Honestly it seems to be pretty reasonable requests. I fail to see how it would be "disrespectful" toward backers ? it's not like Gog asked to be able to release the game before it being available to backers or anything, they just asked for a private playable build.

It sounds like Gog only want to check first the "state" of the game, as in is it a game where the demo is polished but the rest of the level are barren and unfinished (translation check if it's really full game an not just an unfinished fan mod). And second wants to know what are the plan the devs have for the future, probably to avoid the cases where the devs drop support for the Gog version and only release new stuffs on Steam.

All in all, for a new dev releasing its first game it seems to be rather "normal" questions to ask, and as other have mentioned the reason why Steam doesn't ask the same questions is because they don't give a damn and would release anything as long as it somewhat manage to boot.

An In-Dev or day-one full release alongside the other platform would have been nice (and probably would have happened were it not for what looks like misunderstanding/misinterpreting of GoG's well-meant intentions on the developer's side who hopefully reconsiders and re-submits Selaco in the not so distant future) but a delayed GoG release is still better than no GoG release at all.
Don't mind waiting for a couple more weeks/months.

Do appreciate the provided glimpses behind the curtain, so to speak.

Bummer, and all over very reasonable requirements by GOG there.
Anybody who's active on Selaco's Discord tried to talk to the dev and maybe convince him to reconsider? Clearly there has been just a misunderstanding here.

Damn, that's a really sad news, yesterday i recived a very good news about Tunguska coming to GOG, and I was hoping to recive this one as well :(
Hope Selaco Dev changes his mind later!
I would like to have the game here for 2 reasons:
1- I have my main library here.
2- I have a personal issue with Steam, it stolen me so much money and I won't expend money on a store like that.

As much as I like to bash gog over their heads with their own retardery, I find their requests in this case to be pretty reasonable. There's a reason why they'd ask for a test build and inquire about stuff like DLC and Steam doesn't and it has nothing to do with disrespect: Steam's entire business, the platform and its business model is completely based off on automating everything as much as possible and just let the bucks roll in, whereas gog prides itself on its more hands-on approach. If Steam were to ask for test builds and stuff, they'd have to hire staff to deal with that, they'd have to hire staff to correspond with developers and all that costs money. Much easier and much more financially rewarding to omit this part entirely and go straight to the earn-30%-off-of-every-purchase part.

IMHO gog should've taken a big page from the Steam guidebook as far as curation is concerned and trust the consumers to be smart enough to be able to choose which games they want to play, but it is what it is.

Hey all!

I think I could have handled this situation a little better so please allow me to explain myself further.

While yes, I do personally disagree with the requirements, these are by and large not the only reasons I decided to give up on the idea of putting the game on GOG.

To me, it mostly boils down to how sluggish the communication went. It has been roughly 2 months since we submitted this game and we got nothing, we heard absolutely nothing from GOG. It got so bad that fans of the game had to start a ‘movement’ on the forums at an attempt to get their attention. It was flattering and heart-warming, but also frustrated me far more than it probably should because none of this should have been necessary. As a (mainly) solo developer I am juggling a hundred different things around, and GOG being silent was one of the many things I kept having to deal with which added to an endless pile of stress.

When a userbase needs to step in to grab the attention of GOG, you know something is seriously wrong. Weeks later we still got nothing. After waiting for far longer than anyone ever should, I decided to just be an asshole and re-submit the game to GOG at a desperate attempt to hear from them again. So I did it, and 2 days after re-submitting the game I finally got a response.

Look, I am usually not one to get upset over a bunch of typo’s because these things happen, it’s human and not all of us speak English natively (I am guilty of that myself). But given how sloppy everything went for the past 2 months, finally receiving an email that’s full of grammatical errors like the employee didn’t care followed by requirements that I personally disagreed with were just the last straws for me. I was done. I probably should have given myself a few more minutes to cool down before being so ‘open’ about it. I am not used to being public with Selaco and I knew I would eventually make some mistakes when it comes to public appearance. This is one of them. My tone has been far too hostile in the announcement message I made on Discord. On that front, I apologize to GOG and its community.

