Ms. Pac-Man: Quest for the Golden Maze is a PC game released in 2001 by Infogrames. It is the third (and currently final) game to feature Ms. Pac-Man as the protagonist, following Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness.
Story[]
"Play Ms. Pac-Man in an entirely new gaming enviorment. Seek out, explore and complete mazes that are hidden deep within an ancient temple. One day, Ms. Pac-Man was discussing the history of Pac-Land with Professor Pac in his laboratory. While on the subject of the Cleopactra region, Professor Pac told the tale of the mysterious Golden Maze, which has remained hidden in the Temple of Dots for centuries. The legend states that only a true great Pacventurer can conquer the terrifying haunted mazes and uncover it. Ms. Pac-Man decided that she is the Pac for the job, and so she travels to Cleopactra in search of this mystical maze." |
While discussing the history of Pac-Land's Cleopactra with Professor Pac, the professor tells Ms. Pac-Man about the legend of the Golden Maze, a mysterious realm hidden inside the Temple of Dots for centuries, and its legend mentions that only a truly great adventurer can uncover the location by going through the haunted mazes inside the temple. Ms. Pac-Man decides to uncover the secret location and heads to Cleopactra in a search for the Golden Maze.
Ms. Pac-Man travels through Cleopactra, and after much depth and exploring through the Temple of Dots, she discovers the Golden Maze and finds the mystical Power Pellet within it, completing her quest.
Gameplay[]
Screenshot of the Quest mode, taking place Inside the Temple of Dots
Quest for the Golden Maze plays similar to the original Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man. The player controls Ms. Pac-Man through mazes to eat all the Pac-Dots within it, while also avoiding the ghosts that roam around them; Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Sue. By eating a Power Pellet, Ms. Pac-Man can temporarily power up and eat the ghosts. The round is cleared when all Pac-Dots and Power Pellets within the maze are eaten. If Ms. Pac-Man is caught by a ghost, the player will lose one life. If the player loses all their remaining lives, the game ends. An extra life is awarded after scoring 100,000 points.
In each of the mazes after scoring certain amounts of points, one of many rhombus-shaped Power-Up panels and Fruits will emerge from the Warp Tunnels. The fruits and power-ups will slowly wander across the maze until they are eaten or disappear through a Warp Tunnel. Eating fruits will give Ms. Pac-Man bonus points and will add the eaten fruit to the fruit panels, located on the left side of the screen. If three of the same fruit are eaten in a row, the Warp Tunnels within the mazes will turn into portals to the Bonus Fruit Maze.
In the Bonus Fruit mazes, there are no ghosts and all Pac-Dots are replaced by the fruit that led to the maze, awarding more points than the regular Pac-Dots (fruit are worth 100 times . In the Bonus Fruit mazes, the player has a strict time limit in order to eat all the fruit within the maze. Should the player succeed in eating all the fruit in the bonus maze, they will earn a Golden Fruit, which is worth 100 times the fruit's normal amount (ex: regular cherries = 100 pts, golden cherries = 10,000 points). If three of any kind are collected, Ms. Pac-Man can enter the special Golden Fruit maze, which follows the same formula as the bonus rounds except Blinky now wanders around the maze, making it significantly harder to complete. If the Golden Fruit maze is completed, the player is awarded 50,000 points and an extra life. If the player runs out of time on either of the bonus mazes, they will be sent back to the main maze with no bonus. Getting a Game Over will also discard any Golden Fruits in possession.
Quest for the Golden Maze features 25 rounds, each with their own maze layout. The areas take place on the road to Cleopactra (On the Road to Cleopactra), finding a way and venturing inside the Temple of Dots (Finding a Way In and Inside the Temple of Dots, 3 rounds and 4 rounds respectively), The Catacombs (5 rounds), dark labyrinths (Deeper and Darker, 5 rounds), the inner sanctums of the temple (Exploring the Inner Sanctum, 5 rounds) and the final area taking place in the mystical Golden Maze (single and final round). The final round, which takes place in the Golden Maze, features no Power Pellets, making it significantly difficult to finish. The game ends when the Golden Maze is completed.
