Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition released at $169 — bright yellow console comes with Pac-Man: Double Feature 2-in-1 game cartridge

(Image credit: Atari)

Atari has released a hard-to-ignore new console in striking, vivid yellow livery. The bold, (perhaps overly) bright edition of this console is meant to celebrate a special collaboration with Plaion Replai and Namco to bring retro gaming fans the Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition.

Atari 2600+ PAC-MAN Edition | Launch Trailer - YouTube

Watch On

Atari consoles and Pac-Man are both enduring icons of the first home video gaming boom. While the console was released in the late 1970s, it wasn’t until 1982 that Pac-Man was made available for the home cartridge system. The timing of the release was near the plateau of ‘Pac-Man Fever’ that swept the globe in the early '80s.

Namco’s Pac-Man is an iconic and innovative game for its time, designed to offer a non-violent, universally appealing arcade experience to the masses. Instead of bullets and bombs, it features our friendly, bright yellow eponymous hero being pursued by colorful ghosts through a maze.

Pac-Man had a cool trick, though, as he could temporarily turn the tables on the ghosts by chomping power pellets. And there are extra points to be had by grabbing temporarily appearing bonus fruit.

Buy the Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition for $169 from Amazon

“Atari and PAC-MAN both defined what it meant to play,” said Wade Rosen, CEO of Atari. “This release celebrates that shared legacy and the endless joy of the chase that continues to inspire generations.”

Play your old carts on your modern TV

Though some modern retro console reissues seem extremely generous with the game libraries you get in the pack, often baked into the firmware, the new Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition comes with just two versions of Pac-Man in the box.

The Atari 2600+ console is resolutely cartridge-based, and thus targeted mainly at retro gamers with existing collections of Atari 2600 and 7800 games (and accessories). In this light, the Pac-Man: Double Feature 2-in-1 game cartridge makes sense.

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Modern features of this retro console include HDMI output, USB-C charging, and support for multiple display modes (4:3/16:9). However, there are no USB ports or an SD card slot for sideloading games, homebrew, or ROMs. For this level of expandability, you will need to buy a flash cart that fits into the game slot.

For your $169, you will get the bright yellow Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition and a matching Pac-Man CX-40+ Wireless Joystick. As we mentioned in the intro, this console is available now, along with extra CX-40+ Joysticks in Yellow (Pac-Man), Red (Blinky), Pink (Pinky), Blue (Inky), and Orange (Clyde), for $39 each.

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Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.

9 Comments Comment from the forums

call101010

PacMan is owned by Namco how is this even Legal ?
Reply
Udyr

call101010 said:
PacMan is owned by Namco how is this even Legal ?
Namco and ATARI are partners.
Reply
cuvtixo

To celebrate a special collaboration with Plaion Replai and Namco to bring retro gaming fans the Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition.Please read the article before getting outraged. I'm fairly ambivalent. Yay, they have slots for old cartridges to function, but two games? Two? for that matter, I'm not clear why not 5200 cartridges won't work. Is the connector really that different? They could easily put the 69 Atari5200 games into a single cartridge. Heck, they could put a whole gaming system in a cartridge, upscale graphics on all games, oh so much more! Cheap! I'm skeptical about the joysticks, I'd have to have one in my hands before judging. I suspect they're day-glow crap. Pacmac is 45 years old, this is just about an insult to vintage gamers, really. So, so inadequate.
Reply
Sluggotg

Atari Licensed Pac Man from Namco. I got mine today, (complete with the package being cut open by a blade... Thanks Fedex!). It is in good shape. It does look very nice. I was home on leave from the Navy in the 80s and my little sister was playing on her 2600. She showed me Pac Man, I was horrified at how bad it was. I played all the coin op arcade games since pong and at the time .I was also playing games on computers. The 2600 was one of the very first cartridge based systems, (I believe the Fairchild was first). But as we all know Video gaming tech was screaming ahead and the 2600 was left behind much sooner than they expected.
Reply
Sluggotg

cuvtixo said:
To celebrate a special collaboration with Plaion Replai and Namco to bring retro gaming fans the Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition.Please read the article before getting outraged. I'm fairly ambivalent. Yay, they have slots for old cartridges to function, but two games? Two? for that matter, I'm not clear why not 5200 cartridges won't work. Is the connector really that different? They could easily put the 69 Atari5200 games into a single cartridge. Heck, they could put a whole gaming system in a cartridge, upscale graphics on all games, oh so much more! Cheap! I'm skeptical about the joysticks, I'd have to have one in my hands before judging. I suspect they're day-glow crap. Pacmac is 45 years old, this is just about an insult to vintage gamers, really. So, so inadequate.
The cartridges are totally different for the 5200. The controllers for the 5200 were legendarily bad, (look up a picture of one). Despite some decent games on the 5200 it did not sell well.
Reply
Lamarr the Strelok

To those that don't know,Pac man on 2600 was crap. The video accompanying the story shows the graphics of the 7800 version of Pac man. They are incredibly different.5200 was pretty close and it seems 7800 even got closer to the OG but the 2600 version was bad bad. Yahoogle some gameplay and see for yourself.(dare)
Even at like 12 I was like nah bro, I'm good. I got quarters and the real deal at 7-11 a block away.Most games on it were pretty bad really. But,it's pretty incredible what they DID get out of the 2600 hardware. Many of you may be interested in that.Many of you more than me can appreciate what they did.
And no. It's not too bright.Pac man doesn't mess around. We kneel at Pac man.The colored controllers are neat.Different colors are great. What color should they be? Intentional or not,OG pac man is a magnet for kids.I'm talking 2 years old.It's an irresponsibly cute game. I won't get it because I have the real one on steam but this would be fun to have for teh vibes.And even my 12 year old hands would cramp pretty quick too. And the 5200 controller is a controller you put in your hand and it has 2 buttons on each side and a wheel/paddle(?) that turns left and right in the middle of the controller. I didn't play that one much but I think I cramped up on that one too.
OK. Point being the video that's with the video doesn't show the 2600 version but it looks like the 7800 cartridge does come with it and that has the better graphics. I assume the 2600 version comes with it too but.... oof.Hey. It was a stepping stone. Primitive but sorta revolutionary. I'm glad Atari seems to be doing good it seems.
Reply
sukebe

Admin said:
Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition games console released in striking, vivid yellow livery.

Atari 2600+ Pac-Man Edition released at $169 — bright yellow console comes with Pac-Man: Double Feature 2-in-1 game cartridge : Read more
The problem with pacman on Atari is that you can't 'preselect' the next direction you want to go; you have to hit it right at the corner.
So, at least for coin-op players....this was stupid.
Reply
Roland Of Gilead

Lamarr the Strelok said:
Yahoogle
Nice word mash :tearsofjoy:
Reply
dt588

Nobody asked for this, especially for $169.
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