way, attempting to stop the flame of any previous hammer either does nothing or gets you 200 points, which does nothing, so there's no incentive to ever try it again. I'm just trying to prove my point. You have problem?


Speaking of dark stain...


hey, bird, aren't you forgetting something?


Ah, there we go. This bird flies fro and to excreting a total quantity I expect is approximately equal to its own body weight in about two minutes. It didn't occur to me from the weird architechture here or the urban district's close proximity to Mayan temples, but seeing this bird's problem I finally realized: Pac-Land is Mexico!

I think the levels were rearranged around, since is the only one that approaches fun, and it was repositioned to make the game seem less depressing overall. Also, it makes more sense for a town to be around a castle, rather than some 150 acre temple. This IS 1975, after all. Temples are so OUT. It should be noted that the castle in the background of every temple level is now nowhere to be seen. This could mean the people who made this game are just as lazy as I've been saying, or Pac-Man is finally facing the right way.


After being very necessary in the completion of the previous THIRTY levels, now would be a great time to point out that Pac Man can use doors.


Pac-Man hating clock attacks also with arrows. If you're unsure whether I mean that the clocks hate Pac-Man or if Pac-Man hates clocks, understand that you'd probably hate clocks if they hated you enough to shoot arrows at you.


Even the gods hate Pac-Man, as is clearly evidenced in this scene. A lightning bolt deployed with such precision skill to strike Pac Man but not the goat-like-creature, who has done no wrong.


Speaking of gods, apparently they're meeting inside this house here.



Either that or the Care Bears. The castle is pretty terrible, but I can't say the sagging, leaning structures are any worse put together than the houses in the village picture.


That was my mistake! All this time, I thought, since the game is such a failure, that I was supposed to fail, too!


Now that I know it's only a trial, I'm gravely disappointed that this game still worked after fifteen days or uses.

Why, if this is the master evil stronghold,


have the ghosts decided to stock a supply of the only thing that hurts them within it?

More why: Why does the castle have cannons? Not defense, anyway. We've already established that the ghosts don't believe in that. Since they've been following Pac-Man the whole way, one of them could have gone ahead and fired off some shots while Pac-Man was outside the gate writing in his third-person diary. So why cannons?


Why, so Pacman can be launched out of them, of course.


Here it is, thy horrific, malevolent, ferocious Gum Monster. I must say, it's hard to be intimidated by someone who chooses to attack me with a raft.
"Gum Monster" was the also the only great fiend in the previous Pac-Man outing, but since that wasn't an action game, we allowed it to pass. And in that game, it made an amount of sense in the context. If Namco wanted to make call backs to the last Pac-Man game, I would instead have advised them to make this one, you know, fun. And then people could say "oh yeah, this 'fun' is from the game this is the sequel to! I can see the connection!" Only one "boss" in the game, and not even a hard one. This is maybe about as hard as those bouncing knights from Zelda 3, but it emits no satisfying pitch modulating groan signifying your victory. The game is over. Tactfully, with the words "over" and "game," not necessarily in that order. So that's it. No final (or even INTERMEDIATE) showdown with the ghost witch, which means no assurance whatsoever that the same thing can't happen again right away. In fact, the thankfully brief epilogue even suggests that the same thing will happen again. Which naturally brings up the issue of "what was the point?" It's as if this game only existed for me to make a page about. I feel so used.



It's always nice to get some closure with the ending.


Gosh, I hope not.