For the song of the same name, see Pac-Man Fever (song).
Pac-Man Fever is a video game released for the PlayStation 2 and GameCube, developed by Mass Media in 2002.
Gameplay
Pac-Man Fever is very similar to the Mario Party series, and was almost certainly inspired by it to some extent. You, along with three other players, are put on top of a map divided into different tiles. Playing similarly to a board game, the goal is to get your character to the end of the map before anyone else.
Each game's round starts with a minigame - the final score of said minigame will determine how many moves each character will make (1st place = 5 moves, 2nd = 3, 3rd = 2, 4th = 1). When the players return back to the board, they move to their new positions automatically.
Once a player has reached the end, the game is over and players will receive redemption tickets based on how far they got on the board. These can then be used to buy each minigame separately, which can be played in short tournaments outside the main game. Alternatively, once all minigames have been bought, the player can let the tickets tally up to indicate their overall high score.
Tile Functions
Each tile has a rather effective function; these include moving forward/going backward a few steps, losing/gaining/stealing tokens, or playing a single/two-player minigame. There are also store tiles, which allow the player to spend earned tokens on power-ups or a raffle game to earn redemption tickets.
When on a store tile, the player can spend tokens to: move steps forward, move others backward, buy raffle tickets, or gamble to earn more tokens. The three spaces before the goal are raffle spaces for a redemption ticket of the fruit on the space (cherry, orange, and banana). The more raffle tickets you have for the fruit, the better chance you have of winning the redemption ticket. Also, depending on the space you're on, you need to place a certain rank or higher in a minigame.
Characters
Player colors
- Royal Blue = Player 1
- Purple Heart = Player 2
- Thunderbird = Player 3
- Forest Green = Player 4
List of characters
Only two of Pac-Man Fever's playable characters are actually from Pac-Man (that being Mr. & Mrs. Pac-Man themselves), with the rest being from other Namco and Mass Media games.
- Pac-Man
- Ms. Pac-Man
- Heihachi Mishima (Tekken)
- Tiger Jackson (Tekken)
- Astaroth (Soul Calibur)
- Reiko Nagase (Ridge Racer)
Trivia
- Somewhat infamously, Pac-Man Fever does not feature it's namesake song in any way, shape or form. However, it has since been revealed that the game was supposed to feature the song as its main theme, but was removed due to negotiations with Buckner and Garcia falling through.[1]
- There was a planned minigame known as "Dance Contest", which was effectively a clone of Dance Dance Revolution, but it was removed out of legal fear.[1]
- Pac-Man Fever received highly negative reviews from critics, and to-date is the worst rated game in the franchise (even moreso than the infamous Atari 2600 Pac-Man). Despite this, the game was rereleased as both "Player's Choice" (GameCube) and "Greatest Hits" (PS2) variants, meaning it did likely sell somewhat high numbers.
Gallery
Screenshots
Artwork
