2002 was a big year for partying. Mario Party 4 was released that year with massive redesigns to Mario and friends. Sega briefly played in the party industry with the release of Sonic Shuffle back in 2000. Konami had already cornered the arcade market with DanceDanceRevolution. While Nintendo, Sega, and Konami had their own party games on the market, everyone's favorite yellow dot muncher hadn't dabbled into partying in its 22 year history by that point. So, Namco went ahead by making a party game of their own to compete against them.
Pac-Man Fever is a 2002 video game released for the Nintendo GameCube and PlayStation 2 exclusively in North American markets. Named after the famous music album by Buckner & Garcia, this spin-off of the Pac-Man franchise has Pac-Man and Ms. Pac Man enter their first party game. They are also joined by some of Namco's famous all-stars from the same period. Astaroth, Reiko Nagase, Heihachi Mishima and Tiger Jackson make up the rest of the playable cast.
The gameplay plays out as a hybrid of Mario Party and most other traditional board games. 4 Players compete to reach the end of the board first. Players compete in minigames at the end of each turn, and must rank high enough on minigames to continue pass the last three fruit spaces. The first person to win a minigame while on the banana space wins the game.
Compare Pac-Man Party, another party game starring Pac-Man but solely consisting of characters from his universe.
Pac-Man Fever contains examples of:
- Artifact Title: Despite being named after the song, the titular song itself isn't heard anywhere in the game.
- Art Shift: The four Namco all stars look more cartoony than their respective appearances in their home games. Reiko and Tiger Jackson are still recognizable in their deformed proportions, but then you have Heihachi looking a bit out of touch and Astaroth looking way out of place in the Pac-Man art style constantly wielding his massive axe everywhere.
- Bonus Space: Players that reach raffle spaces can try their luck in a minigame to win tickets. The final three spaces on each board also act as raffle spaces for the first player that reaches them. After they are redeemed, they become ordinary token spaces as usual.
- Excuse Plot: The sole reason for Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man being here is that the ghosts are causing havoc at a film studio. and its up to them to stop the ghosts. It really doesn't matter, as Namco's top stars also want to join in on the action and have a party.
- Massive Multiplayer Crossover: Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man are the main stars, but the other four playable characters include representatives from Ridge Racer, Soulcalibur, and Tekken. Other Namco franchises are also depicted in minigames and boards.
