Character Analysis: PAC-MAN (V1)
Background
Name: PAC-MAN
Age: 44 (As of 2024)
Height: 5’4” | 165 cm
First Appearance: PAC-MAN (May 22, 1980)
Likes: Chomping Ghosts, Eating, Power Pellets, His Family, Crack
Dislikes: Evil Ghosts, Not Eating, AtGames
Pac-Man, arguably one of the most iconic video game characters ever. While we might not think much of his original game nowadays, the impact that it had on video games as a whole was massive. It was the first video game to feature the use of power-ups, and was one of the first games to showcase using a main character, showcasing the potential of having characters in your games. What would be considered the first gaming mascot ever, Pac-Man would go on to keep releasing games, whether they be sequels to his original maze chasing adventure, re-imaginings putting him in new worlds, or something else entirely, Pac-Man would go on to have over 40 Years worth of material, all of which will be examined here.
Before We Begin…
Update:
Pac-Man as a franchise has been going strong for over 40 years, this means he has various games, TV Shows, soft-reboots, and cameos in other series. As for what we will be looking at, essentially everything, but of course there will be exceptions. For example, we won’t be giving Pac-Man his crossover with things like Kamen Rider, Tekken, Smash Bros, Sonic Dash, Mario Kart Arcade SP, etc. Basically we are giving him everything except his crossovers.
(Also real quick: I'm basically pasting this all from a google doc into Blogger, so if something breaks, I'm sorry)
Power-Ups
(Quick Note: Not literally every single power-up will be listed, some are just re-skins of other power-ups or are so inconsequential that it’s not really worth mentioning, at least in a vs sense. This also applies to later sections such as equipment
Also I might accidentally miss stuff given how much media Pac-Man has, in which case… whoops)
Ok. real quick, this section is gonna be LONG, I am going to format it a bit differently to make it more easier to digest hopefully.
Equipment
The Artifact
An ancient artifact that kept the planet safe from evil. It can shoot a laser that can instantly vaporize its enemies.
Space Board
Allows Pac-Man to fly into deep space at fast speeds, it can shoot lasers that can destroy asteroids and enemies. Even ones as big as King Galaxian
Magic Pen
A Magical Pen that can bring drawing to life. It can also be used to seal drawings and turn them back into Ink. Some examples of drawings are Pac-Man drawings, arrows, walls, and bombs.
Wing Shoes
Gives Pac’s jumps a boost in height
Golden Fruit
Allows Pac-Man to turn into Golden Pac-Man, giving him a boost in strength.
Kart
Wouldn’t be a 3D platformer series without a Mario Kart ripoff. A standard kart with what you would expect from a racing game. It can drift, boost, and make use of multiple items.
Such as:
Ghostly Adventures - Equipment
Blaster
Shoots rays that can either stun or destroy ghosts
HoverBoard
Allows Pac-Man to take flight
Lemon Rocket
A rocket in the shape of a lemon, it can allow Pac-Man to travel far distances in minutes
Pac-A-Chini
A rocket in the shape of a zucchini. It allows for deep space travel as well as being able to travel through time through sheer speed.
Berry Dispenser
Allows Pac-Man to carry multiple berries, which offer many abilities and forms.
Forms
Planet Pac
Pac-Man, with some form of reality warping, can make himself as large as Planet Earth.
Super Pac-Man
Pac-Man can make himself bigger through various means, he can consume Super Pellets, transform himself at will. He can physically crush ghosts, and grants him invulnerability from ghosts.
Golden Pac-Man
After using the Golden Fruit, he turns himself into Golden Pac-Man. It gives Pac-Man a boost in strength, allowing him to fight on par with Spooky, and even seal his spirit after his defeat.
Pac-Mobile
After collecting enough Power-Pellets, Pac-Man can transform into the Pac-Mobile. In this form, he transforms all of his opponents into Ghosts, running into them will consume their soul. Though this form only lasts 8 seconds.
