![]() It's pretty safe to say that they didn't turn into prolific game composers or there would be more information about them. It's hard to find out much about either of these men, but I'm hoping more will become available soon. Who created the audio experience? The original Pac-Man's short audio was created by Toshio Kai. Pac-Man theme (some sounding more in tune than others), but the sound effects: eating power pills, the "waka" sound of moving along the screen, change notably between the games. I played many of these! Each version maintains the Ms. Here's a video that shows several different versions of Ms. When you're dealing with a brand like Pac-Man that has so many releases, versions, spinoffs, etc the sound effects aren't going to be the same from one console to another simply based on differences in the audio capabilities. Is this the very first though? Games released a few months later like Donkey Kong would have gameplay start sounds, and I'd have to do more research to definitively say, but I've not heard anything like this up to this point. Coming from an era when many games simply launched into gameplay once you pressed start and the audio experience of the game simply began, hearing a musical prelude to gameplay is pretty huge. Pac-Man is credited with all kinds of things: the first cutscene in a video game, the first video game character, and I think I read somewhere, although I can't find it now, that Pac-Man is credited by some as having the first video game theme song. If you're interested in historical footage, here's some video from Midway as Ms. Many contain game sound effects and lyrics that players would've identified with. The album has a number of songs that I've given a listen to. ![]() Pac-Man Fever, a song by Bruckner and Garcia, was #9 on Billboard in March 1982 (the month before I was born). While John Williams and Henry Mancini already had themes cross from movies and TV to video games, PacLand is unique in being a TV show created about a video game. The theme song for the cartoon became the song for the later game, PacLand. Pac-Man at the end! Pac-Man inspired a cartoon, which I dutifully watched an episode and a half of. Pac-Man, clearly aimed at drawing in women players. Here's a commercial for the Atari 2600 version of Ms. The impact of Pac-Man can't be overstated: think about the Karen Collins essay collection I read last year entitled From Pac-Man to Pop Music a title like that implies that Pac-Man is the beginning, and indeed it was the beginning of the video game phenomenon for many Americans. Consider this: a video game, Pac-Man, inspired a cartoon, Pac-Man: The Animated Series, which then transformed back into a video game, Pac-Land. ![]() ![]() The main theme of the Pac-Man Animated Series (which sounds to me like a version of Turkey in the Straw- conjuring up memories of Steamboat Willie!) would become a part of the game PacLand. Here's Dick Clark hosting a Saturday Morning Pac Preview Party for the cartoon with kids literally screaming about Pac-Man. Pac-Man inspired a Hanna Barbara cartoon, which I dutifully watched an episode and a half of. Who knows exactly why, but it caught on huge in America. In Pac-Man, inspired by a pizza with a slice eaten, you're something else- a character made of video game dreams. In most games at this time, you were a dot, a spaceship, an unidentified FP tank, plane, etc, or perhaps a humanoid character. Pac-Man was so popular in the US, it's kind of amazing.
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