3-D Glooper

The Good
In the early Eighties, we were introduced to Pac-Man, Namco’s mascot who spends his days gobbling up Power Pellets and avoiding ghosts that are out to get him. In his first game, as well as the games that followed, the maze in which he roams about is presented in a top-down view. You can see all the Power Pellets you need to eat, as well as the four ghosts making your job difficult. Namco could have taken this concept further, redesigning the mazes in 3-D, but could not be bothered to do this. The closest thing I got was a bonus level in Wolfenstein 3D. In id’s take, the Power Pellets are replaced with trophies, and touching a ghost does not mean instant-death.

In Supersoft’s game, which uses a first-person perspective, the ghosts are known as Gloopers. A much dumber version of their Namco counterparts, they roam around the maze at their own free will and have no interest in trapping you at all. Also replacing the Power Pellets in the maze are either blue or red tokens. You need to get a required number of these according to the right-most figure at the top of the screen. (It is 300 on the first level, but this number is increased on subsequent levels.) Getting a red token will cause the Gloopers to change color from brown to orange, allowing you to eat them. A tiny map will appear below the status area for a few seconds, showing the location of the tokens and Gloopers.

The maze is well designed, with plenty of dead ends and long, gray corridors. The Gloopers are drawn exactly like ghosts. Having them display one eye when they are about to turn a corner provides some realism. From my experience, you only encounter them in these gray corridors, not anywhere else. I like the suspense; you don’t know where the next Glooper is until it is too late.

The Bad
The only sound effect worth mentioning is a low-tone warning letting you know if a Glooper is in your vicinity. However, since it is very quiet, you have to turn the volume up quite high if you want to hear it.

The Bottom Line
3-D Glooper is an interesting take on the Pac-Man concept, in which players are given the opportunity to go around a maze eating as many tokens as they can without bumping into the aforementioned critters. Since this is played from a first-person perspective, you don’t get to see everything at once. A tiny map is displayed when you are near something important. The graphics and sound in this game are good, and anyone who has played Namco’s game who feels like a challenge should hunt this down.