r/Pacman • u/cookiemaster221 • 2d ago
Image Idk if someone already posted this but in Re-PAC 2 sue uses her Japanese name clie
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u/Either_List8340 2d ago
I honestly don’t mind this name change at all. Now I just wish the ghost Sue would appear more in the series.
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u/Hikari_Dreemurr 1d ago
Adding to the list with the pink ghost from ghostly adventures and Ms Pac-Man on the cabinet
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u/tripletopper 1d ago
Wait a second isn't Sue supposed to be the purple ghost in Pac-Land/ Hanna Barbara Pac-Man Cartoon?
If so, then why is the picture of a pac-person and not a ghost?
I understand there's a lot of Americanization in the canon of Pac-Man in the American canon that went in a totally opposite direction of what the Japanese canon was, just like there was in Sonic the Hedgehog years later.
I also knew Namco cut ties with Midway when Midway released Pac-Man and Galaxian for the Bally Astrocade, assuming just because they had the arcade right to publish in the USA, they automatically had the home right, and Namco, and separately Taito with Space Invaders, made deals directly with Atari, bypassing Bally, for home rights. But Midway had an iron clad contract for Pac Man before the break off so they can only do that for newer titles like Pac Land and Pole Position and Dig Dug which were all Atari American releases of Namco Games.
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u/SgtJackVisback 1d ago
This is an NPC who was named Sue in the US version of the original Pac-Man World 2 (full name was "Smoothie Sue", pertaining to a cut mechanic)
Namco never "cut ties" with Midway, the deal just expired in the mid-80's with no ill will of any kind
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u/tripletopper 1d ago
As I said I don't know the internals of what happened so maybe someone has way better documentation, but looking back on it from the outside from far in the future, it looks like it from here. Thought I can't see all the details from where I am.
There was a version of Space Invaders for the Bally astrocade label the Space Invaders and that was originally an arcade Taito game released by Bally Midway in the US.
Similarly there was one called Galaxian labeled as galaxian for the Bally Astrocade also.
And they were quite a bit of the way there with the production of what was going to be Bally Astrocade Pac-Man.
Look at the Astrocade game known as Muncher and literally the only thing muncher does different gameplay wise is allows you to stop in the middle of the maze when you release the joystick. I don't know if the intermissions are still there, but if they are not, those are literally the two biggest differences. The maze is dead on accurate. I don't know if requiring the joystick constantly pressed is a bug or a feature, but knowing that they couldn't release it as Pac-Man, because Atari got the home rights, probably it was a bug that became a feature, to argue in court that they're different enough than Pac-Man to not violate Atari's rights. Now of course they're not going to prosecute themselves because they own the arcade rights and they make the arguably infringing home game that was way better than Atari 2600 Pac-Man,
The arcade that was in lots of malls was called Bally's Aladdin's Castle. Later known as Namco's Aladdin's Castle.
I read somewhere on the internet that somewhere in a trade paper back in the day, Bally Midway was asserting their US rights very aggressively and displayed it with a 2-full-page ad.
If there were such things as three strikes against the company, probably the three wrongs that Midway did to Namco were
1) assuming they had the home rights automatically because they had the US arcade rights with Namco and Taito games.
2) Hiring a third party to build the sequel to Pac-Man, what eventually became Ms Pac-Man, when Namco had their own sequel, Super Pac-Man.
The third one is a theory that I pieced together based on evidence of pre-existing Japanese versions of pre-crash games and their American counterparts and looking back from the future
Did you know that the Japanese game Pac-Man had the joystick moved significantly left of center compared to the American version which was dead on center? And then later games of Namco's Japanese releases that had a button and a joystick always seem to put the joystick on the left whereas Midway invented the Midway Mirror which was mirrored buttons on both sides?
I know later Namco releases were released through Atari like Pac-Land, Pole Position, and Dig Dug, going up to Pac-Mania. Pac-Land, Pac-Mania, and Dig Dug had mirrored jump and pump buttons respectively. The shifter mechanism in Pole Position was too expensive to have mirrored, plus, mirrored shifters would ruin the immersion of being in a Formula 1 racer. Also, right shift emulates American cars. And that is far more ingrained in society than left-handed or right-handed joysticks were in the pre crash 80s.
I would say the first two strikes, if there was bad blood between Namco and Midway, where the reasons why Namco was itching for any excuse to get out of the Midway relationship. The Atari home rights offer was the thing that set it off.
But the third strike the Midway mirror the Japanese video game industry took advantage of by when Atari imploded they sorted decided that the joystick would be on the left side, and the reason is because most people are right-handed and tend to put the more complex controller portion in the right hand. , and they convinced arcade owners that left handed sticks would be better because if they're uncomfortable with the controls they're more likely to make mistakes which means shorter credits which means more opportunities to make money. Remember that the arcade owner is the primary consumer of arcade games. Not the quarter plunker. The quarter plunker is considered the secondary consumer. Arcade game makers answer to Arcade owners and arcade owners answer to quarter plunkers which put a layer between the arcade game makers and the quarter plunkers.
And if you ever searched for a right-handed controller for an console whose joysticks had six buttons or more, only to turn up in vain, I believe Midway did it to themselves and to the American public if you believed ambidextrous controller choices were the future.
Americans won most, if not all, world titles of pre crash video game championships while they were considered relatively new games.
And when I personally built a better mouse trap, namely an ambidextrous joystick that does not fall into the economic traps of button mirroring or the ergonomic traps of a straight eight, , Hori's top American basically confirmed that, what I thought was a half joke half serious reason why there's no right-handed joysticks on the market, is actually more seriously and truthfully is the reason why we don't have right-handed joysticks in the world.
That was the penultimate compliment. (The ultimate compliment would have been to mass produce my design and give me the designer's standard money and credit.) He said my design would sell well around the world especially in America and I solved the two biggest problems of ambidexterity, a problem no one even bothered putting any effort into solving. But the highest hurdle is a cultural one. If he were to send it to his bosses in Japan, he would be fired on the spot and I would know why.
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u/SgtJackVisback 1d ago
Namco never hated Midway, Birth of an Icon states this with more info
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u/tripletopper 1d ago
Okay then you got some information that I wasn't privy to.
It's not like when you date someone and later break up with them you hate them with all your guts.
Lots of people you formally dated you still think are cute don't mind still associating with as friends. If society were more polyamorous than the monogamous expectation, you would consider dating and even snuggling with them if it weren't for the legal ramifications and complications of having babies with two different partners.
That could be the case, but that's not always the case.
As I said I was commenting as an outsider.
Were any of the things I addressed ever mentioned by Namco and their people from their perspective?
Were they, at the time considered bad from the Namco perspective, and then later time healed that wound ,or was it always an amicable breakup?
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u/maricthehedgehog INKY 1d ago
When I watched the Gameplay Trailer and they were talking about the arcade, I was like "WASN'T IT SUE THAT MANAGED THE ARCADE???"
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u/Gobshite_ 2d ago
Interesting that they've backed away from the Pac-Mom/Pac-Sis style for female characters. I feel like those two just won't appear in this game (though they didn't in the original PMW2 either, just Chomp Chomp and Professor Pac)