Coleco’s Pac-Man shrank the arcade hit of 1981 into a miniature cabinet for the table top, with marquee, side art and two joysticks.
Its vacuum fluorescent screen shows a red maze of yellow dots, Pac-Man and the monsters, under a green score. It was licensed from Midway, which sold Namco’s arcade game in America.
Interesting facts
A mini-arcade smash. Coleco’s first four Mini-Arcades – Pac-Man, Galaxian, Frogger and Donkey Kong – sold more than three million units in about a year, and Pac-Man alone accounted for 1.5 million. One reviewer recalls it costing about $60.
Big in Japan, by another name. In Japan the same tabletop was sold as Super Puck Monster, billed as a sequel to Gakken’s Puck Monster handheld. Its box carries a © 1980 Namco notice – a nod to Pac-Man’s Japanese birth as Puck-Man.
Lost fruit, new mode. The arcade’s bonus fruit didn’t survive the shrink, but Coleco added Eat and Run, a capsule-carrying dash found in no arcade cabinet. It was later revived as ‘Chase Mode’ on Basic Fun’s Arcade Classics Pac-Man.