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Perfect score in Pac-Man
Christopher Sypal writes "It seems that nobody has ever been able to get a perfect score in Pac-Man (or at least with solid proof) until now.
" Ya know I don't know if this is a hoax or not, but I don't
care. Its just to strange.
Back in those days, a game was designed and implemented by a single wizardly programmer. The code of the game was less than 64K bytes - mind you, that's a LOT of game logic on an 8-bit processor if you know how to write tight code.
Because it was designed and implemented by a single person, the arcade game of that era was very tight, very cohesive. Every feature, every pixel, every movement, was there because a programmer - THE programmer behind the game - thought of it. In some sense you were exploring the soul of the programmer when you played the game.
Today's games are far too complex for a single person to create. So you license a 3D engine here, grab some AI routines from a previous project and tweak them til they work, license some animation from XYZcorp, get some music company to write tunes, etc. Games designed by committee are just not the same; a game today doesn't represent the overarching vision of a single artist.
All were grand, mystical, things that captured the imagination. Feats of man over nature, with cleverness taking the prize.
The more efficient diesl locomotive replaced the steam engine, but without the grandeur. A modern fuel-injected engine is more efficient and reliable than an older engine, but is incomprehensible.
The 8 bit machines had the same beauty; building a working computer out of parts meant to control traffic lights and microwaves was an act of genius. And the contortions made by programmers to maximize performance were similar acts, marvelous as much for having been done as for what they actually been accomplished.
But those days are gone. *sniff*
I did. I think it was the only Crazy Climber machine in Jamaica but We got the pose together to go "on strike" at the arcade.
... but I don't recall. For Galaxian we used a tag team though. Switching between rounds.
They had just raised the cost of playing from 20c to 40c and the best players took each of the games and ran it into the ground all day. I played a total of 5 games of Crazy Climber in ~6 hours. I also ran a 4+ hour stint on a pinball machine with 3 other players. The Packman, Galaxian and Donkey Kong hackers each did amazing things too.
It was especially cool how Galaxian lets you earn spare flags and after 10 you get a large flag and after 10 of those you get a cup. That day I saw what 10 cups give you
PS : The protest was futile. The prices stayed. The Management bargained with us and a few concessions were won. Ohh to be young and carefree again.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
Perfect Score in Gauntlet? Probably not possible. Tho' I tried... Eight hours on one quarter, once. Ah, to be 11 during the summer again...
"Mitchell purposefully arrived on July 1st -- Canada's Day -- and won the title in time for the Fourth of July. He even wore a red, white and blue, Star-Star Spangled Banner tie to emphasize the patriotic sentiments behind his efforts."
I'm working on finishing up a web (pseudo-)programming project this evening to meet a deadline, getting all stressed out knowing I'm not going to make it, and when I read that, I just laughed my ass off!
Right on, fellow American! Do us Proud!
*cackle*
Repton and Repton 2 were both ported to the Spectrum. I don't know what the ports were like.
We had a BBC Micro in my form room at secondary school for a couple of years. We used to play Repton during lunch hour. I didn't rate it all that highly; I was never really into Boulderdash-type games. We had the BBC port of Arkanoid as well. That was cool.
My secondard school days were my "golden age" for gaming. What with the BBC Micro at school, and my Spectrum at home, I got a lot of games played. I don't play nearly as many games these days. My time gets soaked up posting stupid messages to Web forums :-)
After asking a couple of people here, and a quick chat with Walter Day from Twin Galaxies, this makes a bit more sense. :) :)
While I still remember the score overflowing, nobody else does, so feel free to ignore me on that respect. The score mentioned on the site is the exact score possible if you complete each level perfectly(every dot, blue ghost, etc) before the game crashes at the final level. Some slashdot readers here with a good memory also brought up the point about some levels having differing scoring potential. Quickly figuring things out myself, the score they have listed seems correct.
So, it seems this all is quite possible, although definately more work than I have patience for anymore.
Kevin Day
Midway Games
(speaking strictly for myself, not my employer)
(and incidentally, someone here at work still has a box of a certain PacMan pasta dinner in his office...)
It's been a while since I've played PacMan, i don't think this is possible.
After you pass 250 levels, an overflow existed, which would make the game essentially unplayable. A screenshot of what happens at this point is here.
Assuming at best 20,000 points per level, 5,000,000 is about the peak. However, if I remember right, the score would overflow at 2 million.
In any case, some of us bored people in school played long enough to crash the game at level 250 years ago, and it's nothing new.
If anyone really wants, i could try to ask around at work about what score the overflow happened.
Kevin Day
Game Programmer
Midway Games
(no, I had nothing to do with PacMan.. before my time)
If this feat was actually done, was there a programmer's easter egg at the end? Also, how do we 'actually' know how many boards there were, and how many points are _really_ possible?? I knew a girl who new how to do certain 'patterns' of eating the dots, and she could go on forever. She would get her fill of the game and leave it 'running' when she left. I always thought that there was only one pacman version - not any 'later' versions. Is this feat for the 'original' pacman???
These are important questions that need answering.
It's not sick, it' hardcore.
