Pac-Man Connect and Play – 12 Classic Games

I bought this mainly because I wanted to play Super Pac-Man, and it was cheaper than any copy of Namco Museum Volume 2 for the PS1 (the only other compilation I know of with the game). For $16, I guess I got my money’s worth, but like many others have noticed, the joystick is merely okay. The joystick feels quite loose, which is not really good for any form of Pac-Man, where precision maneuvering is a must. Also, the stick makes a very audible click whenever it’s moved, which makes me wonder about long-term durability.Many of the titles included (Dig Dug, Galaga, Xevious, Bosconian) can be readily found on any number of compilations, but this set includes two additional titles (Pac and Pal and Pac-Man 256) which are interesting novelty games. Pac-Man 256 starts the player on level 255 of the game, and by clearing that level, the player can experience the notorious “kill screen” at level 256. I was never good enough at Pac-Man to get this far, so this is kind of a neat addition, although once you play it a single time, there’s not much in the way of replay value. Pac and Pal is a rather odd game that I’d never seen in the arcade. The basic mechanic is similar to Super Pac-Man, but you are accompanied by a “Pal” who will sometimes help you out by taking various eatables on the screen, thereby helping finish a level. By picking up various items from other Namco games (Galaxians, Rally-X cars, etc.), Pac-Man can shoot or belch smoke to disable the ghosts. It’s a very weird game, and I can see why it never really found too much of an audience.Pac-Man Plus is an interesting variant which features some tweaks to the gameplay (sometimes only three of the ghosts turn blue when eating a power pellet, and the ghosts are more aggressive), but I would have rather seen a game like Junior Pac-Man in its place, since that game is also kind of tough to find on any official compilations.

I purchased this as a gift but nonetheless had some time to play with it also. For all of you who want to go old school or who want to relive some old school games, this is for you. It has a short but decent selection of games including some different Pac-Man titles.Even though the item does include some images, I always thought that this was a lot small. Boy was I wrong! This gaming device is kind of big and not very comfortable to hold unless you place it on top of a small table or desk. Since it has square corners and edges if you are holding it after a while it does start to dig into your hands. The AV cord that it brings is not too long, so get ready to be close to the TV unless you have an AV extension. I do like the fact that you can store the AV cables within the device. Since this is a device that contains old games you will get their traditional music and sound.Gameplay is straightforward and simple, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist in order to figure how to play these games. As for the controls, I would have liked a dedicated main menu button or a reset button instead of having to push buttons A and B together. Sometimes this combination does not work properly and I have to end up turning off and on again. Depending on how much you play batteries tend to last pretty well.Since it was a gift, I can’t speak for the other person but I am guessing that they didn’t enjoy it as much because I haven’t heard anything more about it or have seen them play it.

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 I got a jakks 5-in-1 plug and play ms pac man (that’s insanely selling for $150+ now?) when it came out way back when, mainly for Galaga. With age and new technology, it doesn’t work anymore. I saw this one works well on new widescreen tv’s, so I decided to get one. It comes with seven more games, which is nice, but I’m only going to play Galaga. And maybe Galaxian since it’s there. It plugs in using the same component rca plugs, one for video and one for audio, but is in widescreen. Instead of the scores, etc being on top, they’re on the side of the screen. And it looks pretty good on the new screens, especially compared to the old one’s standard definition.It plays really well. For Galaga anyway. Although I still suck at Galaga, it’s definitely better than the 5-in-1, simply for the fact that the fire button is actually on the right side of the joystick. I tried out pac man and much like the old one, the joystick just doesn’t work that well for it. It does okay, but I’m guessing anyone really into pac man wouldn’t be too happy with the yellow guy not going the way they want. It’s kind of the same thing with dig dug and rally x. The rest of the games seem to work okay I guess. With Galaga I don’t notice any delay from the button when firing and the joystick moves well for it, but it only has to go left and right.I do have two issues with it so far. The first seems to be the most common complaint; This thing absolutely sucks to hold when you’re playing. Yeah, it’a supposed to be a pixelated pac man and it looks neat, but apparently that’s as far as they got when they were designing it. The sharp edges and corners make this better suited as a weapon than as a game controller. It’s good plastic and constructed well, just a horrible end result with the design. I’ve been forced to wrap a towel around it and keep it wedged between my thighs while I’m playing it. It’s not a deal-killer but as-is, it’s really uncomfortable to hold and use. The other problem I have, and others may not, is pushing A+B to return to the main menu does nothing on mine. To me this isn’t that big of a deal, because I really only play Galaga so I don’t ‘need’ to return to the main menu. I guess it’s easy enough to just turn it off an on again.Anyway, aside from those two things that I can deal with, I’m really happy with this – just because I can play Galaga and it only cost me $20!

Bought this for my nine year old son, who is very very into “retro games” aka the stuff I grew up with. It has several games, which I was surprised by because I only expected pacman. I guess I didn’t read the description well enough but was pleasantly surprised.It works great, just plug it in and play – that’s it! My TV is a few years old so I worried it wouldn’t work but I had zero problems.Some reviewers complained that it was hard to hold. I didn’t have that problem at all. I held the flat side easily in my left hand while using the joystick and gripped the curved side with my right hand while pressing the A or B button if necessary. My son held it on his lap and used his left hand for the joystick and his right hand for the A or B buttons, without any issues. It actually reminded me of exactly how I held an Atari when I was growing up. The shape of the device never even came up!All in all, I was very pleasantly surprised by this and it has been played almost nonstop for the past few days. It was a HUGE hit for Christmas and I would absolutely buy again.