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General discussionBackup Installers - versions compiled with galaxy-related changes included?(15 posts)solved(15 posts)solved
(15 posts)solved
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Posted August 28, 2021
Hi, from my understanding the games that support achievements in GOG have been modified in the source code to support integration with the GOG API.

I was wondering if this also applies to games installed through the backup installers?

Thanks in advance
This question / problem has been solved by AB2012image
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Hi, from my understanding the games that support achievements in GOG have been modified in the source code to support integration with the GOG API. I was wondering if this also applies to games installed through the backup installers?
Games installed via offline installers contain the same in-game code that triggers achievements and "talks" to Galaxy. However, regardless of how you installed a game (via Galaxy or offline installers), you do still need to have Galaxy running though for achievements etc, to work. The galaxy.dll's that come bundled with offline installers are mostly there for non-Galaxy users to prevent the games from crashing if Galaxy isn't running when the game tries to talk to Galaxy by sending, eg, an "Achievement Unlocked" 'ping' via GOG's API and expecting a response from the client (that may not even be installed). The offline / backup installer galaxy dll's are not a replacement for the Galaxy client though if client features are actually wanted.
Post edited August 28, 2021 by AB2012
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Hi, from my understanding the games that support achievements in GOG have been modified in the source code to support integration with the GOG API. I was wondering if this also applies to games installed through the backup installers?
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AB2012: Games installed via offline installers contain the same in-game code that triggers achievements and "talks" to Galaxy. However, regardless of how you installed a game (via Galaxy or offline installers), you do still need to have Galaxy running though for achievements etc, to work. The galaxy.dll's that come bundled with offline installers are mostly there for non-Galaxy users to prevent the games from crashing if Galaxy isn't running when the game tries to talk to Galaxy by sending, eg, an "Achievement Unlocked" 'ping' via GOG's API and expecting a response from the client (that may not even be installed). The offline / backup installer galaxy dll's are not a replacement for the Galaxy client though if client features are actually wanted.
Many thanks for the detailed description, it's good to know how it's implemented. I wonder if they would consider asking devs to compile the games without those pings in the first place. Practically this wouldn't make much of any difference other than maybe contributing to the 'DRM free' aspect via purity (and perhaps satisfy potential mild OCD on my part).
Post edited August 28, 2021 by Revilon
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Many thanks for the detailed description, it's good to know how it's implemented. I wonder if they would consider asking devs to compile the games without those pings in the first place. Practically this wouldn't make much of any difference other than maybe contributing to the 'DRM free' aspect via purity (and perhaps satisfy potential mild OCD on my part).
Oh, I agree with you. We actually discussed this the other day on the other thread about the pro's & cons of doing so. I'd love to see "pure" installers without any client integration but that would mean devs would have to compile their game twice and agree to provide two sets of patches, etc, which is highly unlikely.
Post edited August 28, 2021 by AB2012
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Many thanks for the detailed description, it's good to know how it's implemented. I wonder if they would consider asking devs to compile the games without those pings in the first place. Practically this wouldn't make much of any difference other than maybe contributing to the 'DRM free' aspect via purity (and perhaps satisfy potential mild OCD on my part).
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AB2012: Oh, I agree with you. We actually discussed this the other day on the other thread about the pro's & cons of doing so. I'd love to see "pure" installers without any client integration but that would mean devs would have to compile their game twice and agree to provide two sets of patches, etc, which is highly unlikely.
And it’s not like anyone is bothered about 5 or 10 years down the line when we need cracks to remove galaxy dependencies…
Posted August 28, 2021
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nightcraw1er.488: And it’s not like anyone is bothered about 5 or 10 years down the line when we need cracks to remove galaxy dependencies…
True, though for older games that haven't changed, that's one reason why I'm keeping some older pre-2015 "old format" GOG installers + disc versions of the favourites.
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Many thanks for the detailed description, it's good to know how it's implemented. I wonder if they would consider asking devs to compile the games without those pings in the first place. Practically this wouldn't make much of any difference other than maybe contributing to the 'DRM free' aspect via purity (and perhaps satisfy potential mild OCD on my part).
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AB2012: Oh, I agree with you. We actually discussed this the other day on the other thread about the pro's & cons of doing so. I'd love to see "pure" installers without any client integration but that would mean devs would have to compile their game twice and agree to provide two sets of patches, etc, which is highly unlikely.
Perhaps they could add an option to the installer regarding the integration. It would then be up to the user whether to include all references to galaxy from within the code, the placeholder galaxy.dll, and the other residing gog* files. I'd assume this would require a guard in the code somewhere for the toggle, so might not make it completely trace-free.
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Perhaps they could add an option to the installer regarding the integration. It would then be up to the user whether to include all references to galaxy from within the code, the placeholder galaxy.dll, and the other residing gog* files. I'd assume this would require a guard in the code somewhere for the toggle, so might not make it completely trace-free.
All the achievement code is hard-coded into the game's .exe itself. The issue isn't that they technically couldn't supply two versions, it's simply that neither they nor GOG want to so there is no Galaxy-free option from the game developer for any installer to choose from (unless you keep older pre-Galaxy installers, which certainly solves the issue but is also something that only really works for older games that are long finished and don't need patching).
Posted August 28, 2021
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Revilon: Perhaps they could add an option to the installer regarding the integration. It would then be up to the user whether to include all references to galaxy from within the code, the placeholder galaxy.dll, and the other residing gog* files. I'd assume this would require a guard in the code somewhere for the toggle, so might not make it completely trace-free.
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AB2012: All the achievement code is hard-coded into the game's .exe itself. The issue isn't that they technically couldn't supply two versions, it's simply that neither they nor GOG want to so there is no Galaxy-free option from the game developer for any installer to choose from (unless you keep older pre-Galaxy installers, which certainly solves the issue but is also something that only really works for older games that are long finished and don't need patching).
Sure
To rephrase - I am speculating about a potential workaround being for GOG to add a checkbox option that appears during installation that somehow allows users to specify for the code to be void of the galaxy wrapping code. This might depend on how the installers work, but if it doesn't involve anycode generation of some kind then I guess recompilation would be necessary after all. Otherwise, they'd only need to provide one build that works for either scenario depending on if the option is selected or not.
EDIT: looks like installers mostly just unpack archives, so this might not be possible.
Post edited August 28, 2021 by Revilon
Posted August 29, 2021
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nightcraw1er.488: And it’s not like anyone is bothered about 5 or 10 years down the line when we need cracks to remove galaxy dependencies…
But they're not "galaxy dependencies", since all (most) single player games here are completely functional on an offline PC without Galaxy installed.
Let's assume that we're talking about Windows... what would a future version of this OS have to change to make GOG games (with Galaxy "anchors") unplayable (offline/no client)?
Posted August 29, 2021
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AB2012: Games installed via offline installers contain the same in-game code that triggers achievements and "talks" to Galaxy. However, regardless of how you installed a game (via Galaxy or offline installers), you do still need to have Galaxy running though for achievements etc, to work.
I know I had the experience once of playing a game offline and then loading that same game with Galaxy near the end and getting a dump of like 30 achievements from the entire thing.
Posted August 29, 2021
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nightcraw1er.488: And it’s not like anyone is bothered about 5 or 10 years down the line when we need cracks to remove galaxy dependencies…
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teceem: But they're not "galaxy dependencies", since all (most) single player games here are completely functional on an offline PC without Galaxy installed.
Let's assume that we're talking about Windows... what would a future version of this OS have to change to make GOG games (with Galaxy "anchors") unplayable (offline/no client)?
A lot of games have galaxy dll requirement, if that no longer works in the future then the game no longer works. It’s the equivalent of needing a nocd or drm skip patch. It’s already been raised several times that some things no longer work on old systems, and galaxy isn’t on Linux at all. Who knows what else they will push into the installers over the next months/years. Heck there are online only, gated content, mostly multiplayer etc here already.
Posted August 29, 2021
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AB2012: Games installed via offline installers contain the same in-game code that triggers achievements and "talks" to Galaxy. However, regardless of how you installed a game (via Galaxy or offline installers), you do still need to have Galaxy running though for achievements etc, to work.
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StingingVelvet: I know I had the experience once of playing a game offline and then loading that same game with Galaxy near the end and getting a dump of like 30 achievements from the entire thing.
I believe the Galaxy related stuff is stored in %LOCALAPPDATA%\GOG.com\Galaxy\Applications\ where you'll find a folder for each game, named as a 17 digits number. This is the clientId (not the gameId, which is a 10 digits number) and can be found in the goggame-gameId.info file (viewable with notepad, or similar), located in the root folder of every gog game.

