IIRC it was more complex than just "who owns this"
For any given ROM, any or all of the following might have rights over it that would affect sales for a home emulation environment:
The developer who produced the game
The publisher who published it
A different developer or publisher who currently holds rights to it (rights to the ROM, home rights for the game or some other rights)
Developers, publishers or distributors who have the rights to the game in different countries
3rd parties who contributed IP to the game (e.g. Star Wars games need rights from Disney/Lucas, Moo Mesa needs rights from whoever made the cartoon, Suzuka 8 Hours needs rights from Coca-Cola and others, NBA on NBC needs rights from the NBA, NBC and others, Road Runner needs rights from Warner, Konami music games need rights from the owners of the music)
Even ignoring that, a lot of companies want more control over the distribution of their games than ROMs for MAME would give them. Not to mention issues where games companies dont want ROMs being distributed because they would rather you bought/played a newer similar game (e.g. latest Namco Museum/PacMan title instead of PacMan the original arcade ROM or Street Fighter IV instead of original Street Fighter arcade ROMs)
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Re: Until they do....
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