This game really isn't a bootleg because the creators (Tengen) had the rights to Pac Man, but the game wasn't licensed by Nintendo.

I don't think this is a bootleg. It's unlicensed btw.

Wait. How the hell is it a bootleg if Namco allowed this p... oh. it's only bootleg because nintendo didn't lisence it. That's truely a double chromosome moment.

@Spacemodo Not really a bootleg in the typical sense and something that you could find without too much trouble but not officially licensed by Nintendo. It could be sold, just with a warning legal note.

Tengen who published this was a part of Atari and to cut a very long story short they wanted to publish more than what Nintendo allowed as they had a 5 game limit (some companies like Konami made a fake company to fool Nintendo bypassing the limit), Nintendo refused so as revenge Tengen reverse engineered the NES to make games and their own cartridges, some Tetris drama on top and took until WB decided to rename the company Time Warner Interactive that this stopped with a settlement. The first three NES games were licensed though and on other non-Nintendo consoles, a few were licensed in other countries by other companies. There were a few other publishers on the NES such as Codemasters (Camerica), Color Dreams and Accolade for a time on the Genesis that are unlicensed.

Well I mean, it is and it isn't. It was an unauthorized port made by a legitimate company to fight back Nintendo's monopoly on 3rd party developers.

This a bootleg? I played it as a kid and never realized it until now.

This should be called Pac-Mania (Unlicensed)

wait this is a bootleg? black and yellow spunky isn't canon?

@SuperMuppet no bootlegs are just bootlegs

@125scratch No bootleg should be deleted.

@125scratch I don't think a straight-up blanket change on terminology should be done. After all, in the cases where the creators of said bootleg do not have permission from the IP holder, "unlicensed" is an understatement.

This is why I think "(Bootleg)" should be changed to "(Unlicensed)" on this site.

@Rainbow Question Mark: Like I said, this is only labeled as "Bootleg" because the publisher got blacklisted by Nintendo. This game was made by Atari, with Namco's permission. This is an official game.

This is a well-programmed bootleg

iirc the only reason it's labeled as "Bootleg" is because Tengen (Atari's stuff-for-competitor's-consoles division) challenged Nintendo's licensing programme for the NES, lost horribly, and got kicked off the platform. Which is a shame since they made some really good NES software (like a better version of Tetris, and a more faithful Ms. Pac-Man that wasn't just a ROM hack of Namco's port of their MSX conversion of Pac-Man)

actually there's a bit more difference
unlicensed is still in that greyish legal area, most of them end up at retailer stores, and this game is still licensed by namco.
bootlegs are sold illegally in the black market, pop up in many different places, and usually try to rip off something. though of course there are also those "bootleg original" games made by bootleggers, which don't really rip off anything, or at least don't rip off too much...

Really, the only difference is in level of polish. Unlicensed DOES sound better, though.

whoever names these articles really needs to learn the difference between bootleg and unlicensed