“Round as a balloon and yellower than a lemon, it’s Pac-Man…” the song once said in the credits. The video game hero hasn’t aged one bit in nearly 45 years and even gets a facelift by landing on a LEGO set in his honor.
Because it’s the yellow of the LEGO characters that inspired Tōru Iwatani to create Pac-Man. His shape and his ever-open mouth would have been inspired, according to legend, by a slice of pizza. “If Pac-Man was so special, it was because it was the first game that didn’t include violence,” explains Sven Franic, the LEGO designer behind the terminal’s creation. “Back then, a lot of PC games were about destroying things. Since it was the only game to come out of this framework, it was unanimous among a greater mix of genres.
2651 pieces to assemble
Therefore, the famous brand of small bricks launches a new entry in its nostalgic range of icons dedicated to the world of video games at the beginning of June. So here’s Pac-Man in a mini arcade terminal (32 x 25 x 17 cm), with his joystick, his screen, Blinky and Clyde, and the hero all yellow. And there’s even a crank to animate the whole thing and a pretend vintage coin mechanism that lights up.
However, it was necessary to readjust the terminal for the needs of the small bricks. There is no base to pick it up here, everything revolves around the screen and controls. The upper part is occupied by the two pursuers of Pac-Man who, as soon as he has eaten an eraser, can hunt down his two rivals who have turned blue by pressing a simple button.
Retrogamers will surely be won over and will need some courage to overcome the 2,651-piece set. But this immersion in the atmosphere of the 1980s, there is even a mini-set provided with a figure and a small Pac-Man terminal, however, it does not offer gameplay. The only mechanism present is crank operated and simply allows you to simulate a chase.
The LEGO Icons Pac-Man Arcade Game set will be available on June 4 at €269.99.
And for the more daring collectors, there are also LEGO versions of the Atari 2600 console with built-in cartridges and the original Nintendo. But they are no longer functional…
Source: BFM TV
