The Queen of Hearts Maze Game
This might be the oldest commercial Pac-Man clone there is. The splash screen says copyright 1982 TexaSoft. A company named TexaSoft exists today, they produce a shareware statistics program called WINKS. Since they claim on their website to exist since 1981, they might well have started with this game.
Another indication for a commercial clone is that unlike the
contemporary PC-Man and
Pac-Gal, The
Queen of Hearts Maze Game avoids to be obvious. The player character
is called Ace, the monsters are the four card sharks Mary Lynn Club,
Diamond Jim, Sam Spade and Wild Card Hitchcock. The mazes are more
complex than in the original Pac-Man, while the color scheme is
rather close. Gameplay is identical too, but with the addition of
four missing cards
which give extra points.
Either The Queen of Hearts Maze Game runs too fast even on a
286, or it is simply very, very difficult even in the easiest mode.
I could not even finish one level. On my main computer, it ran so
fast that it was pretty difficult just to get a screenshot before
Ace
was swallowed up by a card shark.
