I don't support any particular company. I do however have real issue with the topic of ownership. True, the world is moving towards a state where nobody but the companies own anything - TV, Music, Games, Films are all being streamed or tightly controlled, and this is the way companies want to go, to have full control - understandable as they want to make money.

Me as a consumer however, I want to own the product, to store it locally completely separate from the purchasing path. If I want to install it on this machine or that machine I want to be able to, without installing some third party client, and phoning them to ask permission to play it - which is what the clients do in most cases.

I assume most of us here have lost a game or two at least to some DRM mechanism failing, I for one purchased GTA4 on release, installed it, installed all the R* rubbish and it failed. Some calls to thier helpdesk got it working for about half an hour, before it died again. So I am left with a product I cannot use on any of machines, and a rebuild on the OS to remove R* rubbish. That is not acceptable to me. I realise that people now don't think about it, its all just cloud chuck any old thing on it, but surely the rise in scams, hacking and such like does help understand why not all cloud based things are good. If the internet was cuttoff today, what would you do? Me, I would quite happily continue on as all my stuff is stored securely offline. This is the principal reason I shop here, I then own the product and need the site no further other then point of sale. Another example is the Windows 10 update, this is a company abusing their ownership of a product to push customers for their beneift.

True, technology advances and it can be a struggle to get things running on newer hardware, steam isn't going to solve that, anymore than anyone else, it is an item by item process, which if you don't put the effort in yourself you wont get.

Do note, that this isn't just games, I wont stream music for instance. And there are other reasons secondary to this for not wanting to use steam. I suppose I am one of those smaller group of people, probably older, who remember boxes with maps and such like, and I have been a collector for decades but recently I have started to get rid of it all. Online stores have ruined the collecting scene, and no a digital library is not a collection.

Who needs to grow some balls anyway? Steam? GoG? Publishers?

Steam certainly don't need anymore bigger ball. They have the biggest ball enough to fight hand to hand with Blizzard and even challenging Microsoft.

If you think GoG needs a bigger one, then you're pushing your luck. They've done the best they can do at their current resources. Asking for more is just slowing down their own pace.

Publishers? They're merely giving promotions. You might get some luck by asking for Steam keys manually, but for two ways? Nah, you'd be better asking the dead to return back to life.

You said you're not taking sides, but from my eyes you're just an entitled brat asking for more cookies when given one.
Who needs to grow some balls anyway? Steam? GoG? Publishers?

edit: dunno why this posted twice. removed redundant parts.

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I understand that it's old-fashioned but it's not really that many more clicks. I usually install my games to my secondary SSD in a GOG specific folder which installers seem to remember so I open one up, agree terms then install. Granted, I still use TotalCommander, a file manager from 90s where you have 2 windows to operate with so maybe I don't mind old school as long as it's functional and efficient.

I don't remember if Galaxy supports installing from backups but I think it was a planned feature. I've been putting off updating it as it has a habit of ruining my folder naming scheme and messing up games using mods.

That's great, except that one reason I'm not into console gaming much is because of controllers. Extended controller use is much more painful for me than M+K. So what's a benefit for you from Steam just isn't for me. And yes, I really do prefer dealing with my own installers. I want to know exactly where my games are going, and if something goes wrong on my PC because an installer downloaded a different DX package, C++ library, or .NET framework, if I don't get the notification of what's being changed/added by doing a manual install, I won't know where to start looking.

Achievements, time tracking, and community profiles aren't my thing either. So everything that's great for you about Steam just doesn't apply to me---we're different consumers.

I can assure you most of your steam games won't run on an always offline system.

It's why I won't/don't use Steam.

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If Steam makes things easier for you, you probably name to learn something about computers (and maybe NAS). You've been taken for a ride. Nothing is easier and safer (in the long run) than GoG.

You're making it sound like the GOG installers force a certain folder on you, but that's not true. I never put my games into the default "program files"-folder either. When you run a GOG installer, they give you the option of picking the destination folder of your choosing to install the game to and your system remembers that, so all subsequent GOG games default to that folder from that point on, so the "why should my games be in All Programs" is really only an (easily changable) issue the first time you install a GOG game and never again at any point in the future.

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Some games have multilanguage options on Steam, whereas on Gog they're English only. Sometimes they have more extras or features. Some have better mod support on Steam. Some people like using cloud saves, collecting achievements or selling cards for pocket money, or maybe they just like a functional client, and Galaxy has still a long way to go. Not to mention that unfortunately some devs suddenly realize they 'can't afford' to keep updating their games on non-Steam platforms.

I'm not saying I agree with the OP but there's plenty of reason why one would prefer having a game on Steam rather than here.

I am fine with the transitioning of Steam to GoG, but not the other way around.

For the very reason that if a key or so were to be distributed - someone is going to use that key for a resale or a trade. I'm pretty sure that's going to happen for the most part. I don't think that'd go so well.

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