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General discussionIMPORTANT NOTICE: Unbundling games(1959 posts)(1959 posts)
(1959 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted April 16, 2015
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mrkgnao: Today is Sunday, April 12, 2015.

The full unbundling has begun 27 days ago and has apparently not ended yet, leaving the library in a half-broken state (no update notifications, no links to game pages/forums for unbundled games, broken file links, even more product_bonuses, etc.).

A blue has not posted in this thread in the last 25 days (post #631, i.e. 830 posts ago).

GOG, to assist you:
- Here is the list of most of the issues raised in this thread. A few more issues have been raised after I had posted that list, but given your overwhelming response, I did not collect them. I will gladly do so if you want me to.
- Here is the list of those you have already fixed, AFAIK.
- And in case you are not reading this thread (it might not be your "favourite topic", after all), I also left you a message here.
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Ciris: First off, I'm terribly sorry for not being more active in this thread - since it's a technical matter, I assumed that the guys dealing with unbundling directly would be dealing with feedback, and they thought I'd be passing their actions on to you guys. It's been quite the misunderstanding, and I apologise - I'll be dropping in way more often now :)

Thank you hugely for the list of issues - I've passed it on as a fuller reference to the Product team, who are dealing with the unbundling most directly now. They've told me most of the issues are ones they know about and that are on their more or less immediate to-do lists.

The reason not everything may get fixed right off the bat is that they also deal with setting everything up with games we're releasing - so they have to divide their responsibilities. But they'll do their best to bring everyone's shelves to order as soon as possible.

I'll be back with more feedback as soon as I get news of issues getting resolved - or if many more questions appear. :)
Thank you for your reply, Ciris.
Looking forward to better communication in the future.

Two quick questions:
1) Is the unbundling done? Do you plan to unbundle any other games (e.g. 15 games from your initial list that have not yet undergone this treatment)?

2) Could you please prepare a list of which issues will be fixed (soon) and which you have no plans of fixing?
Posted April 16, 2015
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coffeecup: Currently, I'm evaluating LaunchBox which has exactly that. Though this (universal) game launcher is really pretty, it misses a bit the point for a replacement, because it only cares for installed games and has no support for shop-provided game libraries and not installed games.

Looking at the Launchbox, it is tempting to write something simliar, first focus on managing the GOG library itself, then the other ones (steam, desura, shinyloot, gamersgate, humblebundle come to mind).
I'm a Linux user with a strict "only games may be closed-source" policy, so I'll probably contribute to the planned GOG and Humble support for Lutris instead.

(It's written in Python, which is my "can write it in my sleep" language.)
Posted April 16, 2015
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Ciris: First off, I'm terribly sorry for not being more active in this thread - since it's a technical matter, I assumed that the guys dealing with unbundling directly would be dealing with feedback, and they thought I'd be passing their actions on to you guys. It's been quite the misunderstanding, and I apologise - I'll be dropping in way more often now :)

Thank you hugely for the list of issues - I've passed it on as a fuller reference to the Product team, who are dealing with the unbundling most directly now. They've told me most of the issues are ones they know about and that are on their more or less immediate to-do lists.

The reason not everything may get fixed right off the bat is that they also deal with setting everything up with games we're releasing - so they have to divide their responsibilities. But they'll do their best to bring everyone's shelves to order as soon as possible.

I'll be back with more feedback as soon as I get news of issues getting resolved - or if many more questions appear. :)
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mrkgnao: Thank you for your reply, Ciris.
Looking forward to better communication in the future.

Two quick questions:
1) Is the unbundling done? Do you plan to unbundle any other games (e.g. 15 games from your initial list that have not yet undergone this treatment)?

2) Could you please prepare a list of which issues will be fixed (soon) and which you have no plans of fixing?
I've gotten in touch with just about everyone involved, sending them a long list of issues and suggestions presented in the past couple dozen pages that I managed to get through today.

In short, the unbundling process itself is done - however, issues to remain, many of which we know about and are working on (or are planning on working on in the immediate future).

[EDIT] AS I have learned, certain other titles may still be unbundled. I didn't know this - sorry for my mistake!

Many of them will be resolved by an update that's coming soon - sorting problems, searching, notifications, bad quality artwork, and links to product pages should be gone by then. It's a very difficult issue to diagnose and solve, says the head of our web team, so it's impossible to devise a quick fix for, but the long-term fixes we're planning WILL be incorporated into upcoming plans.

Many of the others - a lack of clarity in naming, missing languages, bundling games that shouldn't be bundled by the unbundling logic, forum links etc., are a question to the Product team - so I'm going to have to wait to a reply from them. Some of this may also be on the developers' end (especially as game naming goes, but possibly also bundling, unbundling, bonus content management and such), so I'm not sure how changes will go. As I said, I'm waiting on a reply about that.

Regarding questions about Galaxy and unbundling, those would be better suited for the Galaxy team. I'll try to get them in on this discussion (via me or by themselves) as well.
Post edited April 16, 2015 by Ciris
Posted April 16, 2015
Don't "fix" it, reverse it and think about what you have done. The nerve of some people...
Posted April 16, 2015
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mrkgnao: Thank you for your reply, Ciris.
Looking forward to better communication in the future.

