I've also heard that GOG's invoicing isn't the easiest thing to deal with, having to manually invoice every quarter for something that is perpetual seems kind of archaic and unfriendly.

I speculate that unfounded speculation are pointess and a waste of time.

One of my speculations that happen unfortunately more than not:

Because someone on the leadership of things from one or other company just want to.

Humans are beings that organized themselves in society and hierarchy.
Higher positions in any hierarchy means more prestige and power.
More prestige and power means more control over what happens and how people respond to your authority.
Therefore, human beings enjoy being in positions of power or authority.
Being able to just say something and that 'something' happening, is a psychological behaviour that human beings enjoy.

I feel that, sometimes, when no apparent logical reason is found, things just happen because someone just wanted to do something and commanded that to happen.

Now, why that person did that is a whole speculation discussion on itself.
As each case is a case on their own.

That would be lovely, but don't you think there would be non disclosure agreements and related?

And part of negotiating, is not laying out all you cards on the table to be taken advantage of. GOG in all honestly are not negotiating from a particularly strong position, and that position would vary depending on who they negotiate with. In other words if GOG reveal all to us, what have they got to negotiate with, especially at the big end of town.

Surely you realize that we have many voices here at GOG, in the forum, and I would not want GOG listening to a good number of those. Some would be for a getting some games at all cost, even more DRM or less profit, and others would be totally unrealistic about expectations.

Transparency would be nice to sate our curiosity and no doubt feed those who like to complain, but how helpful to GOG would it really be, us all giving our two cents worth?

GOG is by no means alone when it comes to secrecy about negotiations. Can you tell me of any store or provider that is open about them ... talking specifics that is?

GOG have to be cognizant about not offending game providers, and so they have a very much tougher job than the likes of Steam (especially) or Epic etc. I can only agree with you, and that perplexity causes a lot of speculation, and certainly doubt, which for some often means buying what isn't here in a timely fashion in a series, at Steam etc instead.

True, but that is the nature of this forum, and so I guess we take the good with the bad, or just remain mute. I personally think it worth conversing about these issues, and perhaps seeds will be sown or thoughts not previously thought, that might curb some of the more outlandish speculation. One can but hope.

While it is great to be able to speculate with a good amount of facts, the reality is, the less facts there are then the more speculation there is, and the wilder it is. This is something that GOG perhaps needs to come better terms with, and maybe give us a little more transparency ... like maybe discuss the issues they deal with, specifics about providers aside.

It would be good, if GOG saw a thread like mine, read the many replies and then decided they should give a bit more clarity. That is another reason why I do such threads from time to time, to try and prompt them into revealing more, and I am sure others do the same or participate for the same reasons.

Seemingly so yes.

I suspect that a lot of game providers, don't really want to provide games to GOG, but do so due to various pressures. That would likely then cause less enthusiasm to fix anything or improve anything.

And I have often thought that some game providers see GOG as a promotional thing, where in reality they want you to buy from Steam etc instead, so provide flawed games here with very little or no update parity, and as can be seen all over the shop, are often labeled by us customers as abandoned at GOG. I suspect there is no shortage of gamers who buy at GOG, and then rebuy at Steam to get a better bugfixed or complete version of a game.

I also suspect that sometimes it is about fostering an image. In other words looking good for seemingly supporting GOG and DRM-Free, when in reality they don't really or just barely ... certainly when the much greater percentage of their games just aren't at GOG.

All that makes me very suspicious about removal due to poor sales. Does it cost them to keep the game available at GOG? It doesn't seem likely. Unless they are continually getting a bad rap through reviews, or good ones aren't competing enough with bad ones.

Such a thread can actually contribute to the reasons why games won't be released here. If someone is speculating about a licence of a certain game and they are actually right, then this could have bad consequences. It is still an open forum where everyone can read the posts. I witnessed a case where a Japanese company canceled a contract about a licensed product after reading details (part of speculations) on social media platforms of the company who got the licence. Japanese companies don't like anything that breaks or could break the NDAs of their contracts.

Going into the territory of NDAs is the worst thing this forum community can do.

Well if only all the facts supported that. That said you would be right in some cases, for sure.

There are many legacy games not available at GOG, and not just a few of them are available at other legit stores or DEV websites. Many of them are also DRM-Free, so there is more to it.

