Chap who coded Google’s Pac-Man clone reveals how the game freaked out Firefox
Waka-waka-waka-waka why why why why?
Marcin Wichary, a designer with experience at Figma, Medium, and Google, shared the story of how his creation of a Pac-Man playable logo for Google in 2010 unintentionally caused a stir among Firefox users. On the 30th anniversary of Pac-Man, Google's homepage displayed a playable version of the game instead of its typical logo.
As a software engineer at Google, Wichary was tasked with building the playable logo, which involved creating Pac-Man within an HTML and CSS environment. Google's logo was a crucial destination on their site, and this new feature was met with excitement by the company.
Wichary, however, was initially overwhelmed by the challenge. The homepage was a significant location, and his role as a software engineer was not the main focus. He began researching and recreating the game, focusing on recreating its iconic sounds. Google's plan was to showcase the game, including its sound effects, without seeking permission from Pac-Man's owner, Namco, as they wanted a near-final product.
After the design and coding work was completed, Google decided to make the Pac-Man doodle auto-play when users left their mouse idle for ten seconds. Wichary liked this idea, as it would showcase the game effectively. However, the designers were unaware that some users, who used the Firefox browser with an extension called CoolPreviews, would have the Pac-Man doodle start automatically as soon as Firefox was opened. CoolPreviews users would not expect to see the loud Pac-Man game start without their knowledge or consent.
Reports of strange noises and unusual computer behavior began to appear after the Pac-Man doodle went live. Google quickly addressed the issue by adding a mute button and requiring users to click to start the game. This patch was pushed within hours, and the phantom Pac-Man sounds ceased. Wichary assumed that few people would be bothered by the autoplay, as most visitors did not linger on the homepage for ten seconds.
He found the emergency live-patching to be the most challenging aspect of his day, but it did not cross his mind at the time.
Written by urgent.news from The Register's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