Two quick questions:
1) Is the unbundling done? Do you plan to unbundle any other games (e.g. 15 games from your initial list that have not yet undergone this treatment)?

2) Could you please prepare a list of which issues will be fixed (soon) and which you have no plans of fixing?
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Ciris: I've gotten in touch with just about everyone involved, sending them a long list of issues and suggestions presented in the past couple dozen pages that I managed to get through today.

In short, the unbundling process itself is done - however, issues to remain, many of which we know about and are working on (or are planning on working on in the immediate future).

Many of them will be resolved by an update that's coming soon - sorting problems, searching, notifications, bad quality artwork, and links to product pages should be gone by then. It's a very difficult issue to diagnose and solve, says the head of our web team, so it's impossible to devise a quick fix for, but the long-term fixes we're planning WILL be incorporated into upcoming plans.

Many of the others - a lack of clarity in naming, missing languages, bundling games that shouldn't be bundled by the unbundling logic, forum links etc., are a question to the Product team - so I'm going to have to wait to a reply from them. Some of this may also be on the developers' end (especially as game naming goes, but possibly also bundling, unbundling, bonus content management and such), so I'm not sure how changes will go. As I said, I'm waiting on a reply about that.

Regarding questions about Galaxy and unbundling, those would be better suited for the Galaxy team. I'll try to get them in on this discussion (via me or by themselves) as well.
Will games in a series be sorted in series order or alphabetically.
Blackwell Series is a good example of cause for confusion/needing to use google to find out which order to play them in.
Posted April 16, 2015
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RafaelLVX: An odd side effect to this is that now I have games I never heard of before. What the hell is "Softporn adventure"? If this is something to do with the Leisure suit Larry series, then at least have the title linked to the LSL series game page. I'm now busy googling this stuff to straighten it out, the same goes for Crystals of Arborea, there should be more.
"Softporn Adventure" has always been included with the LSL 1-6 bundle and it was listed in the section previously known as "What's Cool about it?" on the game card :)

"Includes Leisure Suit Larry 1-6 (LSL 6 is in VGA and SVGA), the VGA remake of Leisure Suit Larry 1, and Softporn Adventure. The (in)famous missing floppies containing Leisure Suit Larry 4 are still missing. No, we are not hiding them, either."
Posted April 16, 2015
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Ciris:
Thank you for your clarifications.

As you may have realised from reading this thread, there is at the moment quite a bit of dissatisfaction and mistrust on the part of a not-insignificant portion of your customer base with the entire unbundling process and the overall state of the website.

If I may be so bold as to suggest a method of working towards a form of reconciliation (which you may adopt, adapt or ignore).

You are talking about plans for more unbundling and about a sizeable upcoming update. May I suggest that rather than dropping it upon us with a general announcement (as you originally did in this thread) or without even that (as is often the case), you publish your detailed plans some time before applying the change. Inevitably, some people will like the change and some will not, and we know better than to expect you to completely change your plans because of our reaction, but increased visibility into the website's near- and long-term future could help diffuse some of exasperation with what is at the moment a half-broken website with new bugs popping up on a daily basis (see the Y1K bug (and I use the term bug charitably because I doubt it is really a bug), reported a week ago, for an example of something that makes your website look like the work of a bunch of *********** (and I do not mean "amateurs", because in my experience amateurs are often the most professional of artificers)).

Think of it as a preemptive changelog. Publish it with a fair amount of detail and a schedule, then stick to your plans and your schedule, if you can. If you can't, update us on a regular basis about ongoing changes. Assign a technical person to be a point of contact, someone who will read the relevant thread on a daily basis and respond; someone who does not need to constantly check with someone else in order to supply relevant information. And don't forget to truthfully explain why you are doing things. If you share things with your users, you'd be surprised how much insight and useful knowledge you could gain in return, insight and knowledge that would allow you to make your site better.

Most importantly: be honest, be transparent, be forthcoming.

Good luck.
Post edited April 16, 2015 by mrkgnao
Posted April 16, 2015
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mrkgnao: Think of it as a preemptive changelog. Publish it with a fair amount of detail and a schedule [..] update us on a regular basis about ongoing changes [..] don't forget to truthfully explain why you are doing things [..]
Most importantly: be honest, be transparent, be forthcoming.
^ I obviously agree with this.

I would always prefer a "sorry, we messed up a bit the unbundling" honest message, way more than zero staff posts for 30+ days.

Also, I'll suggest again an useful feature for testing the community's feeling about some changes: forum polls!
Post edited April 16, 2015 by phaolo
Posted April 16, 2015
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I saw that there was a fresh bluetext post, read Ciris posts and was about to ask for a time-plan regarding GOG's plans, but mrkgnao did a much better job with this post #1569 than I could ever do.

Cheers mrkgnao, hope they listen.
Posted April 16, 2015
I'm looking through the list and not liking it to much so far.

I don't feel expansion titles like HoMM V Tribes of the East, Two Worlds II Castle Defence or Disciples 2 - Rise of the Elves being seperate makes things better. It just clutters up my list. Not to mention the EIGHT Heroes Chronicles listings I have now.

