The player controls character through a maze, eating dots (also called biscuits or just dots). When all dots are eaten, player is taken to the next stage. Between some stages, one of three intermission animations plays. Four enemies (Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde) roam the maze, trying to catch player. If an enemy touches player, he loses a life. Whenever player occupies the same tile as an enemy, he is considered to have collided with that ghost. When all lives have been lost, the game ends. Player is awarded a single bonus life at 1,000 points by default—DIP switches inside the machine can change the required points or disable the bonus life altogether.
Near the corners of the maze are four larger, flashing dots known as power pellets that provide player with the temporary ability to eat the enemies. The enemies turn deep blue, reverse direction and usually move more slowly. When an enemy is eaten, its eyes remain and return to the center box where it is regenerated in its normal color. Blue enemies flash white to signal that they are about to become dangerous again and the length of time for which the enemies remain vulnerable varies from one stage to the next, generally becoming shorter as the game progresses. In later stages, the enemies go straight to flashing, bypassing blue, which means that they can only be eaten for a short amount of time, although they still reverse direction when a power pellet is eaten; in even later stages, the ghosts do not become edible (i.e., they do not change color and still make player lose a life on contact), but they still reverse direction.