Nothing is unclear about who owns the IP.

Once again - the link:
https://www.gog.com/game/might_and_magic_6_limited_edition

See attachment, if you can't find what you're looking for.

Technically, you're right, of course.
Every copy of a game that is not legally purchased from the rightful owner(s) of an IP, is pirated (or simply bought on the second hand market - if we include retail versions).

However...if a rights holder doesn't care about his IP anymore (meaning: the IP owner(s) doesn't sell the game/software anywhere, AND also doesn't care that the game/software is available to download from abandonware sites) - the game/software is in a legally grey area, where the download apparently gets tolerated by the owner(s) of the IP.

Else, the game would not be on offer...cease and desist letters are a thing, you know

One thing is for sure: if there is no regulary way to purchase the game anymore - there is also no income lost for the owner.

With that said: the site Abishia linked to is offering an illegal copy, because the game is officially available for sale.

I'd argue that regular piracy isn't the cause of income loss either. Companies shouldn't count possible future profits as "money that's basically in our pocket", or in other words money that can be "stolen" from them. That's just not how the world works, no matter how much they'd like it to.

Besides, even if you did consider the possibility of "future income loss" (is there even a word for such a thing?), I'd argue that the amount of people using piracy just to test software out before purchasing it far outweighs those who won't ever spend a dime because they can get stuff for free.

Is piracy morally wrong? Totally, there should be no access to copyrighted material through channels other than those intended by the title owner, among other things that are just as bad. That being said, income loss isn't one of them.

You misunderstood, or maybe I wasn't very clear:

the sentence you quoted was intended to explain why IP owners might decide not to go after abandonware sites for offering downloads of games they themselves don't sell anymore.

If there is no interest anymore in an IP, and the IP is financially "dead" (so to speak), there is no apparent reason anymore to enforce the copyright.

Exceptions exist of course.
In cases where IP owners still plan to do something with said IP (new games, etc), they not only CAN, but actually HAVE TO enforce their copyright.

Maybe I did, I admit I didn't really get into the heart of your post and the post you were quoting before writing my own.

Still, even if IP isn't financially dead, pirating it doesn't equal stealing money from the owner. I believe we should state things like this clearly because companies owning most of those title rights already got the upper hand even over their regular customers. ("Piracy is the cause of our loss of income" rhetoric is just as morally wrong as piracy itself)

EDIT. I do believe "true" abandonware, like first Wizardries, is in legally and, more importantly, morally grey area, despite what I wrote earlier.

Their intent isn't to provide the original archive, usually it's modified.

New World Computing was bought by 3DO in 1996.

In 2002, 3DO developed financial issues and laid off a large portion of New World Computing's staff during the development of Might and Magic 9. This resulted in the game being released with a lot of issues and feeling half done, causing mixed reviews and poor sales. A single patch was released before 3DO filed for bankruptcy protections and sold the rights to the Might and Magic franchise to Ubisoft before dissolving.

This is also why the Army Men franchise, which was developed by 3DO, is now owned and released by 2K Games.

Other examples include the game studios Bulfrog (Populous), Origin (Ultima), and Westwood Studios (Lands of Lore, Kyrandia, Nox) that no longer exist but the games that they developed are in print because Electronic Arts owns the rights to them.

It doesn't matter that the studio that originally developed a specific game is around or not. If the rights got bought by another studio, they have the right to publish that game, make money off it, and enforce the copyright. There is absolutely nothing shady or illegal about this.

edit -- fixed a few typos :)

Hmmm, personally i'd prefer if it was a SFX 7z archive, with the GoG stamp or whatnot in it, but then you can just extract the files, find the DOS folder or DosBox folders and change them out as necessary.

That's not a link to the game in question here, specifically Heroes of Might and Magic 2. However the IP ownership is the same (Ubisoft). Nope. Still technically illegal. Probably nobody cares and you won't get caught, but it's black and white, not grey. It would have to be released with some form of freeware license in order to be legal, which does in fact happen sometimes.

It is a loss of income though. Some people who pirate would buy if they had no choice; that's really not debatable. What is debatable is how high the percentage is. Whatever it is, it's absolutely higher than the "piracy does not cause any loss of money" side seems to think, and absolutely lower than the "all piracy equals lost sales" idea that publishers seem to have.

Dude, if you come late to a party, maybe don't try to explain people what a discussion, whose beginnings you haven't caught, is about.

Abishia posted a link (since then removed) to an abandonware site, where they offer a download of Might & Magic Book 2: Gates to another World.

And yes: s/he addressed HoMM2 originally - but s/he then linked to MM2:GtaW.

As can be easily extrapolated, by reading the comment below Abishia's, where InkPanther stated (quote):
"The game you're linking is available for sale on GOG. And it's not even the game OP mentioned."

And some who pirate and then pay wouldn't buy the game otherwise. We don't know the numbers so it's hard to discuss which number is higher.

Nevertheless, in principle counting possible future sales as money that can already be stolen from the one who's supposed to earn it is a mental gimmick to further a particular agenda, nothing more.

As I said before, I do believe piracy is morally wrong but definitely not because of causing future income loss to the copyright owner. Simply put, copyrighted material shouldn't be available through channels not intended by the copyright owner, period.