The first release of Snapper for the BBC Micro featured the familiar arcade game Pac-Man character and ghosts - as shown in the magazine advert. However, potential legal issues resulted in modifications to the graphics and later releases had Pac-Man wearing a hat and four 'alien' like creatures. - ThreadSky

kevedwardsretro.bsky.social • 130 days ago

The first release of Snapper for the BBC Micro featured the familiar arcade game Pac-Man character and ghosts - as shown in the magazine advert. However, potential legal issues resulted in modifications to the graphics and later releases had Pac-Man wearing a hat and four 'alien' like creatures.

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six-is-dead.bsky.social•130 days ago

Their lawyers may have been distracted by another game or ten at the time

dcf21.bsky.social•130 days ago

Presumably when the BBC was released in the US, Acornsoft had to be a bit careful about what software they offered the US market? I'm a bit surprised Superior even re-released Snapper on Play It Again Sam 7, seemingly without fear of litigation.

kevedwardsretro.bsky.social•130 days ago

They were probably assuming that if they didn't get sued the first time around then they'd be OK the second time.

stepickford.bsky.social•130 days ago

Being an IP lawyer for Namco must have been the easiest job in the world in the early 1980s. Fish in a barrel.

kevedwardsretro.bsky.social•130 days ago

They were too focused on North America to start with, meanwhile in Europe we were up to all sorts of naughty stuff like this. However, it didn't take long and their lawyers spotted what was going on!

anderszapac.bsky.social•129 days ago

Didn't Atari handle the home licenses in North America for Namco? I know about the Odyssey^2, VIC-20 and CreatiVision cases when it came to Pac-Man clones. I believe both Namco and Atari cooled off a little after the 2600 game had been released.

kevedwardsretro.bsky.social•129 days ago

I don't know what the licensing arrangements were in North America. In Europe, the Atari VCS version was the only one I remember that was officially licesned!

anderszapac.bsky.social•129 days ago

There was an unlicensed game on the Apple II called Tax-Man which somehow was reworked into an official Pac-Man by Atarisoft but perhaps that never was an option for Snapper?

kevedwardsretro.bsky.social•129 days ago

There were literally dozens of 'Pac-Man' clones with all kinds of name variations for home computers in the early 90s in the UK/Europe. It was the wildwest back then and people didn't care about copyright. Most of the publishers were small companies with only a few employees.

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