conversion capers

which pac-mania port wins out?

zx spectrum

■ Despite the Speccy version lacking in colour – with only Pac-man coloured differently – and using a windowed display, it’s an accurate version of the original that is particularly notable for the fantastic AY music on 128k machines. The scrolling is jerky at times, though. Atari st

■ This Atari ST conversion only uses half the screen to display the actual game, but apart from that it’s a good effort. The graphics here are vivid, with great colour choices, nice shading and slick animation. It also benefits from Ben Daglish’s superb Yamaha music rendition, too. sharp x68000

■ Those with some prior knowledge about this 16-bit Japanese powerhouse will probably be unsurprised to hear that this conversion is right up there among the very best Pac-mania ports. It appears to be pretty much arcade perfect in every single way. A stellar effort. Amstrad cpc

■ Amstrad fans were short-changed with little more than a port of the ZX Spectrum version, only much slower and with even less colour. Pac-man has even lost his iconic yellow colour in this iteration. The scrolling is even worse, too, and the controls feel incredibly sluggish. AMIGA

■ The Amiga version of Pac-mania is one of the very best out there. It’s fullscreen and almost identical to the original arcade game. Our only minor quibble comes with the slightly remixed renditions of the music that aren’t a patch on the original soundtrack. nes

■ Perhaps the first thing you will notice about Tengen’s NES port is that the perspective has been altered, appearing to be from a more overhead angle.

This doesn’t spoil the game too much though and in all other aspects the NES translation is more than competent. Mega drive

■ Given this version is playing on a

16-bit machine and was programmed by Tengen, which had full access to the original source code, you would expect Mega Drive Pac-mania to be slick right? And you would be right; it’s pretty hard to pick any holes in this conversion. commodore 64

■ Despite there being some challenges with the C64 displaying the isometric visuals, Grandslam did a decent job. The status panel is nicely tucked into the bottom of the screen instead of the side. The SID music is nice but not as good as the Yamaha compositions. Acorn Archimedes

■ Krisalis’ 32-bit Acorn iteration of Pac-mania appears to be a port of the Amiga version. Like its fantastic Amiga predecessor, the Acorn Archimedes port of Pac-mania is presented in fullscreen, is fast-moving and has an excellent rendition of the amazing soundtrack. Master system

■ This version smashes it’s 8-bit rivals. Although the sprites are a little weedy and the music is a little lacking, the graphics are fullscreen and the control is spot-on. There is also the added bonus of a new secret level that doesn’t appear in any other version. Msx

■ Another Spectrum version port here, with some minor differences in the colour shades due to the hardware’s palette, otherwise it’s pretty much indistinguishable. This isn’t such a bad thing, of course, especially when the decent soundtrack is ported over too. Msx2

■ The original MSX version of Pac-mania might have been nothing more than a Speccy port but Namco’s own MSX2 effort is a different story. While the graphics are an improvement, the scrolling is distractingly jerky and the music is disapointing. game boy Advance

■ Appearing as part of Namco’s own Pac-man Collection, the GBA conversion is almost a perfect handheld iteration of Pac-mania. We say ‘almost’ because our only bugbear is that the screen is zoomed in far more than it needs to be, meaning it’s hard to avoid the ghosts. ps3/xbox 360/pc

■ This final conversion appears as part of Namco’s own Pac-man Museum compilation for the last-gen machines. All these versions use emulation to play the original in all its glory, meaning the only real change you’ll notice is using a controller instead of the ball-topped joystick.