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General discussionGood News: Galaxy.dll breaks XP-compatibility in good old games(258 posts)(258 posts)
(258 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted June 14, 2017
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GR00T: I disagree. See amok's post above yours.
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richlind33: Then you have no business complaining about Galaxy's diminishing optionality.
Does not compute... what are you smoking?
Posted June 14, 2017
It seeems to be indeed the case that galaxy.dll exists in many different versions. Probably only the newest ones are not WinXP compatibile. It also may be the case that only the file GalaxyWrp.dll is not WinXP compatibile.
Post edited June 14, 2017 by DrakoPensulo
Posted June 14, 2017
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Aemony: ...but the point stands. GOG have never been about making those precious old games of yours playable on the original hardware and software they shipped on. It have always been the very opposite.
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richlind33: No, it doesn't, because it's based on mischaracterization. No one is asking GOG to *restore* compatibility.

I hope every one of you that's making excuses for shit attitude gets an extra large serving in RL -- preferably from someone you've been excusing.
GOG have most likely upgraded their internal development tools to newer versions of Visual Studio and Windows SDKs. This breaks XP and Vista compatibility due to the many changes that Microsoft have shipped in those newer versions, changes that Microsoft have not backported to end-of-life operating systems.

This is a fact of life. If GOG wants to use the latest and modern development tools to ensure that they provide the best possible products for their customers then obviously that will have certain caveats that nobody cares about, such as breaking support for non-supported operating systems.

This isn't rocket science. It's basic software development.

And yes, everyone here is asking GOG to restore compatibibility for an unsupported operating system, which most likely requires them to downgrade their internal development tools to an outdated version that is most likely not recommended and probably doesn't see much focus from Microsoft.
Posted June 14, 2017
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richlind33: No, it doesn't, because it's based on mischaracterization. No one is asking GOG to *restore* compatibility.

I hope every one of you that's making excuses for shit attitude gets an extra large serving in RL -- preferably from someone you've been excusing.
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Aemony: And yes, everyone here is asking GOG to restore compatibibility for an unsupported operating system, which most likely requires them to downgrade their internal development tools to an outdated version that is most likely not recommended and probably doesn't see much focus from Microsoft.
"Restoring" compatibility and "not breaking" compatibility are two different propositions.

In this case we're talking about a single file, and the workaround didn't require development tools, old or new.

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richlind33: Then you have no business complaining about Galaxy's diminishing optionality.
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amok: Does not compute... what are you smoking?
It's called not being a corporate apologist. Try it some time, it's bold and aromatic. o.O
Post edited June 14, 2017 by richlind33
Posted June 14, 2017
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Aemony: Why shouldn't we go even fart|her back and start
Don't know who you mean but farting anybody's back is not very polite isn't it?
Posted June 14, 2017
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Maighstir: Unless I've been heavily misinformed, most people don't make love to their pets...
Pffff, a pat on the head or full blown sexual encounters... it's all semantics :P.

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immi101: Saying that nothing interesting happens on OS-level is a gross misconception. Probably explained by the fact that 99% of the users never directly interact with the kernel(aka "the OS").
But guess who makes neat stuff like containers possible ? The system software just uses the virtualisation support that was implemented at OS-level. And maybe the the average user won't care about containers. But stuff like flatpak will likely bring a "cool new thing" for him, and that uses the same features under the hood.
Yes. Docker uses namespaces and cgroups under the hood, but my understanding is that while they are continuously making it better, a lot of that stuff is old news (Docker just put a nice friendly package around it and made it popular).

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immi101: Same way things like GPU-accelerated video decoding are only possible because it is implemented at OS-level + providing a nice interface to make it usable for user application. Efficient and fluid video playback on youtube is not a feature brought to you by your browser :p
Except that we've been able to view videos on youtube for what? 12 years? How changes to the kernel in the not so distant past has significantly contributed to our video viewing experience?

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immi101: Or just think of the whole area of energy management / energy efficiency. Dynamically scaling CPU/GPU frequency, switching off unused hardware parts, etc.All that stuff started pouring into OS design/programming like maybe 10-15(?) years ago and brought a fundamental change compared to how things were done back in the early days.
Without this work happening in the OS, mobile computing as we are used to it today would have been impossible.
Fair enough, power management is probably an area where the kernel advancements have contributed a lot in the not so distant past.

