"I've got Pac-Man fever, it's driving me crazy, I've got Pac-Man fever, I'm goin' out of my mind."
With the first single from Buckner & Garcia's concept record already top 10 on the US Billboard charts, there was high anticipation on how Pac-Man Fever would chart in Australia.
Futuretronics, in particular, was sweating on the record's success.
At the time Australia's Atari representative, the company committed "close to $1 million" to ensure the local sales success of the emerging worldwide phenomena of Pac-Man.
The reseller hoped to sell 50,000 Pac-Man cartridges "for use on home games machines and personal computers", and a similar number of integrated handheld games.
While Australian Business Computer magazine cast doubt on the sales expectations, it noted the company's "outlay on promotion demonstrates that it must seriously expect a large return".
It had good reason to. As the article points out, Pac-Man was expected to make Atari "an estimated $200 million" in 1982.
It wasn't just personal gaming or even concept records that parodied Ted Nugent tracks: Pac Man was a merchandising juggernaut.
There was an arcade version for parlours, a "battery-run table top Pac-Man game, a Pac-Man puzzle, a card game, and a non-electronic Pac-Man board game.
"Also, there are toys, pyjamas, bumper stickers, greeting cards and gift wrapping, sheets and pillow cases and children's clothing," the article said.
Of course, there was a chance at this point that you didn't know Pac-Man. Australian Business Computer was happy to oblige.
"Pac-Man is a round yellow figure who scores points in a video game by finding his way through a maze and eating dots, fruit and ghosts along the way," the article notes.
"Although it sounds bizarre, the game has proved enormously attractive to many people who previously did not show interest in computer-based games like Space Invaders."
In particular, the article notes, "girls, women and older males" were being hooked, not just the "young male" demographic.
And in the end there was no reason to worry about Pac-Man's revenue potential, or longevity.
Google paid homage to Pac-Man's 30th anniversary with a playable Google doodle in 2010.
Five years later, it set Pac-Man loose on the world's streets by converting Google Maps into one giant Pac-Man game as an April Fool's joke.
Good times.
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