Tw... tw... twenty five?
Oh man... how old that makes me feel.
It seems like just yesterday, the whole world was going Pac Crazy!
But it was some time ago.
I was in fifth grade when the big Pac Man craze was in full swing. EVERYONE was pouring all their quarters in to the game. EVERYONE had to own something with Pac Man on it. There was even a good deal of exposure for our yellow munching friend on the news - I remember it even seemed to get more news spotlight than Space Invaders had a couple of years prior.
I clearly remember Pac Man school folders and binders being easy to spot everywhere as I walked through the hallways or just looked around in class. Pac Man t-shirts were popular. Pac Man pencils, notebooks, Rubix Cubes (yes, there were Pac Man those too!), hand held games (several different versions of them), board games, card games, general medical supplies... just about everything! Ok, I'm not too sure about the medical supplies... wait a minute... YES - there were Pac Man Band-Aids!
I remember those now!
Of course, I was ecstatic to finally play Pac Man at home with... Atari Pac Man. The game was lame - it barely looked like Pac Man and only loosely played like it. Everybody hated it and made fun of it. And everybody owned it and played it ALL the time!
In 1994 while visiting my brother in Washington DC, I took a trip with the family to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. While looking around at all of the old things, there it was... the first of many things to come, that would make me feel like an old guy. You see, as part of American history - as in OLD STUFF, there was displayed the very thing that seemed to modern and new just a few years prior (or so it felt) - a Pac Man electronic game, the one that closest resembled the arcade upright version, was in a display case... as history! I was only in my early-mid 20's, but it did make me feel a bit old I do recall. How can Pac Man be... history? Well, it happens to everything I guess. Time just marches on so damn fast. But it was cool that Pac Man was on display there. Oh how I wanted to play that small replica of the arcade smash! I never did get to play that version of the game. A kid at school had it, but didn't let me play it.
To this day, still haven't played it.
I owned a different version of the game though - another small electronic game. It didn't very closely resemble the game and the rules of it were kind of weird (could only eat dots when traveling left), but it was still fun. I got it for Christmas in 1980 or 81. I still have it, and every once in a while I fire it up to relive some of my childhood memories.
And here it is, my vintage, also 25 years old, hand-held Pac Man electronic game.
While it wasn't the best of the hand-held Pac Man games, I was happy to have it and still am today!
Happy Birthday, Pac Man!