That would certainly be unhealthy for a company if that was happening, but I doubt it is the case at GOG, and employees often start jumping ship when this sort of thing is realized, certainly in any significant manner. I am pretty sure GOG wouldn't have lasted this long, doing well enough as they seem to be, if that was the case.

I don't know about that, but I guess if anything is onerous on a regular basis and poor sales are happening, then yes it might be as simple as you say. But one would presume GOG get feedback about such and it would be a high priority to fix, so it seems doubtful to me if would happen for too long.

I don't doubt for a minute though, that in some cases at least, there is some element that is deemed painful or annoying to some game providers, and that coupled with poor sales means the game gets removed. That painfulness though, might be as simple as I said in another post here, not really wanting to deal with GOG in the first place, etc. Perhaps their finance department pushed them to it, or shareholders or being out-voted by other DEVs etc in the company. Or maybe they weren't generally making enough sales anywhere, and GOG was a last ditch effort to get some profit return or perhaps to just cover costs ... or maybe once enough return was gained, they then removed from GOG, due to their bias against GOG.

Who knows really, unless you are a fly-on-the-wall.

All we can do is speculate ... exercise our brains to come up with reasonable seeming possibilities.

Some of course, don't like to speculate, don't like to exercise their mind, or even use their brain in some cases. LOL

I personally see reasonable speculation as a positive thing. It can certainly help counter a lot of negativity, something we are not short of here at the GOG Forum. ;P

No worries. :)

I would speculate...

... but I've run out of speculation juice.

GOG has confused me to the point that I can't seem to figure anything meaningful about their processes.

The only thing I think I've seen is...

... GOG spent some money putting older AAA's on Amazon Prime (and releasing here) in 2022 while seemingly missing more-and-more high quality indie titles.

Hope that money paid off in new sales here... but for a long-time customer, it's making me keep Steam and EGS accounts. Also...

... I spoke to an indie dev the other day who is nearing release (Burden of Command). He claimed to never have even thought of releasing here. And having spoken with MANY devs, this isn't an uncommon answer.

So IMO the first step in successful negotiations is outreach... something -- from the outside -- it sounds like barely exists at GOG (sadly).

Even though GOG is my primary game store, and almost the only one I am prepared to spend money at, I think it wise to not put all your eggs in one basket, so I have accounts at several stores, including Epic and Steam.

To be perfectly honest, I imagine most DEVs and PUBs are caught up firmly in the Steam bubble, and those stores that sell Steam keys. Steam is the major gaming site for the huge majority, and few have any reason to look beyond them. I imagine if sales are not as good as they hoped via Steam, then they may look into other avenues, and then come across GOG if they haven't. Of course many just write off GOG instantly, don't even check on them when they discover they are just a DRM-Free store. The mindset for the great majority, is that DRM is a necessity, and anything else scares them away, so GOG is never really a serious consideration. They likely don't even probably realize how popular GOG is amongst a certain portion of customers.

GOG seem to be pushing the marketing angle, but no doubt a difficult task.
What probably needs more promotion, is discussion of DRM and the benefits of DRM-Free. That needs to be placed more into the forefront of all gamers. Some will clearly never see any benefit, and prefer the Steam model, and if they can, just buy their games in the one place.

DRM is clearly embedded in the minds of many, and they see it as a defacto necessity, and not just in games.

Well, in the dev discussion I had yesterday, they claimed never to have thought about releasing here...

... but...

... not knowing of any reason they couldn't / shouldn't.

That says to me that GOG isn't actively courting these devs.

Where GOG cannot provide the sales numbers, there are other intangibles they could use...

... published interviews and additional game PR...

... larger presence on the main splash page upon release...

... release giveaways (1 - 5 copies, PR materials, etc).

In short, GOG could make a "bigger," more focused release than Steam, EGS, etc. Would a small dev / publisher want a quiet release among the thousands upon thousands on Steam... or a "big" release on GOG? My guess is they'd want both. Steam for the sales and GOG for the exposure.

But is GOG willing to spend resources to do that? Probably not. And... that strategy requires a long-term plan... something I'm uncertain GOG has... or is willing to implement; IMHO GOG feels like it makes short-term moves which ultimately amount to a chaotic outcomes.