It seems that you're using an outdated browser. Some things may not work as they should (or don't work at all).
We suggest you upgrade newer and better browser like: Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer or Opera

×
Community
General discussionGOG, why?(9 posts)(9 posts)
(9 posts)
Pages:
1
This is my favourite topic
Posted May 12, 2017
high rated
I would like to begin this discussion by presenting a fragment taken from The GOG.com Mentality:
We're all professionals who seek to excel in their respective fields and tend to exceed the expectations while doing their jobs, but that never stops us from enjoying ourselves. Our company philosophy often goes against the flow of the corporate culture, just as much as GOG.com itself stands up to the disputable trends of modern gaming industry!
I am going to list good and bad points of different parts of the GOG experience.
As a software developer myself I have to say I'm a bit puzzled by some of the bad points listed below.

1. The website
Good points:
- Site looks clean
- Doesn't take ages to load and is pretty easy to navigate

Bad points:
- It doesn't scale (lots of wasted space displays with full HD or higher resolutions)
- It is not mobile friendly
- Notifications don't work as intended most of the time
- Chat is poorly implemented
- Search is severely limited (only a few filters available, many more could be provided)
- Downloader links are hidden under More and display in a separate page

There may be many more bad points, these are the ones that I noticed, and I'm left asking: Why?
Do you lack good web developers? Are all of those bad points due to bad management decisions?

2. The forum
Good points:
- Game/series specific forums
- Allows attachments
- No censorship (as far as I can tell)

Bad points:
- No advanced search options
- No unread message tracking
- Not mobile friendly

It seems laughable that in 2017, a major website that maintains a forum is lacking those features.
There's plenty of options available, if you don't have the brainpower to develop it internally just use one that is community developed and has tons of support.

3. GOG Downloader
Good points:
- Error protection
- Increased download speeds
- Download all extra goodies with 1 click

Bad points:
- No Linux version (I don't see a valid reason not to when you already have a Mac version, which is a UNIX based OS)
- Abandoned? (Why do you even provide Downloader links if you no longer even list a link to the Downloader installer?)

Why was the Downloader abandoned? Was it really that difficult of a software to develop and maintain that you didn't have the manpower for it? Is Galaxy taking over the handling of Downloader links?

I've left out Galaxy for now as that software is still in it's infancy (2 years of development but still feels like software that was developed in less that 6 months).

As to the recent decision to maintain two sets of installers, one "classic" and one "galaxy included", again I have to ask: WHY?
Do you really have soooo much storage space and bandwidth that you really don't care about duplicating everything?
Are your developers really that lacking in skill or your management that imbecile as to waste money on such a ridiculous implementation?

The industry is full of talented developers and designers, grab some and please, for the love of all that is good, stop doing stupid shit. And if management is to blame for all the shit, find a way to replace them, they are terrible and need to go somewhere else with their bullshit decision making.
Posted May 12, 2017
(Somewhat) related thread:
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/why_gog_do_not_use_automatic_tools_for_datechecksumfilesize

GOG used to provide wrong offline installers, already expired redeem keys, and now they plan to provide ONE MORE useless installer for each games...
Posted May 12, 2017
avatar
Michiduta: Is Galaxy taking over the handling of Downloader links?
That's their intent, yes. Not meaning this in a sinister way, but they intend for Galaxy to be the default DLer as opposed to GOG DLer. They're just providing DLer links for those of us that don't want to use Galaxy.
Posted May 12, 2017
avatar
Michiduta: - It doesn't scale (lots of wasted space displays with full HD or higher resolutions)
I am with you or can respect all of you pints except the above.
I really hate those sites that up scale showing giant fonts, I always ends unzooming those sites about to 85%, this allow me to see more content at the same time, keeping a confortable fonts dimensions, and needing much less scrolling.
Posted May 12, 2017
avatar
GR00T: That's their intent, yes. Not meaning this in a sinister way, but they intend for Galaxy to be the default DLer as opposed to GOG DLer. They're just providing DLer links for those of us that don't want to use Galaxy.
Okay, but as of this moment Galaxy does not offer that functionality so it is a bad idea to hide and abandon the Downloader as long as the features offfered in it are not implemented in the Galaxy client. Anyone that is into software development should be aware of one basic rule: don't remove a piece of software until the replacement software is ready to provide the same expected features of the software it is replacing.
avatar
DalekSec: I am with you or can respect all of you pints except the above.
I really hate those sites that up scale showing giant fonts, I always ends unzooming those sites about to 85%, this allow me to see more content at the same time, keeping a confortable fonts dimensions, and needing much less scrolling.
There could be a setting in the account menu (what is the account menu for if not for setting personalized preferences and information?) that could allow switching between 2 sets of design templates (they have to be using a template system, surely), one for a lower resolution (keeping the current sizes) and one for higher resolutions (extending, not enlarging/zooming, the information so that it fills more space on widescreen monitors).

