PacMania review - Sega Master System

Wacka-Wacka! PacMan is back yet again - but returns to PacWorld to find everything's gone 3D on him! Unperturbed by this, our yellow spherical hero with the voracious appetite goes on yet another munching spree, out to clear the four levels (Block Town, PacMan Park, Sandbox Land and the Jungly Steps of video pills, and also to see whether he can find Coin World, an all-new secret world.

As you'd expect, PacMan's arch enemy, those pesky ghosts, are back, but Inky, Pinky, Blinky and Clyde have been joined by two new recruits - Sue and Funky, and all six are out to make PacMan's life just as much of a misery as before. The tables can be turned, however, by munching on a power pill, giving PacMan the ability to bite back! If the going gets too tough, however, and Pacman finds himself trapped, he can also jump over the ghosts' heads to escape!

What the Mean Machines staff thought

This has got to rate alongside Gauntlet as the most outstanding Master System conversion yet. Full-screen graphics and an addictive quality result in a game which grabs you from the outset and only lets go when you've played the thing to death! Okay, the somewhat repetitive nature of the game could lead to some players relegating this to the back of the cupboard before long, but fans of the coin-op and nostalgia freaks will absolutely love it.

I've played what seems like a thousand different PacMan games on a thousand different systems a thousand times before, but I still thoroughly enjoyed this. It's incredibly slick, with fast, smooth and colourful graphics and really addictive gameplay. The ghosts are pretty devious, and you have to work out some good escape patterns to keep them off your back - cracking all the levels and finding Coin World certainly takes some doing! Pacmania is one of the most enjoyable, challenging and addictive Sega coin-op conversions yet seen - PacFans shouldn't miss it.

Have your say about this review

Ben Parkinson - 20 Aug 2008, 15:36 GMT

This is the best Pac-Man game ever! (after the original of course)
Even better than Ms. Pac-Man. I neve played this game 'back in the day' but got it about a year ago. Took it home, fired up the trusty ol' Master System and was blown away by how good an 8-Bit 3D game could be.
Everyone needs to play this game.

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