Ms. Pac-Man
Ms. Pac Man was a popular video game in the 1980s, the sequel to Pac-Man. It was first released in arcade form by Midway in 1981. Many consider it better than its predecessor. Ms. Pac-Man was originally a hack of the game Pac Man called Crazy Otto. Midway was getting impatient waiting for Namco to release their next Pac-Man game (which would be Super Pac-Man) so they renamed Crazy Otto to Ms. Pac-Man and released it.
The first level of Ms. Pac Man
It added a few improvements over the original:
- Non-deterministic AI for the ghosts, making it harder for enthusiasts to follow set patterns through levels.
- A variety of different mazes used through the game.
- Bonus items (such as cherries and pretzels) entered the maze and bounced through it, rather than appear in a set location as in the original, making the player go out of his way to attain it.
- Brand new sound effects, including a new "death" sound and opening theme.
It was also one of the more successful of early arcade games in the female demographic, which has been attributed to Ms. Pac-Man being a girl - although the Ms. Pac-Man sprite was little more than Pac-Man with eyelashes, a bow, lipstick and a dimple. In many ways, Ms. Pac Man was more successful than the original, and can generally be found in modern arcades with greater frequency than Pac-Man.
The game featured new intermission scenes that showed the meeting, and eventual marriage of Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man.