Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga, also known under the subtitles 20 Year Reunion and Class of 1981, is an arcade multi-game compilation, developed by Cosmodog and originally released by Namco-America in 2000. The compilation features the games Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga, and was released for the 20th anniversaries of both games.
The Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine would be the first in a series of Pac-Man anniversary machines, which were predominantly designed for the U.S. market. It would be followed by the Pac-Man 25th Anniversary machine in 2004. "Home version" variants of the original machine are still produced today by the Chicago Gaming Company.[1][2]
The arcade machine features both Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga, both of which were developed in 1981 (although Ms. Pac-Man was commercially released in 1982). The original Pac-Man is also an unlockable game, playable by entering a secret joystick combination. Each game can be set (by the arcade operator) to run in its standard mode or its "speed-up chip" mode by default; the other speed setting is accessible by the player with another joystick code.
The Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine adds a "continue" feature upon getting a game over, in which the player can insert another quarter to resume their game (while continuing off of their current score). This feature can also be disabled by the arcade operator.
Unlike with the original Midway cabinets, high scores are saved into the machine's memory, meaning that they will be preserved even if the cabinet is unplugged or turned off.
Codes[]
Pac-Man: On the game selection screen, enter Up, Up, Up, Down, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, Left. Blinky will turn into Pinky, the extra-life sound will play, and selecting Ms. Pac-Man will load original Pac-Man.
Speed adjuster: On the same screen, enter Left, Right, Left, Right, Up, Up, Up, Fire. You will hear the fruit-gobble sound. The speed will be changed to normal or fast (speed-up chip), whichever one is not set by default.
Development[]
Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga was conceptualized following a pitch by Ed Pellegrini to Namco-America. Pellegrini was a co-owner of Atlas Distributing, a Chicago-based "coin-op" company, and previously worked with both Bally Midway and Atari.[3] The initial pitch concept appears to have been for a machine solely featuring Ms. Pac-Man, rather than the eventual concept of being combined with Galaga. The pitch proposal was accepted, though would be published and manufactured by Namco directly (whereas the initial pitch was seemingly for Atlas to handle distribution).[4]
The development of the machine's hardware was outsourced to a Chicago-based "Cosmodog Ltd".[5] Cosmodog was tasked to effectively create a brand-new Ms. Pac-Man board set with identical gameplay performance to the arcade original. Two months into the project, Cosmodog was asked to add Galaga compatibility to the board, in addition to a menu system to switch between both games. Namco did not provide the original source code for either title, resulting in Cosmodog having to disassemble and reverse-engineer the games to be able to run as arcade-accurate as possible. The original Pac-Man was added in towards the very end of development.[4]
All arcade machine artwork and branding was designed by Don Marshall, who was Cosmodog's "landlord and downstairs neighbor".[4] The machine would be officially released by Namco in 2000, just ahead of the 20th anniversary year of the original Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga.
The Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine is noted as being the catalyst for a lawsuit between Namco and General Computer Corporation (henceforth "GCC"). An agreement between both companies, as set in 1983, required Namco to grant royalties to GCC for any Ms. Pac-Man "coin-operated game" sold; however, no royalties were granted to GCC upon Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga's release. This resulted in the former staff of GCC filing litigation against Namco, with Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga in particular being a focal point of the lawsuit.
In the lawsuit, it was ruled that GCC was owed royalties for virtually all use cases of Ms. Pac-Man; greatly worsening the situation for Namco (even going by the initial 1983 terms). However, subsequent "home versions" of Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga - lacking usable coin slots - were released by Namco and the Chicago Gaming Company prior to the final ruling. The court ruled that the "home versions" without coin slots did not apply to GCC's royalty agreement; resulting in Namco using this "loophole" for many later Ms. Pac-Man releases and merchandising (including the later Pac-Man's Arcade Party and Pac-Man's Pixel Bash arcade machines).
Machine models[]
Several different Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine models are known to have been produced. This includes five models based on the original Cosmodog hardware:
Chicago Gaming Company "home version" model.
Original model (2000): uses a near-identical form factor to the original Bally Midway Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga cabinets, the most obvious difference being the much larger 25-inch monitor.
"Cocktail" model (2000): a sit-down cocktail table model, featuring two sets of joysticks on opposite sides.
"Cabaret" model (2001): uses a smaller cabinet design (standing approx. 8.5" shorter) with a sunken-in marquee and a 19-inch monitor, the same size monitor as in the full-sized Midway cabinets. Both coin-operated and "home version" models were produced; on the latter, the coin door is merely a flat sticker with no functionality.
