''Scarfman'' is a clone of ''

Pac-Man originally called ''Puck Man'' in Japan, is a 1980 maze action video game developed and released by Namco for arcades. In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. Th ...

'' written by Philip A. Oliver for the

TRS-80 The TRS-80 Micro Computer System (TRS-80, later renamed the Model I to distinguish it from successors) is a desktop microcomputer launched in 1977 and sold by Tandy Corporation through their Radio Shack stores. The name is an abbreviation of '' ...

computer and published by The Cornsoft Group in 1981. A version for the

TRS-80 Color Computer The RadioShack TRS-80 Color Computer, later marketed as the Tandy Color Computer and sometimes nicknamed the CoCo, is a line of home computers developed and sold by Tandy Corporation. Despite sharing a name with the earlier TRS-80, the Color Co ...

followed in 1982 as ''Color Scarfman'', which uses 64x64 low resolution graphics. Oliver also wrote the Enhanced

BASIC BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...

Compiler for the TRS-80 Model III and 4.

Gameplay

The game presents a maze filled with dots and five symmetrically placed power capsules, and the player-controlled Scarfman tries to eat the dots without being eaten by one of the monsters that randomly roams the maze. Unlike ''Pac-Man'', there are five monsters instead of four. Eating a power pill causes monsters to lower their eyes, indicating that they're vulnerable. The eyes shift to the normal position when the pill's effect wears off. In ''Color Scarfman'', eating a power pill causes the ghosts to remain vulnerable—indicated by turning blue—until eaten or the level ends.

Reception

Dan Ekblaw reviewed ''Scarfman'' in ''

The Space Gamer ''The Space Gamer'' was a magazine dedicated to the subject of science fiction and fantasy board games and tabletop role-playing games. It quickly grew in importance and was an important and influential magazine in its subject matter from the la ...

'' number 54. Ekblaw commented that "Overall, I would say that ''Scarfmans defects outweigh its good points by far. I've found that this game loses its novelty after a few weeks and will spend the rest of its days sitting on a shelf". In a 2012 retrospective, ''

Gamasutra ''Game Developer'', known as ''Gamasutra'' until 2021, is a website founded in 1997 that focuses on aspects of video game development. It is owned and operated by Informa and acts as the online sister publication to the print magazine '' Gam ...

'' wrote that the "chirp-chirp-chirp chomping sound effect is maddening. But it does play like ''Pac-Man'', more or less".

References

{{reflist, refs= {{cite web , last1=Hague , first1=James , title=The Giant List of Classic Game Programmers , url=https://dadgum.com/giantlist/ {{cite web , last1=Boyle , first1=L. Curis , title=Color Scarfman , url=http://www.lcurtisboyle.com/nitros9/colorscarfman.html , website=The Tandy Color Computers Game List {{cite web , last1=Reed , first1=Matthew , title=Scarfman , url=http://www.trs-80.org/scarfman/ , website=TRS-80.org

External links

Review
in ''

Creative Computing ''Creative Computing'' was one of the earliest magazines covering the microcomputer revolution. Published from October 1974 until December 1985, the magazine covered the spectrum of hobbyist/home/personal computing in a more accessible format th ...

''
Review
in ''

Personal Computer World ''Personal Computer World'' (''PCW'') (February 1978 - June 2009) was the first British computer magazine. Although for at least the last decade it contained a high proportion of Windows PC content (reflecting the state of the IT field), the mag ...

'' 1981 video games Dragon 32 games Pac-Man clones TRS-80 games TRS-80 Color Computer games Video games about food and drink Video games developed in the United States