Max score per board in Pac-Man is something like 20,000 points. (That's eating each ghost 4 times on each power pill and chomping 1 5000-point bonus fruit.) 12,000/board is a little more realistic for an awesome player. But anyway... it's an awesome achievement, kind of like eating 28 hot dogs in 30 seconds.
Give a monkey a brain and he'll swear he's the center of the universe.
I do not believe this to be a hoax for a variety of reasons.
;)
E XT=931240958.1977679960&hitnum=13 . (I'm not sure how to get a more specific ref from deja, forgiveness if that breaks.)
b le-monsters).
First of all, I know the book exists. I saw it in a bookstore once and was amused to see scores of mine from recent pinball tournaments in it.
Secondly, there was much hoopla, at least in rec.games.pinball about this event (probably in other groups like rec.games.video.arcade* too). One such message from one of the organizers is hopefully at http://x21.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=472947745.1&CONT
Thirdly, there most certainly is a maximum score to Pac-Man. The game crashes at Stage 256 (if you didn't know that by now, what kind of nerd are you??), so there is a finite end. I don't know the exact numbers involved offhand, but with a little knowledge (dots*10 + 4*50 for energizers) * 255, that's the basic eating score. Add to that 2 cherries * 100, 2 strawberries * 200, 4 oranges * 400, etc. for all of the fruits. For all boards where the energizers actually turn the monsters blue (they stop after awhile), add (200+400+800+1600)*4*(number-of-boards-with-bluea
The only hard part after awhile would be setting up the monsters for the perfect kill every time. Clearing the boards is simple rote, as has been demonstrated years ago, as the first Pac-Man ROMs didn't have randomness or anything. So after the last working-energizer board, the game is essentially DONE except for the sheer work involved.
There is one muddy point, and that is the settings or ROMs of the games. The original game, for example, had long blue periods for the first 3 boards, whereas the newer ones were long-medium-short-longish. The first game would obviously have a higher top score, as there would be more available blue boards.
Anyway, hopefully this mostly debunkified this as being a hoax. I for one am pretty convinced it is legit.
I probably should've elaborated more in my previous posting (see first thread), but there are a couple of factors here.
;)
;)
The technical explanation is the "stage" byte keeps getting incremented until it hits 0. When the game goes to look up settings for stage 0, it reads garbage and goes haywire. Nice table.
(For those that aren't aware, a similar thing happens in Galaga. After Stage 255, comes Stage 0. Except in Galaga, you can still move and shoot, the starfield still moves, but Stage 0 never disappears and no enemies ever show up. This is a feat I personally actually managed to accomplish on a "fast-fire" Galaga. I believe I wound up with something in the 3M range. It would be a significant exercise, but you can compute the theoretical maximum of Galaga, too.)
Anyhoo, the score will in fact wrap at 1M. There's not really any way to know, except that someone witnesses the fact that it did, each time. If they have it on tape, I'm sure you can see each time it rolled. The high score stops counting, since your score is now "below" the new high score. I rolled a Pac-Man once using patterns found in video game books back then, but I was never good enough or cared enough to play to the "end." I assume the scores were kept in BCD, but I don't know for sure. I am aware of similar circumstances in solid-state pinball games (it's pretty obvious what it takes to roll an electro-mechanical game).
As far as scores/level, it will tend towards 13000 or so. Say ~200 dots (2000) 4 energizers (200), 2 keys (10,000) for 12,200/level. Figure out how many dots there are, and you can figure it out for sure. I think keys start at about the 20th level or so, and ghosts won't turn blue after 25-30, so at least 200 levels will be as I described above. On levels you can eat monsters, there are 12000 points there (200+400+800+1600)*4. So the scores will vary early on from 12000-14000/level up to 25000/level, but most levels will be 12000-13000 or whatever the number is.
Keith Johnson
Game Programmer
Williams Electronics Games, Inc.
(I played Pac-Man when I was 8-9 or so)
You mean when I beat this in 4th grade I shoulda *told* somebody? Doh!
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
Maybe it's because I'm an adult now, but I've always felt the classic video games were superior to today's games. So many of the modern games seem to rely on graphics and sound, with little else to enjoy.
I consider Gauntlet to be the all time arcade game myself... nothing I've seen since, compares.
Castle Wolfenstein and Castle Wolfenstein II rocked. Nothing like playing it for the first time, and suddenly you see Hitler. It scared the shit out of me.
The Apple II rocked for games. Anyone remember Hard Hat Mack? I still think Wizardry I is the all time great RPG game.
Maybe Linux will bring a renaissance to classic games. With it's growing popularity, and minimalist feel, we could see a resurgence. Maybe a Wizardry type game...
Anyone remember a text-based adventure game (a la Zork), where you played a detective and had to find a killer. There was a butler named Fong, and it took place in a mansion... I never solved it, but I'd kill to know who the killer was. Me and my best friend spent like an entire summer playing that game, never being able to win it.
Anyone have the source for Lemonade Stand around somewhere?
gutterface
after digging through their website looking at tournament schedules, i noticed there was some videogame/pinball competition held in littleton, CO on April 26, 1999. so that's what those kids have been doing with their days off from school :)