After all, I believe many of the innovations in Android were making the Linux kernel more power-efficient.

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immi101: If people talk only about visually changes that is often simply due to ignorance or lack of interest.
I mean, let's be honest, for the majority of users the inner workings of a computer is like magic.
All that matters is the stuff that you see on the screen.
Exactly and I think there's an ever increasing disconnect between advancements to kernel and the typical user experience. Short of getting a brand new usage paradigm for computers that require a lot of optimization at the kernel-level, kernel advancements will yield ever diminishing returns.

Sure, it may make devs' lives easier (I'm personally always keeping an eye out for new features with containers) and contribute greatly to specialized uses (ex: GPU-based computations for deep-learning), but these things are increasingly remote to your typical user whose hard-earned cash Microsoft is trying to obtain with every new version of Windows.
Post edited June 14, 2017 by Magnitus
Posted June 14, 2017
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HereForTheBeer: In fairness, this discussion is being held on a site that caters to people looking for old games, with titles going back to the early 80s. I find it a bit curious that people are chastised for running an OS that came out in 2001 but it's cool that we get releases from the 80s and 90s.
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Aemony: <snip> Because otherwise why end with XP? Why shouldn't we go even farther back and start supporting ME, 2000, 98, NT 4.0, 95, Win3.11, Win2, Win1 and MS-DOS? I mean, that's what you're saying, right? That we should go against the whole core of GOG's identity?
I said absolutely nothing about what gOg should do. The comment was about people in the community giving shit to those who choose to use an older OS though the site itself attracts exactly those sorts of people with all of the old titles.

------

If we are to discuss the "core business model" - which has been a moving target the last 3 or 4 years - it should be noted that it was about more than just old games on new hardware. The big one was and is DRM-free, of course. Then there is support. For several years it also included one-world pricing. Remember, in 2008 when gOg went live, XP was only 7 years old. At the time, Windows 7 wasn't yet released as a retail product. And XP was the dominant OS as people were running away screaming from problematic Vista. The typical gOg customer was running XP; I was using it when I joined up. They bought games knowing they would likely run on XP with gOg's massaging, and that they could get support for games on that OS.
Posted June 14, 2017
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HereForTheBeer: Remember, in 2008 when gOg went live, XP was only 7 years old. At the time, Windows 7 wasn't yet released as a retail product. And XP was the dominant OS as people were running away screaming from problematic Vista. The typical gOg customer was running XP; I was using it when I joined up. They bought games knowing they would likely run on XP with gOg's massaging, and that they could get support for games on that OS.
That sort of thing is always going to change with the message of time. 8~ years ago games were still being made FOR XP.
Posted June 14, 2017
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richlind33: Then you have no business complaining about Galaxy's diminishing optionality.

You're behind the curve, mang. Need to get with the times. o.O
I fail to see the connection here at all.
Posted June 14, 2017
I was just thinking - if GOG breaks XP compatibility (because of Galaxy, bacause they change software for making installation packages etc.) for a game that I purchsed and doesn't provide previous (XP compatibile) version of a installer on my account - how does it look from legal point of view?
Post edited June 14, 2017 by tburger
Posted June 14, 2017
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GR00T: Nothing. But if your old rig can't run one of the newer OSes, it's also not realistic to expect to be catered to when software has moved on from an OS that was retired and is no longer supported.
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HereForTheBeer: In fairness, this discussion is being held on a site that caters to people looking for old games, with titles going back to the early 80s. I find it a bit curious that people are chastised for running an OS that came out in 2001 but it's cool that we get releases from the 80s and 90s.
I think there is a big difference between using an OS and playing a game.
Using WinXP equivalent to playing Baldurs Gate ?
eh, probably not :p
Posted June 14, 2017
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Aemony: And yes, everyone here is asking GOG to restore compatibibility for an unsupported operating system, which most likely requires them to downgrade their internal development tools to an outdated version that is most likely not recommended and probably doesn't see much focus from Microsoft.
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richlind33: "Restoring" compatibility and "not breaking" compatibility are two different propositions.

