Honestly, I feel this is a step in the right direction and we need to wait and see what measures are added to combat abuse.

Yes, the abuse of downvoting every post in a thread still exists but its obvious to see if a post is actually bad or if its just abuse by a bot by seeing the other posts around it. If only that post is downvoted, it could have some issues while if every post in the thread is downvoted regardless of content (even with posts disagreeing with the downvoted post), its just abuse.

Im hesitant to push GOG to remove the post upvote/downvote given the fact that upvoting posts is useful for trouble-shooting and downvote is useful for when the forums come under attack by spammers. Maybe attaching user names (so and so liked your post/disliked your post) would be useful in combatting and identifying downvoting bots.

The changes are basically meaningless. The low rated marks are still there. Rep can still go down until it affects what users can do.

All of those in the threads have the red/orange low rated mark.

https://www.gog.com/forum/general/the_last_recorded_rep_project
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/rep_system_is_finally_gone
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/wow_did_they_just_remove_the_individual_user_ratings_today_or_is_it_a_glitch

Blizzard did the same with world of warcraft forums multiple times.

P.S I don't see why having new basic forums would be a problem when they could stick the floating menu bar that links to the game store and profiles over whatever new forum arrives.

Coincidentally Blizzard also did this with some classes in WoW.

This forum software is not the best, as it lacks a few things.
EDIT - When I say, lacks and not the best, that doesn't mean it is bad because of that. Just that some other forum software has nice features that aren't available here. The primary focus should always be text though, which the current forum software does quite adequately. Sure it would be nice to have variable font sizes and colored text, and be able to use bullet points and Spoilers etc. It would also be great to have conversations in Chat (more than two people).

But at least we have it, unlike some stores such as Epic, and aside from the downvoting issue it is still far better than what Steam etc provides.

It is one thing to edit (modify/add to) forum software code, but a much higher degree of difficulty and skill to develop forum software ... different skill sets are involved.

I doubt there is any existing forum software, and I have used a few, that properly caters for what GOG would want or need. Even if there was, that would still require a high degree of expertise and complexity to come to grips with and to migrate what needs to be migrated over.

GOG provide this forum as a service to us, which in turn likely benefits them, but to do a huge expenditure on developing new forum software, is probably not something they can afford or wish to entertain, especially as it would be complex and a huge endeavor to migrate old to new. The forum is not just general threads about whatever, it is also threads devoted to games with lots of important help and information about them. There are also many threads that negate the need for help from Support etc.

Far better in my estimation, for GOG at this stage in their life cycle, to stick with the forum software they have and just make the simple changes to negate downvoting. In reality we want them to spend money and devote time to what really matters here ... games. If there is a limit to what they can currently afford to do, they should at least do that.

EDIT 2 - Having images inline with text, can be both a blessing and a curse. And while you cannot delete a post, replacing or wiping the text of a post is effectively the same. And like others I believe in accountability, though that only occurs if quoting happens, but then quotes can be modified, so are not very reliable anyway.

And including IMG tags in posts is NOT one of the things lacking. That's a boon. Strong focus on text!

They also are very keen on integrity and accountability, which is why one cannot delete one's own posts.

Chandra. another thing I would suggest is the removal of the upvote/downvote system entirely. because that has been heavily abused by trolls and downvoting spambots. It was a good feature in the past but we as a community have changed and IMHO should be removed as well.

Oh, simple. Out of touch middle managers. They're given the derogatory name of manglement for a reason. "Let's upgrade the helpdesk database becomes", "Why are we paying for that when we could build our own?" (Short savings, long grief.) Or they'll buy into marketing/sales pitches that are obviously farcically false and start requesting the impossible or absurd. "I want the forum to be compatible with all Bluetooth versions!"

You could imagine the meme explosion on this place. And the LAAAAAAAAGGGGG this ancient forum would have loading all that extra content. Lol.

Great, that's something I will remember!

Management would have to realize that temporary cost should not be the deciding factor here. I could name a number of benefits for the web-team, including mods and support, saving them lots of time. For instance if someone was asking for a change, even a simple one can turn out to be a week's or several weeks worth, the team could spend improving other parts of the website (shop, there's the special sales, other things). Say they decided to switch over to uBB/vBB instead and maybe even rebuild the whole enviornment? Yes, it will cost lots of money in the short term, if it means that customers will be more satisfied and once again start to recommend GOG as the place to be? More money. Given the situation the world is in right now, there's maybe not the best time to start off and rather stick with a half-baked working environment that investing heavily ... Even the most stubborn manager will realize that in the long run, if they don't invest into renewal and without adding QOL improvements, when this system collapses, good money will be wasted, there will be no revenue from sales and ultimately more cost and losses will be accrued.

GOG (forums) are ancient and they suffer from a severe lack of features. Other forums, even older than GOG, custom made and tailored around the needs of their owners, they still run, accomodating several thousands unique members and hundreds of thousands of UPI/day. The sole reason for this is that many kept handing the legacy on to new techies and website administrators, while in this case GOG staff left? Laid off? before the job had been finished and someone else had to take over and see what they could do. Otherwise they could keep the forum and add to it however they see fit.

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I don't have high expectations that anything is going to happen and/or change soon, yet there is no reason not to believe that the much needed changes will be made and oft-wished for things and suggestions can finally be implemented. Every little bit helps, though. It's a good place waiting to become better, so, GOG, don't hesitate - act! (And kick some manglement' @sses to make it happen)!

Thank you another nice change!

Respect. Like I said previously, I would have preferred the option to hide posts without having them auto-hide for others (if a high enough number of downvotes occured), but this is still what a ton of people wanted I believe.