"Home" model (Chicago Gaming Company, 2006): uses the same cabinet as the original coin-op model, but features an imitation coin door instead of the cabaret sticker. Pressing the reject button will open the test menu, and opening the door will access the volume knob and LCD monitor controls. Additionally, this version is powered by a standard computer power cord with an IEC C13 connector instead of the built-in cord on the earlier versions, and there is an on/off switch on top of the cabinet. This model is still produced to this day.[1]
"Bartop" model (2016): A smaller tabletop variant; reuses the cabinet design of a much earlier Pac-Man 25th Anniversary machine model. Only released as a "home version" model without a coin slot.
Depending on the production year of the machines, some releases use CRT monitors while others use LCD monitors.
In 2024, Bandai Namco Amusement America released a "home version" machine titled Pac-Man's Pixel Bash Edition: Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga. This cabinet is a variant of the 2018 machine Pac-Man's Pixel Bash featuring artwork based on the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine.
Trivia[]
While the exact number of machines sold is unknown, Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga is noted as being particularly common in North America. Notably, Namco reported "strong sales" of the machine in the company's 2004 and 2005 financial reports. At least 13,000 machines had been sold by March of 2003.[6]
Due to the customized hardware used, Ms. Pac-Man has the capacity to load 64 sprites on its screen at once, as this amount is required for Galaga; 58 of these sprites are zeroed-out when playing Ms. Pac-Man. Additionally, Ms. Pac-Man (on a technical level) can be played with the background starfield from Galaga enabled.[4]
The explosion/death sound effect in Galaga appears to be re-recorded compared to the original. This may suggest there were issues surrounding the sound effect on Cosmodog's hardware set (notably, early versions of MAME were also unable to emulate the explosion sound).
Earlier revisions of the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga hardware feature slightly incorrect sound in the included games; this is particularly noticeable in the secret Pac-Man game. Some later revisions appear to feature one-to-one sound performance with the originals (save for the aforementioned Galaga explosion).
When displayed in the "attract" sequence, the games' copyright notices are altered to feature the now-defunct web URL "www.namcoarcade.com"; additionally, Ms. Pac-Man is altered to credit Namco instead of Bally Midway. The Pac-Man attract screen (which is only visible after getting a game over in the game) features the proper Namco logo from the Japanese Puckman ROM.
Galaga's attract sequence retains a glitch from the original game, in which the player can take full control of the attract screen (without inserting a quarter) by firing a bullet as the tractor beam appears. However, this bug is not present on later Chicago Gaming Company-built machines.
Some machines feature a minor printing error on the coin door artwork, in which the top-left Boss Galaga has its purple coloring blanked out. This was carried over into the Pac-Man 25th Anniversary artwork.
The Chicago Gaming Company flyer erroneously uses a screenshot of Pac-Man Plus instead of the original Pac-Man, with the bottom level indicator blanked out (possibly to hide the Cola Can from being visible).
"Anti-piracy" flyer based on Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga.
Namco-America is known to have run an anti-piracy ad based on Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga in 2003, possibly issued in response to the bootleg Ultracade machine.[6] The issuing of this flyer is rather ironic in retrospect, given the legal issues that followed; with the ad going so far as to state "Ignorance is not a defense".
Due to the machine's popularity, a number of merchandise pieces have been created based on the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine design:
A handheld keychain version of the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga machine was released in 2018 by Super Impulse, as part of the World's Smallest - Tiny Arcade line-up. The Pac-Man code is intact, but it unlocks Dig Dug instead.
In 2021, for both games' 40th anniversaries, Arcade1UP released a machine model based on Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga. Several further models based on the Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga branding were also released, including a 2023 "Deluxe" model. These machines do not feature the Pac-Man code or include it as a playable game.
Oddly, Arcade1UP also released two "Counter-Cade" models referred to as "Pac-Man/Galaga" - which mimics the design of Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga, but with the original Pac-Man game instead.
Following the release of Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga, Cosmodog would develop the hardware to a similar "Retrocade" Centipede/Millipede/Missile Command machine, which was published by Team Play in 2001. Later variants of this machine would feature a newly-created Let's Go Bowling game, which is still programmed on the original 1980s arcade hardware.[7]
Gallery[]
Flyer for the Chicago Gaming Company "home version" model.