In this case we're talking about a single file, and the workaround didn't require development tools, old or new.
You're still missing the point. It's only newer versions of the DLL file that breaks compatibility. Why? Because that newer version of the DLL (which includes stuff older versions doesn't include) have most likely been built with newer development tools. The only way of "restoring" compatibility would be to recompile that version of the DLL file using older development tools. Which means supporting and maintaining a completely separate development chain for an unsupported operating system.

You really don't know shit about software development.

Steam's DLL files will also hit this challenge eventually. It goes with the territory. And the more GOG must maintain separate development tools and chains to support unsupported operating system the more $$$$$$$$$ it costs.
Posted June 14, 2017
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vsr: Why not include "Classic Fallout: New Vegas Ultimate Edition" as an extra?
It won't have achievements and Galaxy integration, but who cares? Galaxy doesn't work on XP anymore anyway.
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real.geizterfahr: It'd be great if GOG could offer the original (unaltered) files of EVERY game as bonus content. Without any fixes, custom installers or Galaxy stuff. For all the Linux users, people who have their own DOSBox installation, people who still have their old Win 95 (or 98 or whatever) machines, people who love to play around with the files on their nerd-systems, ect.

I'd probably never need them. I love that I don't have to do shit to get Wing Commander Privateer to run on Windows 10. But I know that there are a lot of weird people with even weirder computers on GOG. And I think it wouldn't really hurt GOG to offer those files too.
I think this would be a fine compromise, as it would not intrude on the gog developer's time to maintain compatibility, and it would ensure that games would always be able to run on the OS they were originally designed for. In most cases, anyone with an intermediate knowledge of computers won't need a fancy gog installer anyway.
Posted June 14, 2017
high rated
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Aemony: And yes, everyone here is asking GOG to restore compatibibility for an unsupported operating system, which most likely requires them to downgrade their internal development tools to an outdated version that is most likely not recommended and probably doesn't see much focus from Microsoft.
Nope, many here are asking gog they please should not break something. That WinXP is not working anymore is a symptom that something is going in the wrong direction, something that's not just a problem for people who want to run games in wine on other systems like mac and linux or using outdated operating systems like WinXP or Vista.

I bought many games here assuming that someday gog is gone and I need to fix the installers myself to run the games on coming operating system. In the past gog always tried to keep the games as close to the original as possible and mostly did not add any extra stuff. Only in rare cases they used fanpatches or mod, but that's because the original games were utterly broken. They did a great balancing act in supporting newer OSes without unnecessary breaking something, which gave most of us the freedom to use the installers for preservation and building up a big backlog, knowing someday in the future we have good chances to make these games playable on then modern OS. For that reason many people here are concerned about galaxy, they just want a basic installer without any additional stuff added that maybe can break something in the future, they want the installers exactly like gog did it before. And that's not against galaxy, it's more about how things are handled at the moment. Let galaxy patch all the online features after the installation into the games and try to keep the installers independent and compatible as possible. They are the main reason why many people came here in the first place and they please should not become to feeder for galaxy.
Posted June 14, 2017
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DrakoPensulo: Do you have a list of games affected by galaxy.dll problem?
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Aemony: Right now it only seems to be Fallout: New Vegas, but any new title on GOG that comes with Galaxy integration will most likely be effected. It's also possible that if GOG starts patching old games with the new features that they as well will be affected, though in that case you can simply downgrade or disable auto-updates for those titles and you'll be able to play them on XP still.
Nope, rollback feature is only available via Galaxy...
Oh, the irony.

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GR00T: Nothing. But if your old rig can't run one of the newer OSes, it's also not realistic to expect to be catered to when software has moved on from an OS that was retired and is no longer supported.
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HereForTheBeer: In fairness, this discussion is being held on a site that caters to people looking for old games, with titles going back to the early 80s. I find it a bit curious that people are chastised for running an OS that came out in 2001 but it's cool that we get releases from the 80s and 90s.
The thing is, that some people (like me) are also here to get old games DRM-free for their old systems.
This group has been chased away by several things by now and most of those aren't posting here (anymore).
Now we get more Win10 fans every day.

I could just as well say "If you want to use Win10, then buy current games, duh!".
It would have about the same value as what I'm reading here these days.
Post edited June 14, 2017 by Klumpen0815
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionGood News: Galaxy.dll breaks XP-compatibility in good old games(258 posts)(258 posts)
(258 posts)