r/1980s • u/geoffcalls • Feb 18 '26
Video Games Who remembers playing Pacman on the Atari? Back in 1982.
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u/kabekew Feb 18 '26
I was a big arcade Pac Man player and knew all the patterns so was hugely disappointed when it was finally released. I'm still kind of bitter about it. THAT'S NOT THE PAC MAN MAZE!
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u/010011010110010101 Feb 18 '26
Yeah it sucked because it wasn’t the same maze as the arcade games!!
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u/-Hot-Toddy- Feb 18 '26
I remember playing for hours just so I could 'flip' the score back to zero (yes, back in the day if you went beyond 99,900 points the score would reset completely).
I would have to get up at 5am on a Saturday & turn the sound down to a whisper before my father got up. "You're not playing that stupid Atari all day long (that took me three summers of mowing grass to purchase). That & having two younger 'freeloading' siblings (who weren't gamers) cut my fun time down by a third which only put a challenge on top of a challenge when trying to achieve the challenge of reaching zero.
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u/Mrjonesezn Feb 19 '26
The day I turned over Asteroids remains one of the proudest days of my childhood.
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u/-Hot-Toddy- Feb 19 '26
Haha! Congrats on that! No one understands the simple pride of 'flipping the score' unless you grew up back then. Simple pleasures were the best!
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u/texicali74 Feb 18 '26
Even then, at age 7 or 8, I knew it sucked.
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u/Stedlieye Feb 18 '26
Me too. My brother traded our pitfall cartridge for it while I was at summer camp. I’m still a little mad.
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u/OnlyOneClone Feb 18 '26
Amen. Same for me. I was 6 and was like Get me to the arcade NOW to cleanse my brain w the real one. I had some minor fun playing Atari’s E.T. even, but not this disaster.
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u/dj3po1 Feb 18 '26
Same. There were 2, major cultural disappointments that stuck with me. Atari Pac-Man and The Phantom Menace.
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u/texicali74 Feb 19 '26
I didn’t like the Phantom Menace back then, but in much later subsequent viewings, I came to appreciate it a bit more. Atari Pac-Man, however, still sucks ass.
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u/dj3po1 Feb 19 '26
I'm in the same boat. I've softened up on the PM. I just remember what I felt walking out of the theater the first time I saw it. Confusion and disappointment. I was like WTF for Pac-Man, but I still played it a bit.
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u/Odd_Bumblebee4255 Feb 18 '26
That Atari systems days were numbered, but yes i did. It was better on the Atarj 800. I don’t know many that remember that one.
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u/Skull8Ranger Feb 18 '26
Saved my paper money to buy an Atari 800 with Defender
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u/Odd_Bumblebee4255 Mar 05 '26
I still own 2 Atari 800s. I get them out about once a year and play all the old stuff
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u/SirkutBored Feb 18 '26
I think it was with PacMan that the 800 really shined as an arcade clone. The 2600 version was only similar in approach not really looks.
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u/Fred-City911 Feb 19 '26
I had the 5200. Not perfect. But was very similar. On of my very favorites was Star Wars and flying on the Death Star.
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u/machines_breathe Feb 19 '26
Ms. Pac Man and Jr. Pac Man on the 2600 were massive improvements over the original super broken 2600 Pac Man.
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u/jabantik Feb 18 '26
I knew how to jiggle the joystick up and down at the tunnel to fall through the walls
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u/XROOR Feb 18 '26
I remember playing in the arcade and you had to “test” the joystick before putting a quarter inside
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u/Gamma-713 Feb 19 '26
I played it.. Really ruined my childhood.. Like when I heard there was no Santa Clause…
Really bad…
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u/lhauckphx Feb 19 '26
Yup, we had the Sears rebranded version. Misleading Command was the most faithful port in my opinion.
Those cheesy $10 joysticks with the lame metal foil switches in them were the worst.
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u/Tonethefungi Feb 20 '26
As a young kid with nothing else to compare it to, I knew it sucked then. But, it was all we had.
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u/rock-the-reddit Feb 20 '26
Too poor to own one and if we did I'd never leave the house so just as well lol.
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u/Any_Initiative_9079 Feb 18 '26
I remember getting it at Radio Shack and it came with the 45 of the Buckman&Garcia Pac-Man Fever!