This developer interview was originally published on the defunct website Pac-Land (playingpacman.isfun.net). This document is re-published here for historical/archival purposes. Formatting and grammar have been altered in certain circumstances.

On October 16^th of 1999, one of the Namco Hometek team members of the PSX game Pac-Man World—who went by the Nick-Name "Pac-Man's Pal", stopped by the Pac-Chat message board to give us Pac-Freaks some behind the scenes making of the game and some "spoiler" info as well. All of us appreciated his visits.

Below is the transcript of his post.

Hi there Pac-Maniacs.

For those of you who don't know, I'm Pac-Man's Pal, one of Pac-Man World's designers.

Now that PMW is out and you are all playing it, I thought you might want to know more fun stuff about the game.

The spoiler section is below and well marked!

Powers

Pac-Man was going to have a few more power-ups in the game. They were:

• Magnetic shoes: That allowed him to walk up walls.
• Big Gloves: That allowed him to fly when he flapped his hands.
• Chili Pepper: Pac-Man would eat this and for a short period he could breathe flame.
• Inflate: Pac-Man would suck on some helium and blow-up like a balloon. If he'd hit a sharp object, he'd pop!

Levels:

Originally there were going to be a few more levels that got cut due to time constraints or for editorial reasons.

They were:

• Pac-Dot forest: Pac-Man could shake trees and Pac-Dots would fall! There was a lumber jack ghost with an axe who would take a swing at you. This guy was given "the axe" 'cause Japan didn't like the ghosts to carry objects. That's why the ghost in space don't carry guns either or operate objects. The boss (Ironwood) was a giant mad of logs (like the secret character in Tekken) with a saw blad in his torso, which he could throw at Pac-Man like Xena's circular blade.
• Steam Train: Pac-Man was to run along the top of a steam train. Conductor and porter ghosts tried to knock him off. The train was supposed to take Pac-Man from the forest to the pirate town.
• Underwater: We had originally planned Pac-Man to swim from one island to another. (The islands were shaped like Pac-Man, a dot and a ghost. It all just became Ghost-Island in the end..) At one point a giant fish was to chase Pac-Man ala Crash Bandicoot and another one would swallow him. The next level was to take place inside the fish. We scrapped that 'cause Zelda 64 did a "inside the fish" level.
• Sock Puppet-Land: Okay, not really. This was really my running joke for a "proposed level" in the game.

Enemies:

Mehearty is the pirate ghost.

Piero is the clown ghost.

Kiba is the "savage" ghost.

Sparky is the spot-welder on the factory level. Only in the third level does he switch between his nose being up and down. Originally, he was supposed to do it all of the time.

The shark in the factory is supposed to be mechanical. I wanted a giant wind up key for him, but it interfered with the shark's fin.

The little robot with the giant claw in the cinematic actually was an enemy in the game. However, he never quite worked right and we took him out.

The cratelifters in the factory level are supposed to be big magnets that lift and drop boxes. You could originally kill them by bouncing, but in some cases, you lost your ride and couldn't continue, so we made them immortal.

We had a "funhouse mascot" enemy planned, but we couldn't agree on what he should be so we scrapped him.

The HMS Windbag's name was originally the HMS Hanky. We changed it because of South Park's Mr. Hanky. Krome Keeper's original name was Clankity-Cland. It was going to be re-changed to Rusty Buckethead, but for some reason, Krome Keeper stuck.

Levels:

I designed the following levels: Crazy Cannonade, Factory 1, 2 and 3, Mansion 1, 2 and 3. I also did the chase and HMS Windbag boss round, contributed to the gameplay of Krome Keeper, Anubis Rex and Toc-Man boss rounds. I also stocked the mazes with traps. You can also see some of my design sketches in the gallery.

The Funhouse was supposed to have a roller-coaster level where you rode in a cart ala Donkey Kong Country. Unfortunately, we lost that one due to deadlines.

The Ruins level (originally Archeology) was concepted with a "history of Pac-Man" in hieroglyphics and as a shrine to the giant quarter (token) God. The boss was called "Arcadanum." Art decisions were made to change those ideas later on.

The Factory was concepted as a Pac-Dot factory. In it, we were supposed to see dots come in, get juiced and press molded into power pellets. Pneumatic tubes would have sucked Pac-Man up and along through the factory with the dots. The idea got lost as head-lines hit.

All the level's themes are based off of my favorite place: Disneyland. With a particular emphasis on the Haunted Mansion and the Pirates of the Carribbean (my fave attraction). I think we're missing only Main Street and Critter Country..

Friends

The original friend line-up was more otaku friendly. They were: Ms. Pac-Man, Professor Pac, Mappy, Dig-Dug, Valkerie and Sandra. The management never liked Sandra and Japan put the kibosh on the whole idea anyway. So we went in with the "easy" Pac-Man family choices instead.

Spoilers! Do not read if you intend on beating PMW and being surprised!

Toc-Man and Cinematics:

First of all, Toc-Man is Namcot spelled backwards. My little "inside joke." My original drawing of Toc-Man is of a "Nutcracker" style Pac-Man. The drawing scared the producer, he didn't even want it in the gallery!!! The little ghost inside Toc-Man is Orson, named after Orson Wells. The original cinematics (which I wrote as well as the in-game dialogue) were going to be an "Citizen Kane" style newsreel telling the story of Orson and Pac-Man's career over the past 20 years.

The story goes: Orson was a childhood friend of Pac-Man. As Pac-Man got more popular, Orson got jealous. He tried starring in his own game, TV show and even had a cereal like Pac-Man. All were dismal failures. When Pac-Man married Ms. Pac, Orson was insanely jealous. Orson turned his interests to the pac-dot harvesting business and made a fortune, but still he resented his famous friend. Finally, he decided that if he couldn't have people love him, he would become someone they would love. Pac-Man!!!

In an early draft, Orson was a really fat ghost (from eating all those pac-dots) and even painted himself yellow and pretended to be Pac-Man. It was a really weird idea, so we just made him a little ghost in a big Pac-Man suit.

The ending cinematic seems a little disjointed because Orson was supposed to say "It's not fair, everyone love Pac-Man, but nobody loves a ghost." Pac-Man was to say, "I love you, Orson," and then eat Orson. Japan and the producer didn't want Pac-Man to talk. I suggested subtitles. Time and money kept that from happening, so we were left with the slightly disjointed movie in the game.

BTW, if you get ALL the P-A-C-M-A-N letters in the game, it unlocks a secret "bloopers" movie ala Jackie Chan's bloopers (or the ones in "Bug's Life" which came out just as our animation house was doing the movie!!! I came up with that idea three years before!!!! Pixar ripped me off!!!)

Ahem

Anyway. Hope you like the game and knowing a little more of what we were thinking! We had a great time making it!!!

—Pac-Man's Pal