It wont bother me to much, but definately not an improvement in my eyes.
Post edited April 16, 2015 by PestilenceX
Posted April 16, 2015
I wish I was as optimistic as some of you. I'm pretty sure that most companies real decision makers (despite press release verbiage and a couple great blue typers) care absolutely nothing about a small handful of complainers on a forum. They'll update their database/servers/whatever in whatever way best works for their business plan and thinking long term won't care about a short term hit of a few deserters.
Posted April 16, 2015
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RafaelLVX: An odd side effect to this is that now I have games I never heard of before. What the hell is "Softporn adventure"? If this is something to do with the Leisure suit Larry series, then at least have the title linked to the LSL series game page. I'm now busy googling this stuff to straighten it out, the same goes for Crystals of Arborea, there should be more.
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JudasIscariot: "Softporn Adventure" has always been included with the LSL 1-6 bundle and it was listed in the section previously known as "What's Cool about it?" on the game card :)

"Includes Leisure Suit Larry 1-6 (LSL 6 is in VGA and SVGA), the VGA remake of Leisure Suit Larry 1, and Softporn Adventure. The (in)famous missing floppies containing Leisure Suit Larry 4 are still missing. No, we are not hiding them, either."
Thanks, but you missed the point. The point is, from the game shelf it's impossible to know that, unless you now implemented links to its original game page for each of the unbundled titles, or unless you'll be here answering each time I ask.

I didn't know about Softporn adventure then, so I had to dig around to figure it out. To be honest, I didn't know the game even existed, so in this case it ended up being an interesting find.
Posted April 17, 2015
I don't like it, AT ALL. It causes a lot of download bloat and massive overlap. The worst offender is Heroes Chronicles. In this day and age of rising internet bandwidth I can't see ANY reason that this needed to be 'fixed'. It wasn't broken and in fact was much more easier to see what was what before the 'unbundling.

A waste of time and effort that could have been better spent elsewhere...like sorting out the update notification bugs (i.e. not receiving them) and the update naming/numbering system.

I just stumbled on update 1.04 for Pillars of Eternity, and wasn't aware of it. Lucky I'm in the habit of checking frequently now....what with the Wasteland 2 patches causing issues.

Tony.
Posted April 17, 2015
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To reply to most of the comments posted between my last post and now:

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omega64: Will games in a series be sorted in series order or alphabetically?
We have no way to set which game comes before which in a series so the system understands - so they'll be alphabetically - BUT, after the new "My Account" is launched (which is the major update I mentioned in my former post), we'll be introducting new ways to arrange your games.

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mrkgnao: May I suggest that rather than dropping it upon us with a general announcement (as you originally did in this thread) or without even that (as is often the case), you publish your detailed plans some time before applying the change.
Firstly, let me tell you that your post makes a lot of sense and I personally agree with many of your points - however, as the “inside person”, I also know some points of the other side, if I should even call us that, and will try to explain them so that our decisions make more sense to everyone.

I’ve asked if that would be a possibility, as it seemed a reasonable idea to me as well. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple - as some plans are still up in the air, and we would not like to promise a change that will end up not being made, or talk about dates for plans that might not work out due to other, more urgent things coming up. However, I WILL try to get as much information to you guys about what’s being changed as possible, as soon as possible - hopefully even before the change is made.

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mrkgnao: If you share things with your users, you'd be surprised how much insight and useful knowledge you could gain in return, insight and knowledge that would allow you to make your site better.
I understand we’ve made a bad impression with a few cases, and it may not seem like it from those - this thread included - but we DO take input into consideration. The forums, the wishlist, random suggestions in various places, they’re seen, read and discussed more often than you may think. I’m sorry if we’re not transparent enough in when that happens and what’s being taken into account, but in that case, I will try to make it seen.

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phaolo: I would always prefer a "sorry, we messed up a bit the unbundling" honest message, way more than zero staff posts for 30+ days. Also, I'll suggest again an useful feature for testing the community's feeling about some changes: forum polls!
I admit. We messed up - I messed up in not passing the information on, and the people I’d be passing it on messed up in not checking in to see what’s up on the community end of their project. The unbundling also kind-of messed up in terms of leaving bugs behind.

But as I said before, we’ve put people on the job from today morning to fix as much of the simpler stuff as possible, and much of the more complex bugs will go away with the new “My Account” page, which we’ll be launching soon - so even though the start was rough, we’re trying to make things work as well as they can.

—

I’ve passed on all the issues listed so far in this thread, they’re being looked at, and I’ve been notified that people will be delegated to deal with them first thing today.
Posted April 17, 2015
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Ciris: [..]The unbundling also kind-of messed up in terms of leaving bugs behind.
But as I said before, we’ve put people on the job[..] complex bugs will go away with the new “My Account” page, which we’ll be launching soon[..]
Thank you Ciris : )
Also, fingers crossed for the new MyAccount!
Post edited April 17, 2015 by phaolo
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionIMPORTANT NOTICE: Unbundling games(1959 posts)(1959 posts)
(1959 posts)