mqstout: Achievements are anti-features and rely on DRM-like systems to be implemented, and, thus, should NOT be forced. Unlike on other strong DRM platforms where they are.
Like, seriously, your goals are antithetical to what the majority of the rest of us want at all. I'd rather GOG entirely axe the Galaxy achievement system entirely! ...
Because your "achievement equality is HARMFUL to the rest of our goals, of a DRM-free environment with offline installers for everything. Achievements require Galaxy, and are very much DRM-like. I absolutely do want to to shame you, because what you want is damaging to me and all of us (including yourself, whether you admit it or not).
Sorry, your argument on achievements are even more bunk now than they were in the past. You want to reinforce Galaxy. We've seen where this leads. We've seen games that implemented Galaxy features that de-facto turned it into DRM (calling them bugs and they were later fixed.) You have no ground to stand on
Those are strawman arguments.
Neither I, nor any Achievement/feature parity advocate in history, has ever advocated for "forced Achievements." Achievements are and always have been optional. Anyone who doesn't like them or doesn't want them can either:
a) not use Galaxy or
b) use Galaxy, but disable the Achievements feature.
Therefore, there is no sensible reason for why Achievement haters should be able to dictate that likers of Achievements must not be allowed to have them, since Achievement haters are under no obligation to participate in the Achievements system (and nor should they be, even Achievement advocates would never say they should be).
Alternatively, if by "forced" you are referring my statement that GOG should not allow games onto its platform that lack feature parity (unless there are good reasons for some features being removed): in those cases, the devs had already decided, of their own Free Will, to implement Steam Achievements into their game, which is something they did
because they believe in their hearts Achievements to be a worthwhile and value-adding feature to their game.
If they then decide to treat GOG customers like second-class citizens by refusing to give GOG customers Galaxy Achievements too, then that
wouldn't be because they suddenly decided that "Achievements are bad so therefore we won't give them to our GOG customers because we don't believe in them."
Rather, they would be excluding the feature solely because the devs decided it's
easier to be lazy and/or cheap and/or unethical (i.e. not caring about treating all of their customers equally well).
That is to say, "being forced to add Achievements" has nothing to do with the scenario that would occur if GOG started to enforce feature parity. That makes it sound like devs who are opposed to the idea of Achievements would be compelled to add them against their will. But that's not what would actually be happening.
If anything were being forced, then the
only thing being forced would be devs being forced to
stop unfairly discriminating against GOG customers on the basis that they are too cheap and/or lazy to put in a few hours of work to give GOG customers feature parity.
As for your other points: since Achievements are
optional and also since they do not remove, nor alter, nor restrict access to any in-game content of any game, then that means that no, they are not DRM either.
No, Achievements aren't damaging to you, nor any others who dislike them, because none of you have any obligation to participate with them when they are offered. You can completely ignore them forever, and by doing that, they will have never have any negative impact on you.
No, I do not want to "reinforce Galaxy." Rather, I believe anyone who doesn't want to use Galaxy should be free never to do so.
I also believe that no game content should ever be DRM-gated behind Galaxy (which is something that Achievements do not do, because they are not "game content" per say).
Achievements also have no impact on preventing GOG from offering offline installers for everything, so I'm not sure where the logic is in conflating the Achievement subject with the offlline installer subject, even though they have no relevance to each other.
