All my Steam games still have the option last week.
While I did not launch Steam this week, I think the option is still there.

There are three options:
- "Always keep this game up to date"
- "Only update this game when I launch it"
- "High Priority - Always update this game before others"

You can't refuse updates on Steam, you can only "update later". If you don't do it, you can't start the game.

I care about DRM. I have many games I cannot play today because of DRM. I can make some of them work with a CD crack, but not all have a CD crack, and the ones that do are either not updated or from a different version(country). I also have DLC I cannot access for some games because the DRM used has long gone out of business.

The thing is, Steam and Galaxy won't be around forever, and even if it's around for a long time, it will change in the future. It's TOS will change. It's format will change. You will have to accept these changes if you want to ever download your games again or update them. You also might not even have that option, because you will no longer be capable of using their program anymore on your system due to their changes.

A sad reality too, is that many developers want to sell their games on GOG DRM free, but GOG won't sell it here. I'm not talking really bad games, I'm talking some great new and olde school games. Of course "great" is subjective, but my point is that if you ever read what the developers say, you find tons of these developers saying they want GOG to take their games, and GOG says *no*. Many developers care about DRM too, in that they don't even want their own games to have it.

I think it really depends. Sometimes they force updates for legal/license reasons and sometimes they don't. GTA4 I'm sure is a case where they're forcing it, because Rockstar doesn't want to worry about possible legal issues of still hosting those songs for people (even if we all agree legally they could have that doesn't mean there wouldn't have been a court challenge if they did).

Now what you could have done is download GTA4 and gone into offline mode, but obviously someday you're going to want to go online with Steam again so it's a temporary deal. If the game had been on GOG they could have done a smart "download a backup the original version while it lasts" promo, but alas the game was not here.

For a lot of the same issues already mentioned here, I agree that I still want DRM free and support GoG.

I don't like the way IP has been going over the years with you basically renting the right to play a game at the IP owner's discretion. When I bought an Atari, Nintendo, or Sega cartridge, the game was mine to play whenever and for how long I wanted. I wasn't forced to update, I didn't have to log in and have a connection to play, and there wasn't the threat of the company going out of business to stop me from ever playing it again. We're paying a lot of money for these games, and as legitimate customers that are supporting these companies, we should feel safe in knowing we can play the game we purchased any time we want.

The forced updates are a problem for me mainly for two reasons. The first and most important reason is mostly mods. Take Stellaris for example. They updated that game so frequently and each time, your mods and saves were worthless. I may like a current version of a game and want to finish my save game. Many times I spend a lot of time getting and setting up the mods I want, only to have this effort wasted by some insignificant forced update. They finally added the option to keep older versions of this game, but most games don't offer this. At least with GoG, I download the game and install it, I keep the download, and I never have to worry about updating because I keep that download in a file with the mods that require it. I have multiple versions of Mount and Blade and Warband in files with numerous mods that each require a different version. This would not be possible with Steam and many mods stop development when they're finished and don't update with the game, specifically smaller mods that only change small aspects of the game.

I still have all of my old cartridges and systems and still play them from time to time. I collect games and I love going back and playing them over and over. This is especially true with PC games with mods and addons that are sometimes created years after the game community has died.

Steam, Origin, or Uplay could shut down any day and I'll have permanently lost my entire libraries. Even if they continued to offer the download, which I doubt they would, I wouldn't be able to log in to their server to install and run the game.

All DRM accomplishes is making sure that pirates are playing the game hassle free. They still find a way to pirate it, distribute it, and play it. It mainly punishes those of us that actually pay a more than fair price for a game.

So yes, I will forever support GoG unless they forsake us and implement DRM.

The notion that I would have to sign into a client ONLINE in order to play my OFFLINE games (the glorious SCHEME monopoly) causes me an intense physical reaction of revulsion. Yes, I care, and it sickens me that people let it ever get to this point.

A lot of the trust that people put in services like Steam depends on the notion that "They'll never do something that can give them so much bad PR to make them lose sales and money". In their minds, Steam will never let millions of people complain because they can't play their games. But a lot of people simply don't care about that scenario. For example, Steam has an offline mode, but it needs to "phone home" from time to time. I know a lot of people who simply don't care about "what will happen to my games if Steam goes offline" because they simply trust Steam over themselves, when it comes to preserving their games. We, on GOG, live our lives backing up everything, but a lot of guys out there have no interest in doing that. Most of them actually consider "DRM-free" to be an hassle more than anything else, because you have to update the game yourself, you have to preserve it yourself etc. On Steam they just click "Buy, Download, Play".

I haven't backed up a single thing... guess I'm not on gOg...

If I recall correctly, you don't care about DRM, do you? It's fine, but being DRM-free is clearly the main selling point of GOG...

Im also not on gOg, apparently..

edit - by the by, gOg's main selling point is games.

If gog was just about games I would not be here. I am here because there is no DRM to worry about. The only supposed DRM is when you are playing a multiplayer game. That is done just to make sure that you don't have 2 or more people using the same account to access multiplayer. This is not to control who plays but more to keep people from messing up someone else's stuff in the multiplayer game 'verse

A good example of this is Neverwinter Nights, both 1 and 2. Servers that host the games need to make sure people are not stealing each others characters and stuff.

Humble Bundle has what I call a "claimwall" for their game giveaways:

1. I add the free game to my shopping cart.
2. I "purchase" the free game for $0.00.
3. Humble Bundle confirms the deal and says thanks for your business.

I thought that was all I had to do, but it's not:

4. In your email you are presented the "claimwall" that says you have claimed the game. No sign of trouble.
5. Click the claimwall, and you are presented with a long list of banner advertising that everyone is conditioned to ignore.
6. At the bottom, under all the banner ads, in fine print that I can't read, it vaguely implies my game will expire if I don't activate the DRM key in a few days.
7. Humble Bundle exploits the DRM to take away the free game I "purchased" and thought was mine.

This isn't an accident. Humble Bundle knows exactly what they're doing. In some jurisdictions, it might be called false or deceptive advertising, or more specifically, bait-and-switch advertising. They get you to come to their site by promising to give you a free game. Then, if you're not paying attention, they renege on that promise, and save themselves the cost of a few Steam keys to improve their profit margins. Little things like this are part of the reason Humble Bundle is able to undercut everyone's prices AND do more giveaways.

The claimwall is what made all this possible, by exploiting DRM in a negative way that even the DRM designers did not intend. If it has DRM, it's not yours, and it will NEVER be yours. The DRM is a permanent leash that can be yanked away at any moment...on purpose, or by accident, but ALWAYS eventually. If it has DRM, you will lose access to it, guaranteed. It's only a matter of time.

That said, how many times do I re-watch a movie after the first time I finish it? 0? How many times do I re-play a game after the first time I finish it? 0? For many people, DRM might be comparable to the return date for a rental. If you're OK with that in at least some circumstances, then you can be adequately served by cheap access to DRM'd products like video games, from a big "rental" business like Humble Bundle and Steam.

if gOg was not primarily about games, then....

I'm not sure I see your point here or how it's exploiting DRM, but as for the fine print you can't read: it's in red lettering on a white background and I have no issues reading it (and I wear glasses to read). It also tells you exactly when the redemption period expires., and notes right on the redemption link graphic that the game is free for a limited time. Sure, it can be annoying if you forget to redeem and it expires (it happened to me on one of their game giveaways), but since the game's free of charge, I don't really see the issue with it. Besides, it's no mystery that you're redeeming on a platform (Steam) that supports DRM anyway.