[HN Gopher] Show HN: Reverse Pac-Man
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Show HN: Reverse Pac-Man
Keep one eye on the first ghost and the other on the second
Author : Eagle64
Score : 60 points
Date : 2025-05-05 12:17 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (reverse-pacman.staticrun.app)
(TXT) w3m dump (reverse-pacman.staticrun.app)
| brudgers wrote:
| I can't see the whole screen on my laptop, and the screen doesn't
| scroll.
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Thanks for the feedback. It is fixed
| pmontra wrote:
| It's one of those things that "why did nobody think about it
| yet?!"
| toast0 wrote:
| Pac-Man Vs. [1] was a commercial game on this wavelength. I
| don't think I ever played that one.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pac-Man_Vs.
| jaimebuelta wrote:
| I was going to say the same thing. Pac-Man Vs was incredibly
| fun and a great party game.
| roskelld wrote:
| One Little Ghost (2012) [1] [2] for the ZX81 is one version I
| only recently found out about. Figured it was worth mentioning
| here given how impressive it is for a game on the humble ZX81
| machine that's well over 40 years old.
|
| [1] https://bobs-stuff.itch.io/one-little-ghost
|
| [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rq2hOlC97SQ
| iorekz wrote:
| genius
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Haha. I'll take the compliment.
| roskelld wrote:
| Are you planning on adding the power pills to give Pac Man a
| fighting chance?
|
| Also, I noticed that he often circles around the upper left area
| a few times at the start even though there are no dots to
| collect.
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Good idea ! That will add a new cool dynamic. The behavior of
| the Pac-Man is to avoid the ghost with some random pattern
| added. This might happen.
| xnx wrote:
| Very cool. Gemini is such a fun tool to do a one-shot MVP of a
| game like this: https://g.co/gemini/share/7639ee864df7
|
| Gemini wasn't clever enough to disallow ghosts changing
| directions mid-way, but it did do a smart thing with "pellets
| remaining" scoring.
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Really ? Even if you specify that ghosts can turn only at
| intersections?
| xnx wrote:
| I'm sure it could. I was very unspecified with my prompt
| (below). No doubt it could add sound, etc. as well.
|
| Prompt: Create a game of Pacman with only 2 ghosts. Instead
| of the player controlling pacman, the player controls the
| ghosts.
|
| Controls: Ghost 1 (Red): WASD or ZQSD Ghost 2 (Cyan): Arrow
| Keys
| amadeuspagel wrote:
| Awesome. It's mind-bending to control two players. The idea of
| using arrow keys to control one player and WASD to control
| another is genius. Maybe you can visualize which is which by
| coloring the explanatory text.
| eesmith wrote:
| I used to solo play 2-player Gauntlet for the PC this way, back
| around 1990.
|
| In the 1980s it was pretty common to have 2-player games with
| both players on the same keyboard.
|
| Edit: Spacewar (see
| https://archive.org/details/msdos_Spacewar_1985) is an example
| of a two-player-on-one-keyboard game, from 1985.
| redbluething wrote:
| Yellow Wizard Needs Food Badly!
| chrisweekly wrote:
| Warrior is about to die!
|
| man that takes me back
| vunderba wrote:
| I built a dual snake game where you simultaneously control two
| snakes a while back, perhaps I should do a Show HN about it at
| some point.
|
| https://specularrealms.itch.io/the-twins-of-caduceus
|
| _Fair warning: It 's a game made for people who excel at
| ambidextrous tasks like patting one's head and rubbing one's
| tummy, or juggling Rubik's cubes that you are also solving._
| KennedyHere wrote:
| Fun game! From the title, I was expecting to guide Pac-Man to put
| all the dots back in place.
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Haha. I haven't thought of this. That would be a cool other
| mode
| GlassOwAter wrote:
| Poo-Man or Puke-Man
| xnx wrote:
| Crap-Man?
| vunderba wrote:
| While that would be amusing, mechanically it would be identical
| to the original game.
| derefr wrote:
| Not really. Presume that _everything_ is time-reversed, and
| the game kills you if you do anything not possible when your
| playback is flipped around and played "forward." Then:
|
| - Obviously, you "emit" dots and fruit and power pellets as
| you traverse the grid.
|
| - Less obviously, once you populate a dot/fruit/power pellet
| onto a grid square, you can't visit that position again --
| as, if reversed, that'd look like you going over those things
| without collecting them.
|
| - You'd randomly enter the powered-up state, and you'd then
| have to visit one of the unpopulated power-pellet grid
| positions in order to emit the power pellet to get out of
| that state -- before the powered-up-state timer expires. (The
| power-up-state going on longer than that is invalid!)
|
| - While in the powered-up state, you'd see pairs of ghost
| eyes unavoidably approaching you; they'd touch you, turn into
| ghosts, and then flee from you. That's fine. But once they
| become ghosts and move off of the grid-space you occupy, you
| can't touch them again.
| alnwlsn wrote:
| For that, you want this rom hack/patch
|
| http://48k.ca/bacman.html
| mrighele wrote:
| Me too, also because I remember playing that kind of game, on a
| Creativision, more than 40 years ago [1]
|
| [1] https://archive.org/details/Crazy_Chicky_1981_VTL
| mtVessel wrote:
| On FF (similar on Edge):
|
| Secure Connection Failed
|
| An error occurred during a connection to reverse-
| pacman.staticrun.app. PR_END_OF_FILE_ERROR
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Thanks for letting me know. There is a problem with the host. I
| moved it to itch.io https://themarelle.itch.io/reverse-pac-man
| kmoser wrote:
| On Firefox it freezes on the keyboard instructions screen for
| me. Console shows it requires WebGL. Maybe put a message on
| screen indicating that?
| xnx wrote:
| Would be fun to have dual stick controller support:
| https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Gamepad_API
| tantalor wrote:
| You should make it so user can hold down a key to change
| direction _before_ they reach the intersection, joystick style.
|
| As it is, it feels like you are checking for key press (not key
| down) in a narrow window when the ghost reaches the intersection.
| That is very hard to play. It is much more forgiving if I can
| press and hold the key whenever I want.
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Thank you for the suggestion. Your wish has been granted. It is
| definitely better like this.
| tantalor wrote:
| Yes! thanks
| bentcorner wrote:
| For anyone interested in this style of gameplay mechanic, the
| game _Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons_ (steam:
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/225080/Brothers__A_Tale_o...)
| uses a twin-stick approach to this, and builds puzzles around
| controlling two "people".
|
| It's a quick play and the game is pretty good, I recommend
| experiencing it.
| bitwize wrote:
| That game was an emotional journey, man. Very short as these
| games go, but it hit hard.
|
| And the music was by Gustaf Grefberg, "Lizardking", my favorite
| oldskool demo musician by a mile.
| progforlyfe wrote:
| It's not loading at all for me. Hug of death?
| Eagle64 wrote:
| Even with this link ? https://themarelle.itch.io/reverse-pac-
| man
| narcindin wrote:
| Reminds me of a demo I played 10 years ago called swap box turbo.
| Designed for two players, it is a simple platformer where you and
| your partner swap positions and momentum every 3 seconds.
|
| You can play it single player too and have an experience similar
| to this.
|
| https://www.freeindiegam.es/2012/12/swap-box-turbo-nifflas/
| kazinator wrote:
| The ghosts don't respond to a key until they encounter to an
| intersection, so that you cannot reverse direction instantly.
| Maybe there is a deliberate point to that, but it doesn't make it
| less annoying.
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(page generated 2025-05-06 23:01 UTC)