Ghostly Adventures - Forms
Fire Pac
After eating a Fire Berry he turns into Fire Pac. He can shoot fireballs hot enough to incinerate ghosts, can melt ice, and glide for a while.
Pac-Kong
After eating a primordial Power Berry, he turns into Pac-Kong. He becomes larger and physically stronger, however he becomes highly animalistic during this form.
Ice Pac
Turns into Ice Pac after eating an Ice Berry. He can shoot ice that is cold enough to freeze ghosts and even lava. He can also extend a hose-like tube from his mouth which can shoot ice blasts.
Rubber Pac
After eating a Rubber Berry, he turns into Rubber Pac. He has the properties of a rubber ball, allowing him to bounce into high places, and bounce off walls.
Granite Ball Pac
After eating the Stone Berry, he turns into Granite Ball Pac. In this form, he is a giant boulder-like ball. He can roll, dash and crush enemies in this form.
Balloon Pac
After eating the Inflate Berry he turns into Balloon Pac. He can move around like a hot air balloon by releasing air from his mouth.
Pac Zilla
After eating the Pac-Zilla Berry, he grows into the giant Pac Zilla. He grows larger than buildings, he gains a boost in strength, and can eat projectiles and launch them back out.
Chameleon Pac
After eating the Chameleon Berry, he turns into Chameleon Pac. In this form he can turn invisible, he can extend his tongue outward, which can be used to grab ghosts or to swing around.
Metal Pac
After eating the Titanium Berry, he turns into Metal Pac. In this form he gains the properties of a magnet, allowing him to stick to metal surfaces. He can also extend a magnet from his tongue which can attract ghosts to him.
Spin Pac
He gains this form after a Spin Berry. He gets a boost in speed, and can spin fast enough to make ghosts dizzy.
Planet Pac
After eating the Planet Berry, he turns into Planet Pac-Man. He becomes as large as Earth. He used this form in order to eat the Ghosteroid, which threatened all of Pac-World.
Wizard Pac
Grants Pac-Man limited Magic, such as creating objects, taking control over minions, turning himself into a fly…and making others fart…
In Theory, Pac-Man could do whatever he thinks off
Brainiac Pac
He turns into a NERD. It grants Pac-Man super-intelligence, capable of creating advance robotics.
Arachnid Pac
(I’m not including an image for my fellow Arachnophobes)
He gains the powers of a spider. He can shoot and spin webs, trapping his enemies.
Digital Pac
After eating the Wifi-Berry, he gets transported into cyberspace.
Rocket Pac
After eating the Rocket Berry, it turns the user into a rocket, granting flight.
Fly Pac
Gains the abilities of a fly, such as the ability to fly and their compound eyes, which should grant them a wider field of vision
Abilities
Rev-Roll
A Spin-Dash rip-off Pac-Man charges in place and let’s go, he rolls forward with a ton of force. It can also be used on treadmill-like platforms to power gates or move platforms.
Butt Bounce
A simple form of attack that not only breaks open crates, but also gives Pac-Man a boost in height.
Summoning
In Pac-Man Monsters, Pac-Man can summon allies to help him in his adventure. This grants him access to a massive list of monsters, including some of his past enemies like Spooky and Golvis
List of monsters can be found here: https://pacman.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_Monsters_in_Pac-Man_Monsters
Teleportation
Pac-Man can teleport to get himself away from harm's way.
Duplication
If Pac-Man ever feels cornered, he can duplicate himself, up to 32 duplicates.
Regeneration
Whenever Pac-Man dies, his body collapses on itself. He uses a life and comes back with his body fully intact.
Perception Manipulation
Pac-Man can slow down his perception of time in order to react and dodge enemies quickly.
Resurrection
When Pac-Man dies, he turns into a ghost. While in this form, Pac-Man seemingly has all the properties of a standard ghost.
Possession/Body Snatching
While in his ghost form, Pac-Man can steal another player’s body, leaving them as just a ghost while Pac-Man creates a new body for himself.
Soul Regeneration
As a ghost, Pac-Man can regenerate his soul whenever it gets damaged. This is consistent as Pac-Man, along with other characters, can also do this in World Rally and in Kart Rally.
