Pac-Man

Pac-Man is the protagonist fictional character of the franchise of the same name by Namco, who was first introduced in the arcade game Pac-Man in... 1980. Ever since, the character appeared in more than 30 officially licensed game spin-offs, as well as in numerous unauthorized clones and bootlegs, spawned a variety of Pac-Man merchandise with his image, as well as a television series. Pac-Man became a worldwide social phenomenon and Namco's mascot. Pac-Man's origins are debated. According to the character's creator Tōru Iwatani, the inspiration was pizza without a slice, which gave him a vision of "an animated pizza, racing through a maze and eating things with its absent-slice mouth". However, he admittedly said in a 1986 interview that the design of the character also came from simplifying and rounding out the Japanese character for a mouth, kuchi. The name comes from the Japanese folklore character Paku who was known for his appetite as well as by the Japanese onomatopoeic slang phrase paku-paku taberu. The arcade art on the original Puck-Man portrayed the character as a yellow circle with a large mouth as well as hands, feet, eyes and a long nose.
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Tōru Iwatani is a former Japanese video game designer and creator of one of the most popular arcade games of all time, Pac-Man. Iwatani was born in the Meguro ward of Tokyo, Japan. He joined the computer software company Namco in 1977, where he started his career in the video game business. There, he came up with the idea for a game called "Puck-Man" and in 1980, he, along with programmer Shigeo Funaki , a hardware engineer, a cabinet... designer and Toshio Kai for sound and music, finished the game. It was released to the Japanese public on May 22 of that year, where it became a huge success. It caught the attention of arcade-game manufacturer Midway, who bought the United States rights for the game and released the game in the U.S. as "Pac-Man", for fear that kids might deface a Puck-Man cabinet by changing the 'P' to an 'F'. Due to its innovative concept and continuing international popularity, it is regarded as one of the all-time classic video games. Iwatani returned to his Pac-Man roots in 2007 when he developed Pac-Man Championship Edition for the Xbox 360, which he states is the final game he will develop.
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Midway Games, Inc. is an American company that was formerly a major video game publisher and developer.. Following a bankruptcy filing in 2009, it is no longer active and is in the process of liquidating all of its assets. Midway's titles included Mortal Kombat, Ms. Pac-Man, Spy Hunter, Tron,... Rampage, the Cruis'n series, NFL Blitz and NBA Jam. Midway also acquired the rights to video games that were originally developed by Williams Electronics and Atari Games, such as Defender, Joust, Robotron 2084, Gauntlet and the Rush series. The company's predecessor was founded in 1958 as Midway Manufacturing, an amusement game manufacturer. In 1973 it moved into the interactive entertainment industry, developing and publishing arcade video games. The company scored its first mainstream hit with the U.S. distribution of Space Invaders in 1978. Midway was purchased and re-incorporated in 1988 by WMS Industries Inc. After many years as a leader in the arcade segment, Midway moved into the growing home video game market beginning in 1996, the same year that it made its initial public offering of stock. In 1998, WMS spun off its remaining shares of Midway.
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