World's Biggest Pac-Man

World's Biggest Pac-Man is a browser game created by an Australian along with Microsoft and Namco-Bandai.^[1] It is a Pac-Man game which differs from the original by having multiple players playing together in a series of user-created, customizable and interlocking mazes. The game was announced at the Microsoft MIX Developer Conference on 13 April 2011.^[2][3]

The game was built as a HTML5 project for Microsoft's new Internet Explorer 9 as well as a way for Namco-Bandai to celebrate the original Pac-Man's 30th birthday and to promote the future releases of Pac-Man games. A week after launching, it had 13,500 user-designed mazes and nearly 300 million dots eaten. Created as a community tribute to the original Pac-Man, it follows the guidelines that Namco-Bandai originally set for Pac-Man. The project is supposed to be community-driven and a team of moderators keep an eye out for any offensive mazes that might be created.^[4]

Although no login is required to play the game, users who wish to create their own mazes or post high-scores need to sign in using Facebook Connect.^[5] Although created with Internet Explorer 9 in mind, World's Biggest Pac-Man is playable on any browser supporting HTML5.^[6][7]

Gameplay[]

The gameplay for World’s Biggest Pac-Man is similar to classic Pac-Man, but with a few differences. As before, the goal is to eat all of the dots and power pellets in the maze without being caught by the ghosts roaming through it. The number of power pellets is not fixed at four, but is rather determined by the user who created that particular maze. In addition, there are no tunnels; instead, doorways at each edge of the screen allow Pac-Man to travel to an adjacent maze, with a new arrangement of dots and obstacles. Every maze has a fresh set of four ghosts, but they do not use the doorways. The player can move to a new maze without clearing the current one, and can return to an unfinished maze at a later time. The game continues until the player runs out of lives.^[7]

Another distinct feature in World's Biggest is the ability to construct new mazes adjacent to pre-existing ones. To build a maze a Facebook account is required, and is accessed via the Facebook Connect platform. The game also has high score tables that players can attempt to top, either by competing against themselves or against other countries via country rankings. The player also has the option to display high scores online via Facebook.^[5][7]

Ghosts[]

One aim of the game besides eating all the Pac-Dots is avoiding being defeated by any of the four ghosts. Running into a ghost will kill Pac-Man on contact, unless Pac-Man consumes a Power Pellet. These pellets, which can be more or less strategically placed when creating a maze (a minimum of 0 and a maximum of 10 per maze), will make ghosts edible to Pac-Man and turns the table completely, since now the ghosts are running away from Pac-Man instead of him being chased by the ghosts. In the original game the ghosts are hunted in a very defined pattern of Scatter, Chase and Repeat.^[8] Unlike the original, the time the ghosts remain vulnerable does not diminish as the game progresses to the point where the ghosts will only merely reverse direction. If the player leaves a board without completing it, the ghosts will remain immobile in that maze until Pac-Man returns, in which they will begin chasing him again.

Fruits[]

The fruits on World's Biggest Pac-Man give the player the opportunity to earn additional points. The fruits appear upon consuming a certain number of pellets on the current maze and it is not mandatory for the player to retrieve them as they are only a secondary aim and will not affect the completion of the level. By default, the fruit will be a 100-point cherry, and for every maze cleaned of pellets, the next maze attempted will advance to the next fruit and remain until the player finishes another board and the fruit value further increases. Once the player cleans seven boards, the bonus "fruit" will be indefinitely locked at the 5,000-point key until the game ends.

• Cherry, 100 (or 200) points
• Strawberry, 300 (or 400) points
• Peach, 500 (or 600) points
• Apple, 700 (or 800) points
• Melon, 1000 (or 1500) points
• Galaxian, 2000 (or 2500) points
• Bell, 3000 (or 4000) points
• Key, 5000 points

Maze Creation[]

Screenshot of World's Biggest Pac-Man creation tools

World's Biggest Pac-Man offers the option to create your maze and this feature is what defines this game and makes it different from the original one. Users have to be connected to Facebook in order to create a maze, otherwise the levels are only playable for fun and no mazes can be created. Adding a maze to a certain location has been made easy, just hover a pointer to the plus sign which can be found adjacent to other mazes and press create. Instructions are given to the user on how to use the creation tool, where there is a pencil to use for creating walls, dots and power pellets, and a rubber which can be used to remove any mistakes or changes. The creating tool also has a time limit of 60 minutes which is plenty of time for most users to create a maze, but if it is not enough, more than one maze can be created. The user has the option to reset the maze but the time limit does not reset when doing this. Once the maze is finished and the user is happy with the results, they have the option to preview their work or simply just submit it, and it will be added to the vast and growing world of all the other mazes other users have created on World's Biggest Pac-Man. At the moment the game has a grid of over 4,000 x 4,000, which supports over 16 million mazes. Dan Kitzler, of West Covina, California USA, was the first to reach the edge of the "supposed" 4,000 X 4,000 grid on 21 November 2016. He went beyond that grid number, shattering the illusion that the grid only contains 16 million mazes. Dan contacted Ashley Ringrose (website creator), and even Mr. Ringrose does not know the actual size of the maze grid. The maze grid is made up of 25 X 25 (625 maze) quadrants.^[10]

Reception[]

• The Guardian has called the game "an internet hit",^[6] while ABC News has called it a "web sensation".^[11]

High Scores[]

There was a Guinness World Record for "The highest score on World's Biggest Pac-Man". At the time, it was 5,555,552 points which was set by Stephen Kish on 14 August 2011.^[12] They no longer hold such a category on their website. That high score was beaten unofficially by a Twitch streamer known as NewTxtDoc. He reached a score of 11,111,108 over a 25-hour period from the 23 November to 24 November 2020. ^[13]

References[]

External links[]

• Official site
• Microsoft Australia’s news article about launching World’s Biggest Pac-Man
• Current statistics of World's Biggest Pac-Man (not accurate)