I am sure you have played Pac-Man for an awful amount of time, and I am sure you never thought let’s put a bet on it and lose my life savings on catching ghosts. Well someone has.
Bandai Namco has partnered with Gamblit Gaming to change Pac-Man for the casino floor by adding real-money betting to a game that already had a reputation for eating quarters back in the day. This hit new addiction is called Pac-Man Battle Casino, and it looks similar to Pac-Man Battle Royale, a four-player competitive Pac-Man arcade game which came out back in 2011.
In the Battle Casino version, each player must put down a minimum bet to play. Darion Lowenstein, CMO at Gamblit Gaming, told Compete that the betting floor will be determined by casinos and “will likely range between $2 and $20.” So, probably more than a quarter.
You can only place bets beforehand, not during the game, so you can’t heighten the stakes if you realize you’re winning. The prize for the last Pac-Man standing isn’t determined by the bets, though. Instead, it’s all up to a prize wheel that spits out a randomly generated figure per round.
Lowenstein told Compete that the game’s meant to be played by “two to four human players only; as always, the CPU controls the ghosts.” He also clarified that it’s all “skill-based,” and the only random element involved is the cash prize.
Pac-Man champions will bankrupt casinos, maybe. But before that happens, it seems like there’s a way for average players to get one over on the house: illicit teamwork. In Pac-Man Battle Royale, Pac-Man can eat other rival Pac-Mans, and everybody has to worry about the ghosts. In the casino version of the game, though, wouldn’t it benefit competitors to team up and counter the ghosts together, then split the final winnings? Am I ruining all the fun?
Pac-Man Battle Casino première at the G2E trade show in Las Vegas next week, at which point Pac-Man Battle Casino’s creators will announce which casinos will host the game.