Now, the requirements. I have been very careful with who gets to play Selaco for over 4 years because Selaco is completely open source and even a toddler can leak this game with ease. It’s one of the many reasons a public demo will not happen until we’re very close to release. Knowing plenty of stories where games leaked by ‘accident’ far before release which in turn completely fucked a studio over is something that I think about a lot. If everything went smoothly in regards to GOG, I probably would have been less hesitant, but everything so far has went rather sluggish so I have every reason to be careful about who I send this game to. If I agreed with the requirements I would have swallowed my fear and send the game over, but I simply don’t feel like it’s necessary. There is tons of Selaco footage to find on the internet to prove to GOG that this is a real game and no other platform asks these questions. You can make the excuse that it’s their way of quality control, and I absolutely respect and admire that, but there’s plenty of ‘’garbage’’ on the store to counter that argument.

TL;DR: I really want to give this a go, but outside of the requirements I did not agree with, far too many annoyances in regards to communication made me want to step back.

I really like GOG as a community and you guys have been absolutely awesome about this whole thing. The heart-warming messages were the reason I went to give this a go in the first place. But, for now, I’m putting this behind me. Maybe closer to release I'll try again.

If you have any questions, message me here or on Discord (Nexxtic#2255)!

Thank you for taking the time to explain your issue, Wesley_de_Waart
I wish all the best on your project and hope it gets some very good sales on steam when it finally launches.
And I definitely expect to, somewhere down the road, buy your game on GOG.

Thanks for the explanation anyway. Maybe it can come here eventually after it has been released elsewhere.

Hopefully, this serves as an example for GOG of how to NOT do things in the future. I think anyone would be frustrated with not getting even a peep from the side they've been trying to contact for months. A simple yes/no would've been a million times better than just silence.

Asking what is the plan for dlc and patches and expansion pack is not a valid question?

Gog often gets slapped when dev do not update Gog games but do steam. Or we do not get dlcs...

Is it not in our best interests for them to ask those questions and get some commitment from new developers to fix their games.

I really think the game is going to be shit based on deb reaction.

No need to explain to me GOG requirements, I know it has curation system and I understand it's a relatively small store front in comparison to Steam. I thought I stated it at least two times, perhaps not.

We'll see about GOG release when public Demo is ready.

Stay tuned and vote if you haven't already.
https://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/selaco

looks like the only fault from gog is the lackluster feedback, similar to support tickets
best would be show how many are in your line and when you should expect a reply

"I really think the game is going to be shit based on deb reaction."

Care to elaborate why you would make such an assumption? Personally, I am very confident with this project and so is the rest of the team. We still have miles to go but the playtest reactions have been very uplifting for us because of how positive most of it is. And that is knowing that we are still far from release.

I am not sending them a playable build because I think the game is bad, if that is what you are asking. We love this game and think / hope all of you will enjoy it too! I was perfectly clear about why I am not sending a dev build in my previous message.

" this particular requirement seems rather reasonable"

Yes, that is exactly what I said in my message as well. You did read the whole thing, right?

Requirement 2 was less of a problem. In regards to the release date; we truly do not know. We have somewhat of a target but there are too many different variables we have to consider so there's a huge chance we are way off target. Only time will tell! I have nothing to add with their second requirement due to a lack of information. That should not mean we cannot at least show the game on the store so people can follow the project and stay up to date.

I feel like GOG requires too much communication and they have proven to be lacking in that regard. Given how I already spent a ton of time directing a team, talking to patrons and working on the game, having an additional thing to worry about is not something I like especially because so far things are way too slow. And steam allows us to just press a few buttons and it's done.

Remember that i would love to give this another shot when we are closer to release. But right now I really don't feel like continuing with this. It has been a frustrating couple of months.

No need to further explain or defend yourself, as far as I'm concerned.
You've said your piece, providing a much needed glimpse behind the curtain (again, much appreciated) in the process, and explained the reasons why Selaco won't appear on GoG, at least for now... and that's that.

Again, an In-Dev release would have been nice, but as long as Selaco is coming to GoG at all (closer to full release I guess?), at least I can live with whatever delay it takes until then.