By pressing the "P" key to pause the game, the camera angle can be adjusted to perspective views, or an close-up view that moves along with Ms. Pac-Man. By default, the camera is set to an upright view similar to the arcade Pac-Man games. Pressing the Escape key will allow the player to end the game immediately and get a game over. If the player achieves a high score, they can register their initials on the high score board. The player's progress is saved after every maze completed, and each maze individually can be replayed anytime through the maze select menu within Quest.
Power-Ups[]
After a certain amount of points are scored, Baby Ghost (a small green ghost) will appear on the screen, who is always vulnerable to Ms. Pac-Man. When eaten, a green-colored panel power-up will appear in the center of the maze. These power-ups include:
- Speed Up - Featuring a fast Ms. Pac-Man moving on its panel, Speed Ups will temporarily double Ms. Pac-Man's speed.
- Super Diamond - Featuring a diamond and an S on it (resembling Superman), this power-up will temporarily make Ms. Pac-Man invincible and increase her current mulitplier.
- Rainbow - Featuring a prism reflecting rainbow on its panel, this power-up will make all the ghosts temporarily vulnerable and frozen in place.
- Military Ms. Pac-Man - Featuring a Ms. Pac-Man with a military helmet, this power-up will make all the ghosts vulnerable and frozen in place. Four glowing Ms. Pac-Men clones with blue attire will emerge from the Warp Tunnels and eat the ghosts. If there are ghosts without bodies, the amount of Ms. Pac-Men clones will decrease to reflect the number.
Additionally, two types of light blue-colored, rhombus-shaped power-up panels will emerge from the Warp Tunnels, in a similar manner to the Fruit:
- Score Multipliers - Featuring a number ranging from x3, x5 and x10, these panel power-ups will briefly multiply the current point value of everything with the number associated with the multiplier.
- Grapes - The Grape panel will briefly turn all Pac-Dots into fruit, which are worth more points.
2 Player[]
The game also includes a two-player mode, where two Ms. Pac-Men play simultaneously. The second player controls a Ms. Pac-Man clone with a blue bow, gloves and boots.
In this mode, there are three different mazes to choose from. Each maze does not feature any of the four hostile ghosts. The goal in the two player mode is to eat the most Pac-Dots as possible before the opponent. Like the Quest mode, Baby Ghost will appear after a while; if Baby Ghost is eaten, the Ms. Pac-Man that ate Baby Ghost temporarily powers up and can attack the opponent's Ms. Pac-Man. If the opponent is successfully attacked, the attacked player will be temporarily knocked out and will drop all their Pac-Dots. The game ends when all Pac-Dots are eaten within the maze, with the player having eaten the most Pac-Dots winning the game.
Trivia[]
- Many of the game's levels share names and environments from the previous Ms. Pac-Man title, Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness, such as Cleopactra and the Temple of Dots.
Unused textures within the game files feature maps related to Pac-Man, Pac-Junior and Baby Pac-Man.
- Ms. Pac-Man: Quest for the Golden Maze is the only major Pac-Man game where Pac-Man himself is not present in any form. A handful of other minor titles, however (such as the web game "Find Pinky") also do not feature the Pac-Man character.
- In the game files, there are multiple texture files related to Pac-Man, Pac-Junior and Pac-Baby, indicating the characters were meant to be playable at one point during development before they were replaced by the Ms. Pac-Man clone.
- Quest for the Golden Maze was released by Infogrames following their acquisition of Hasbro Interactive, in which Infogrames also acquired the Namco license that Hasbro held.[1] This makes the game an unofficial part of Hasbro Interactive's "arcade revival" series (alongside Pac-Man All-Stars); it is unknown if any development on the game was initially planned at Hasbro.
- The game was released in Taiwan under the name "3D Pac-Man 2", or "3D Elf 2" (3D小精靈2); this follows the release of Pac-Man: Adventures in Time as "3D Elf" in the region.
- A variant of the game dubbed the "Gold Edition" is known to have been released in Brazil (alongside "Gold Editions" of Pac-Man: Adventures in Time and Pac-Man All-Stars). It is unknown what this version is; it may be a Brazilian equivalent to the Three Pack box set release.
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
Artwork[]
References[]
- ↑ "Hasbro Interactive Acquires Rights to 11 Namco Titles" (https://www.atariarchives.org/cfn/12/03/0062.php)