Okay, the ghost behavior is definitely like the A8 cart but it has the 5200's cycling attract mode and intermissions, so this is some kind of hybrid. Plus, this one has the different eating sound which isn't seen again until the Datasoft release. It's only about 14K, while the A8 version is 8K and the 5200 version occupies about 23K out of a 32K cart.
Here are the possibilities I see:
1. Someone really went to a lot of trouble to implant most of the 5200 upgrades into the A8 game (all except the improved A.I. and faster speed).
2. Perhaps the original A8 Pac-Man had these features and Atari trimmed them out to make the game 8K, making this a proto.
3. This is an early upgraded 5200 Pac-Man build, making this a proto that was possibly modified to the A8, or not assembled for 5200 hardware.
4. This is somehow related to the Datasoft version.
I had pretty much forgotten about this game, but when I have time I really want to do some code forensics.
Does anyone have a good copy of the Datasoft version?
EDIT: This appears to be a cassette of it??
Pac_Man_US_Gold.zip