Intelligence
Pac-Man for the most part is fairly intelligent, while he is far from the level of the extremely intelligent characters such as Professor Pac and Orson, he is still able to quickly maneuver efficiently in mazes, can solve various puzzles, and even operate machinery built by the likes of Orson. Of course, he has the ability to make himself a genius with the use of the Brain Berry, granting him impressive intellect, capable of quickly building combat robots, at the cost of becoming nerd emoji 🤓
Feats
Overall
Hunted Ghosts for over 44 Years
Defeated a variety of villains such as Toc-Man, Spooky, Erwin, Mollusc, Golvis, etc
Rescued his family and friends on numerous occasions
Has traveled through time multiple times.
Has saved Christmas
[Ghostly Adventures] Was given the title of Pac-Man and went on to protect Pacopolis from hordes of Ghosts and Betrayus.
[Ghostly Adventures] Has saved the planet from the Ghosteroid and even overpowered a Space Worm
Power
Can easily destroy wooden chests, wooden crates
While using the upgraded Toc-Man model, can easily smash metal crates and robots
Can grow as large as the planet (Planet Level)
He can also rotate the Earth while in this form (15.98 Ronnatons of TNT)
His Power Pellets can power up Santa’s Reindeer, who can carry massive amounts of presents at fast speeds (2.48 Teratons of TNT)
With his space board, can pulverize large asteroids
[Ghostly Adventures] Can become as large as a planet (Planet Level)
[Ghostly Adventures] Can eat the Ghosteroid, which threatened all of Pac-World (Planet Level)
[Ghostly Adventures] After eating a Power Berry, can overpower the Space Worm, which can pull planets (9.7e41 Joules Star Level)
Durability
Pac-Man can tank asteroids, which can also fragment metal crates
Tanked an explosion caused by the destruction of a Death Machine (315 Tons of TNT)
Survives a giant Space Station exploding
Can survive bombs in World Rally
Can tank underwater bombs
Speed
Can pilot and react with the Space Board, which can zoom past stars (78,887,908 c)
Can pilot an asteroid, which can traverse past stars and nebulas (MFTL+)
Pac-Man can roll past Saturn in a second (0.41c)
[Ghostly Adventures] Can consistently keep up with ships that can travel throughout deep space
[Ghostly Adventures] Can pilot the Pac-A-Chini and visibly react while its traveling through time through sheer speed (Immeasurable)
Scaling
Pac-Family
Pac-Man is consistently the strongest of his verse, and given that he saves his family numerous times, it's clear that he upscales from them.
Ms. Pac-Man defeated Mesmerelda, who at the time had all the gems of virtue, which can sustain entire countries (73.26 Teratons of TNT)
Assuming all gems are equal in power, having all 4 gems should be 293.04 Teratons of TNT
Professor Pac-Man can just… fly from deep space back to Earth in a short time frame (3068 c)
Ghost Gang
(The Best Ghost Gang designs BTW)
Yeah, I don't think this one requires that much justification, these guys have been chasing and killing each other for years.
Clyde (Actually Blinky) can pulverize a giant metal crate with his scream (278.87 Tons of TNT)
It’s likely their mechs were powered by the Golden Fruits, which helped seal Spooky
Misc Villains
Pac-Man has gone through many adventures throughout his years and fought many enemies as a result, given that he has beaten all of this bad guys, he likely scales to all of them
Golvis threatened to destroy all of Pac-Land (Country Level) (See QnA)
Spooky was going to destroy all of Pac-Land (Country Level) (See QnA)
Spooky can also rain down meteors
He also made a storm that covered Pac-Village (9.63 Megatons of TNT)
Toc-Man can roll fast enough to catch on fire (83 Tons of TNT)
Toc-Man can fly into deep outer space in a short time frame (36,821 c)
Wandy’s experiments were draining the Ghost Realm, which made the ghosts weaker.
