Namco Museum (Nintendo Game Boy Advance, 2001)

I originally purchased this cartidge for me shortly after my 8 year old daughter got her Nintendo DS. Who has the time or money to go to an arcade and play these games, let alone find them in an arcade? This collection of original games we old timers use to play in the arcades is great! The games sound and look the same, except for the small size and the fact that I'm not running out of quarters. My only regret is that the Nintendo DS (and I'm sure it would be the same for GBA) is so small that a real "physical" player such as myself has difficulty keeping it still enough to see the screen - this is especially true for Ms Pac Man & Galaga. This is one great advantage to the large game units...they are impossible for players to move during play. Also, the simple ball joy stick was much easier to operate than the cross-shaped navigation control on the NDS. I don't play as well as I did, but then I don't need to...I can play as often as I want. Well, until my little girl asks for it back! If I was better with the controls I would give this cartridge an EXCELLENT rating. But, due to the limitations of the controls on the NDS & GBA it makes fast play difficult. So, I rate it as GOOD. :)

If you like classic gaming then you will Love Namco Museum! The games included in this compilation include Dig Dug, Ms. Pac-Man, Pole Position, Galaga and Galaxian!
All those quarters dropped at the arcade are back in one compolation sure to please - Especially since we won't need to fill the coin op full of quarters!

Why is it a great game? Simply for the nostalgia factor, and nostalgia is what you get. Ms. Pac-Man, Galaga, Galaxian, Pole Position and Dig-Dug are what's contained in Namco Museum. If you're looking for some nostalgia on the GBA, this is where it's at. Otherwise, you're gonna get more bang for your buck with the follow-up Namco Museum for DS, which has these games and several more.

Regardless, all the games are as you remember them. You can adjust the difficulty and lives in the options, and several games allow screen scrolling for greater detail or stretching to fit everything on the screen. Some games you'll prefer the stretching (Ms. Pac-Man, so you can keep track of ghosts) and others work better scrolling (Dig-Dug). They also come with helpful hints and tips that give you a better idea of how to score higher or just survive longer.

So while I feel Galaga and Galaxian are pretty much the same game, others may not look at it the same way and enjoy it regardless. I mostly play just for Ms. Pac-Man and Dig-Dug, but since they're there, on occasion I'll enjoy a good round of Pole Position or Galaga.

I largely bought this game because of Pole Position and Dig-Dug, both solid games I've grown up with. The other games are a great bonus. Highly recommended for the nostalgia!

If you are a game player who enjoys todays thrills and chills the new games provide, then don't waste your money buying Namco Museum. Dig Dug, Pac-Man and Galaga as well as those other old games were old many years ago before we knew what was cool. The old games on this CD are really lame and should be put out of our misery. Namco knew they were so lame that they included updated versions on the cd.
I would not recommend this game to anyone for any reason.

I bought this game because it had a good selection of the old school games, (Did Dug is my absolute favorite!) however; don't expect it to play like the arcade game. The small screen of the GameBoy is a severe limitation to these type games (games like Mario are a much better design for GameBoy). For example, on Ms. PacMan, you can play full screen (which is very, very tiny to see) or scroll screen (which "conceals" the errant ghost or two, which eventually results in you getting eaten by said errant ghost). I know I am getting old, but the arcade games are just much better. With arcade games (or game systems that are hooked up to your TV or even computer games) you can see everything that's going on! One thing I do like about this game is that under the options menu, you can give yourself an extra man or two and change the level of difficulty to easy, medium, or hard----something the old school games just don't have. When I saw this game, I thought I would play it all of the time, because it had so many of the old games that I liked. But the truth is that I hardly play it at all. This is a way to make those games of bygone days portable, but to me, it is an exercise in frustration.