When it was first released in Japan, "Pac-Man" was only a modest success; Namco's own "Galaxian" had quickly outdone the game in popularity, due to the predominately male playerbase being familiar with its shooting gameplay as opposed to "Pac-Man"s cute characters and maze-chase theme. Iwatani claims that the game was very popular with women, which he had hoped to accomplish during development. By comparison, in North America, "Pac-Man" became a nation-wide success. Within one year, more than 100,000 arcade units had been sold which grossed more than 1 billion in quarters. "Pac-Man" overtook "Asteroids" as the best-selling arcade game in the country, and surpassed "" with more than US$1 billion in revenue. By 1982, it was estimated to have had 30 million active players across the United States. Some arcades purchased entire rows of "Pac-Man" cabinets.