Mollusc - While his plans and intentions were never specified, it’s stated that the artifact had the power to protect the planet, in addition, official statements mention that Pac-Man had to travel back in time to save the planet
[Ghostly Adventures] Betrayus claims his Ghost Ray could turn Pac-World into a Ghost World
Erwin siphoned the Spectral Realm, which would lead to its collapse, the siphoned energy would power his robots, he can even create machines durable enough to tank the collapse (Universal)
It was stated that Orson would restore the spectral realm, effectively undoing the collapse.
Erwin’s siphons harvested the energy of the entire Spectral Realm in a relatively short time frame. (558 Billion c - 33 Trillion c)
Erwin’s battle robots should naturally be faster given their intent to kill
Dig Dug
Ok hear me out.
Pac-Man and Dig Dug definitely share a universe, given that Pookas, the main enemy of Dig Dug, also resides in Pac-Land. Dig Dug also has a skin in Pac-Man Championship Edition 2, where you play as Dig Dug and all of the ghosts are replaced with Pookas. There are no gameplay differences between the 2, showing that they are comparable. In addition, Pac-Man can tank a hit from a Pooka in Pac-Man World 2, when Dig Dug normally gets one shot by them. Even Toc-Man had no trouble kidnapping a Pooka. He also has playable appearances in other video games.
(Credit to G1^2 Death Battle Fan Blogs, specifically from their Shovel Knight Vs Dig Dug Blog for the Dig Dug Info and Calcs)
Dig Dug is able to destroy giant Earth sized barriers by ramming into them (107 Zettatons)
It’s implied that Dig Dug can survived getting sucked into a black hole
His ship can fly between planets in presumably a short time frame
His son, Mr. Driller is able to drill 500 “astral meters” (780K c - 78 Million c - 161 Million c)
QNA
How Big Is Pac-Land?
Pac-Land has been threatened multiple times, notably Spooky and Golvis having statements saying they will destroy all of Pac-Land. This begs the question, how big is Pac-Land, since its size determines how powerful they would be. Visually it looks different title to title, but Pac-Man Monsters blatantly states that Pac-Land is a country. This likely isn’t a one-off statement either, as in Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness, there are several lands disconnected from Pac-Land, some of which are obvious stand-ins for real world countries, Pac-Land being just another land implies it's also a country. This is also implied in PAC-MAN Friends, with another stand-in of Egypt. While Pac-Land’s size has never been directly stated, given it’s a country, and likely comparable to real world countries, it should at least be an average sized country. This level of power is supported by The Gem’s of Virtue power output.
Pac-Man’s Soul Regeneration
This is surprisingly consistent, as there are 3 games in which Pac-Man can regenerate his soul. Those being Pac-Man Party Royale, World Rally, and Kart Rally. This is important because whenever Pac-Man dies, he turns into a standard ghost. Meaning to put Pac-Man down, you would need some kind of soul manipulation and fully erase his soul. You could potentially extrapolate this further if you believe he gains all of the abilities of the Ghost Gang, who have shown to be able to regenerate their souls even after it’s completely destroyed. (Note the lack of eyes popping out, they come back later in the game despite this). In addition, he can regenerate his body too, either naturally, by stealing another’s body, or by using a life.
Are 1-Ups Canon?
1-Ups in general are a tricky subject when it comes to standard arsenal, mainly due to the idea of potentially being just gameplay mechanics, which are usually discarded in vs debates, however given enough justification they can be allowed, for example The Mario series has blatantly made 1-ups an actual item that exists within the lore of Mario, many of which carry some on them at all times, giving them to the justification of allowing them to be part of their inventory.
In the case of Pac-Man, a similar case can be made. I will go over various points surrounding the concept of Bonus Lives
The Existence of Lives as items in Pac-Man games: Extra Lives are an item in the Pac-Man World games, these are hidden throughout Pac-Land and when collected give Pac another life. Professor Pac also explicitly acknowledges the existence of the item. Other games also have some variation of "lives" such as Pac N Roll, which contains the special flag, also granting a bonus life. Of course, these are immediately converted into another life when grabbed so Pac can't physically hold onto these, plus they are normally hidden, so Pac has to go out of his way to find them, he will not naturally encounter them in most scenarios, so it's unlikely he would find some during a fight, at most Boss fights in the World series drop Health Wedges, rather than full lives. However the important bit is that there exists items that will grant lives, implying that lives as a concept are a thing in the Pac-Man series.