I've never used/installed Galaxy, but I have a bunch of folders in that location. Some games will store their settings and save files there, like Children of Morta, for example. So one should be careful (backup first) if wants to delete some of the Galaxy stuff in there.
Posted August 29, 2021
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teceem: But they're not "galaxy dependencies", since all (most) single player games here are completely functional on an offline PC without Galaxy installed.
Let's assume that we're talking about Windows... what would a future version of this OS have to change to make GOG games (with Galaxy "anchors") unplayable (offline/no client)?
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nightcraw1er.488: A lot of games have galaxy dll requirement, if that no longer works in the future then the game no longer works. It’s the equivalent of needing a nocd or drm skip patch. It’s already been raised several times that some things no longer work on old systems, and galaxy isn’t on Linux at all. Who knows what else they will push into the installers over the next months/years. Heck there are online only, gated content, mostly multiplayer etc here already.
So does that mean none of the newer GOG games should work in Linux with WINE? I don't think the galaxy dlls are preventing them from working in WINE. I am pretty sure I've already installed some such games in WINE.
Posted August 30, 2021
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nightcraw1er.488: A lot of games have galaxy dll requirement, if that no longer works in the future then the game no longer works. It’s the equivalent of needing a nocd or drm skip patch. It’s already been raised several times that some things no longer work on old systems, and galaxy isn’t on Linux at all. Who knows what else they will push into the installers over the next months/years. Heck there are online only, gated content, mostly multiplayer etc here already.
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timppu: So does that mean none of the newer GOG games should work in Linux with WINE? I don't think the galaxy dlls are preventing them from working in WINE. I am pretty sure I've already installed some such games in WINE.
Nope, the galaxy client is not on Linux. However if that dll is removed from your OS in the future, stops working, or becomes more malicious ha distinct possibility with GOgs current direction) you are stuck unless you get some third party patch to remove it.

Edit, and as if by magic, the second post I read today mentions such galaxy.dll issues:
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/profile_page_and_galaxy_not_working
Post edited August 30, 2021 by nightcraw1er.488
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General discussionBackup Installers - versions compiled with galaxy-related changes included?(15 posts)solved(15 posts)solved
(15 posts)solved