Always buy games low & buy later.

That even includes re-release to new stores - as we don't know entirely what problems can come from bringing old game to new store b/c of old platform requirements and new platform requirements; especially as more games lean into proprietary stuff like Steamworks, Origin, Uplay, Galaxy, etc etc...and build those into the game from the ground-up.

We've seen the previous problems already w/ GOG version's of No Man's Sky, Dungeon Siege 3 w/ DLC issues, newer Deus Ex titles, and now Hitman 1: GOTY - where those issues needed to be fixed, even after those hit GOG initially.

With so many bad business practices in general in gaming these days - release games now & patch later; de-value base-games by putting them in Bundles; releasing DLC's/Season Passes and/or expansions to devalue games or previous packages; re-releasing games as Remasters; Remakes done later; DRM put on games to make them more or a rental and players have less ownership; client-app's forced into games to also kill the 2nd-hand market; etc etc - it's often just best just to buy cheap & wait it out.

By waiting - you can get better editions or versions; more patching behind a game so it's more stable & less buggy; not got milked on DLC's/expansion pricing schemes & shenanigans; better hardware's out so a game can run better by sheer brute force of newer hardware; maybe grab an edition with less DRM (if it exists) somewhere; more mods are available; etc etc.

I ain't dropped $45 on a game since Witcher 2 pre-order on GOG - and for many reasons I already mentioned.

Indeed.
I once posted a couple of funny videos about Biden and got a warning from moderators.

This is disgusting.
GOG should stop caving to totalitarian regimes.

I see GOG made another very smart customer friendly move. Bravo, yet again.

Smh

Whilst I agree with you. There's not much that can be done sadly. Taking in total GOG users a very small number use the forum, even less are aware of current issues, and even less are taking part in the boycott.

It should not come as a suprise that this is their plan, as this is what they always do. Screw something up then post some PR thing saying its getting looked at then post nothing, hoping that it all blows over.

They could use the earnings they've done from GOG to change unlocks and the assisnation mode to offline. It probably requires like two or three developers. Its not that difficult to do.

For instance, offline assassination attemps could be made through random seed generation (this is probably already done, someone generates a seed and then send them out to the clients already for these daily missions, its probably fully automated). So generating a seed through an in-game RNG tool and post the seed it on any forum where people play HITMAN. People can then copy paste it and play the generated assassination attempt. In the end they can post screenshots or not whether or not they succseeded or not (if they want to) for that specific seed. Or they can just generate and play one without any other influence for their own.

Just remove anything that requires an online connection and force people to post screenshots if they want leaderboard scores but I don't see this as a problem. Speedrunners do that all the time, all the evidence to make records must be manually provided through video format. Or just store anything locally. Cheaters will always exist regardless, and through this way you can be make sure that in an online discussion, there will be less cheating (cheaters disturb the peace of the forum).

The unlocks could be done through leveling, levels could be stored in your savegame and not through your account. If you want to reset your progress and level, just delete your save to start again. Its simple enough because all the values are already set up, it just need to be "rewired" through programming. Instead of saved on a server, just store it in a savegame.

What I mean is, its not difficult to actually make this game fully DRM-Free and fun for everyone. People are already organized, all it takes are easy to use ways to play this game fully offline.

Its demand as you say a little labor therefore salary in addition. The question is after. Is it profitable? because the game was released for several years on steam and was free on epic. So sales are not going to be huge on goggle. We don't live in a caring world. Gog is a business, the goal is earned not losing money ^^.

My thoughts exactly. It's 60 bucks after all which again is quite unusual for 4 year old game but that's on IOI part. If that's the case, one more indicator they care more about money then their reputation.

But one thing for sure. Its going to put an end to the future coloboration with ioi. To avoid a new controversy, hitman 2 and 3 will never see the light of day on gog.

Interesting. I was thinking exactly the opposite. This release worked fairly smoothly for GOG, all things considered. I fully expect H2 and H3 to arrive here at some point, probably faster than H1 made it.

Not entirely sure. The game's been review-bombed to hell, and it got off the front page nearly as quickly as it got on. It's already on Youtube, and probably going to gain traction. Let's not forget that DRM-Free is the only thing that makes GOG appealing. For price, Steam tends to have them dead-to-rights, which is probably another reason this game's sales won't be a tenth of what Steam has.

Honestly, I never attribute to malice what can be attributed to stupidity, and it's clear that the GOG staff was a bit stupid in not realizing just how DRM-heavy this game is. IOI is just not a big enough name to sell out for when they've held fast against the likes of EA and Ubi. They're going to have to start working to regain people's trust, especially if the Zoom Platform people are serious about finally expanding.

I have to agree with Lukin - This is likely the last Hitman game we see here. Good riddance to bad rubbish is what I say.

Perhaps you're right. Time will tell.

In future I agree, I can't imagine this will happen again unless IO backs down -hard-, just because GoG will likely not take this kind of publicity hit again at the absolute worst interpretation. In mine, they wont risk this loophole being abused again.

The reason this is taking time is probably because of contractual garbage. To break contract and kick them off the storefront has to have a lot of oomph behind it. It's easy to say "this game doesn't function," because the game crashes at a rate of 5spf(seconds per frame) but it's quite a bit harder to argue non-functionality in this case from a contractual law point of view. especially if the wording allows this trash by technicality since GoG may not have considered this scenario when putting in their contract. It's why I'm giving GoG time at all.

Good, we don't need this kind of crap anymore around here.

If both these will also be added to the catalogue, the next controversy will be about saved progress. To get an idea how this would look like just read Gamepressure's key information

That's not all of it of course. You can't transfer anything from EPIC or Steam, you'd have to buy it all over again, register, jump through several hoops until hopefully it works so you can continue playing.

IOI will never change any of that, not for GOG, so the best that can still happen is to remove that piece from this store and move on ...