Extra Lives are granted via "points" in many Pac-Man games. From the original to games being released now. Pac-Man has consistently been able to gain an extra life when he earns enough points, typically 10,000 points. Another example being Pac-Man World 1 which has this mechanic. The Manual of the game also mentions that collecting Pac-Dots will grant lives. This is important to note because, given eating enough Pac-Dots, Pac-Man can generate an extra life, Pac-Dots being something he can generate. Not only that, but Pac-Man can gain dots simply from attacking enemies
Pac-Man starts off with 3 lives in many games. For example in the original arcade release, he has 2 extra lives, along with the one he starts out with. In World 2 he starts off with 5.
Conclusion: Extra lives are explicitly mentioned in lore, by both statements and items that grant them. Pac-Man has consistently shown various ways where he can generate a life, mainly via points, which he can gain easily via generating Pac-Dots or even attacking, and Pac-Man has shown to start off with multiple lives, usually 3. Regardless of your stance, Pac-Man has also shown various ways to regenerate, showing that he may not even need 1-Ups as a concept.
Universal Pac-Man
The big Pac-shaped elephant in the room. Let’s break it down. To start, The Spectral Realm is a separate universe. Essentially the plot of World 3 is that Erwin is siphoning the Spectral Realm which will lead to it collapsing with the Universe, threatening both universes (see image above). Erwin also directly states that this energy is powering all of his robots, all of which Pac-Man directly fights and tanks hits from. Erwin also confirms his machines can survive the collapse.
Erwin himself at the end of the game fell into the raw energy, which exploded in its entirety. As weird as it may sound, his playable appearance in World Rally implies he survived this explosion. The Ghost Gang were also near the vicinity of the explosion and were confirmed to be teleported after the explosion. Orson also works on stabilizing the Spectral Realm at the end of the game, despite the realm being nearly destroyed and both universes almost reaching their end.
To add consistency, this actually isn’t the first time a ghost realm has been absorbed. In Pac-Man All-Stars, Wandy, the main bad guy, was draining the energy of the Ghost Realm. This has some parallels to the Spectral Ream, both being where the ghosts come from, both are separate dimensions from the real world, and both have affected its residents in some way, either by weakening them, or by affecting them mentally. While it’s never stated what affects Wandy draining the Ghost Realms energy had, nor was it stated that the universe was in danger, there are enough similarities between the two events that add some level of consistency for the events of Pac-Man World 3.
“You missed XYX”
Outright, I’m confident I missed stuff, Pac-Man has so much material, many of which not having much documented footage or notes. There are also minor things I elected to intentionally leave out as I feel some things aren’t that important to list, example being mundane things like a Mallet. I might update this blog overtime if I run across new stuff, but for now I’m happy with where it’s at.
Summary
Attack Potency: At least Country level to Planet Level (Via defeating Spooky/Golvis and scaling to Ms. Pac-Man. Via rotating the Planet, and becoming as large as Earth/Eating the Ghosteroid) Star Level [Ghostly Adventures] (Via overpowering the Space Worm) Likely Universal (Via overpowering Erwin and his various death robots)
Speed: MFTL+ (Via piloting the Space Board, which can pilot at high speeds, Via Scaling to various villains, such as Toc-Man or Erwin who can siphon an entire universe) Immeasurable (Via piloting the Pac-A-Chini)
Durability: Country to Planet (Can tank hits from villains who can hit this hard) Likely Universal (Via tanking hits from Erwin’s death robots)
Access to a plethora of Power-Ups with various hax
A large list of equipment to aid him in battle
Body and Soul Regeneration makes him difficult to put down for good
Can summon various allies and clones to help him in battle
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