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A Playable PAC-MAN On Google Doodle
Kilrah_il and several other readers made sure we noted Google's tribute to PAC-MAN on its 30th anniversary — a playable game implemented in JavaScript. "'To play the game, go to google.com during the next 48 hours (because it's too cool to keep for just one day) and either press the "Insert Coin" button or just wait for a few seconds.' There is also an Easter egg for those who want to recall one of the first multi-player games, but you'll have to RTFA to find it." This doodle may overshadow the Official PAC-MAN 30th Anniversary Destination.
Insert coin twice to enable multiplayer.
One player is controlled via arrow keys, the other by wasd.
If you have a friend on hand (or some serious ambidextrous skills....) click "Inser Coin" twice and use the WASD keys to control MsPacman!
"...So I hung back and lurked. For 18 months. Can't beat a good old-fashioned lurking."
Google handled approx 88 billion searches in Dec-2009. (88b/31)*2=5.67billion searches in two days. If (conservativly) one tenth of those are work related, that's 567m. If one in ten work related users plays this once for 60 seconds, that's 3.4 billion seconds. 3.4 billion seconds is approximatly 108 person-years worth of productivity. (Which at US federal minimum wage is about 1.6 million dollars). That's a low figure as those who need google to work probably don't earn minimum wage. Now that's power! I personally played for more than 60s....
Windows in 6 Bytes (IA-32) : 90 90 90 90 CD 19
Yes, it works on iPhone. Not very well, mind you, but it is controllable with swipes.
Have a Nice Day, Adobe!
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
They have a bug in the Pacman game.
If you try to do a Google search in the search bar after you're done playing the game, the WASD keys don't work. Even after you do the search from the first page, and the first page of results shows up, you still can't use those keys.
I'm betting that "pcmn" is going to be one of today's hottest Google trends.
I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
The Google PacMan kill screen for you
This is so subtle I doubt anyone else will catch it without looking for it. There's a bug in the original ROMs collision detection with the monsters. The way it works is this - each monster is polled one at a time instead of all at once. That's (part of) the reason you can be partially consumed by the monster instead of merely touching the outside (the collision detection is in the middle) - here's the bug - since it rotates through all the monsters, it's possible to (on very rare occasions) to pass through a monster without harm. I've done this in both Mame and in my home-arcade (full-size stand-up).
The google-doodle - ALSO has this emulated. Now THAT is attention to detail.
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(you don't have a home arcade with full-size arcade games taking up part of the house? Dude - ask the wife - I'm sure she'll understand)