It seems weird that we're living in the age of widescreen monitors with full HD and ultra HD resolutions and sites are still designed with a width that barely fills little more than half the screen.
Posted May 12, 2017
avatar
Michiduta: Okay, but as of this moment Galaxy does not offer that functionality so it is a bad idea to hide and abandon the Downloader as long as the features offfered in it are not implemented in the Galaxy client.
No argument here. I've tried Galaxy three different times and never got it to work properly. So I'm sticking with the DLer until such time as that's no longer available, then it will be browser DLs.
Posted May 13, 2017
avatar
Michiduta: Okay, but as of this moment Galaxy does not offer that functionality so it is a bad idea to hide and abandon the Downloader as long as the features offfered in it are not implemented in the Galaxy client. Anyone that is into software development should be aware of one basic rule: don't remove a piece of software until the replacement software is ready to provide the same expected features of the software it is replacing.
Galaxy provides the option to download offline installers. I believe they're named a bit differently than the download links (it's been a long time since I've compared, so maybe that has changed), but it does offer this functionality. Galaxy is a much heavier client than the Downloader, but they're still both, more or less, clients.

In my experience, gogrepo.py is far superior to both. I know that a lot of people get pretty bent out of shape about Galaxy, but it provides offline DRM-free downloads, which is good enough for me. In addition to that, there are at least 3 or 4 different ways to get your games, with some of those being open source like gogrepo.

Kudos to GOG for keeping things open enough that you can use open source tools to download your games. I see mostly negative things on these forums, so I'm going to try to be one of the few to say something positive about this really awesome company.
Posted May 13, 2017
avatar
GR00T: That's their intent, yes. Not meaning this in a sinister way, but they intend for Galaxy to be the default DLer as opposed to GOG DLer. They're just providing DLer links for those of us that don't want to use Galaxy.
avatar
Michiduta: Okay, but as of this moment Galaxy does not offer that functionality so it is a bad idea to hide and abandon the Downloader as long as the features offfered in it are not implemented in the Galaxy client. Anyone that is into software development should be aware of one basic rule: don't remove a piece of software until the replacement software is ready to provide the same expected features of the software it is replacing.
avatar
DalekSec: I am with you or can respect all of you pints except the above.
I really hate those sites that up scale showing giant fonts, I always ends unzooming those sites about to 85%, this allow me to see more content at the same time, keeping a confortable fonts dimensions, and needing much less scrolling.
avatar
Michiduta: There could be a setting in the account menu (what is the account menu for if not for setting personalized preferences and information?) that could allow switching between 2 sets of design templates (they have to be using a template system, surely), one for a lower resolution (keeping the current sizes) and one for higher resolutions (extending, not enlarging/zooming, the information so that it fills more space on widescreen monitors).

It seems weird that we're living in the age of widescreen monitors with full HD and ultra HD resolutions and sites are still designed with a width that barely fills little more than half the screen.
If they implement in the way that you say, then yes, but unhappily most of the sites that "are designed" for Full HD or higher resolutions, are also designed keeping in mind only small screens that as much have 14 inch, with the side effect that in larger screens, all look oversized.
Posted May 13, 2017
avatar
Michiduta: 2. The forum
Good points:
- Game/series specific forums
- Allows attachments
- No censorship (as far as I can tell)

Bad points:
- No advanced search options
- No unread message tracking
- Not mobile friendly

It seems laughable that in 2017, a major website that maintains a forum is lacking those features.
There's plenty of options available, if you don't have the brainpower to develop it internally just use one that is community developed and has tons of support.
Just some commentary on the points you have there:
1, The game-specific forums are alright, but are often abandoned.
2. The attachments are pretty limited in size from what I remember.
3. There are...let's just say a lot of people who will disagree with you on that censorship point, and I can only hope that me merely mentioning this doesn't bring on the inevitable derail.
4. Advanced search options? The searching itself sucks, options or no.
5. Actually, there ARE notifications for unread messages, but at the moment, they're completely broken or disabled or something after GOG added the new taskbar thing at the top. Notifications now only work on Galaxy, and it's unclear when GOG will fix this, if they even intend to at all.
6. Interestingly enough, it seems GOG is actually quite familiar with externally-hosted/"prepackaged" forums, but has no interest in moving to them or making use of such functionality.

Considering that maybe 5% of their userbase at best ever even looks at the forum, chances are that they're not about to touch it anytime soon.
Pages:
1
This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionGOG, why?(9 posts)(9 posts)
(9 posts)