Good riddance!

I'd say we've been seeing that shift for years and years now, and almost everyone who was going to leave has already left. (May be a time for some to return and lend a hand here if they'd be willing to, yes. But doubt they will.) Since it seems unlikely that something like what GOG used to be will pop up somewhere else for us to go to, those of us still around will probably keep sticking around, at least on the forums, to lash out, if perhaps not also as customers.
Exactly. There are a lot of straws accumulating. For some the last one already came some time ago, for others it may just happen that this card pack is it, for others it may be in the future. But they're all straws.
QFT for the first part. For the last, thing is that they did have some competition back in the "good old days". But the rest, who admittedly were far smaller players, gave in, on both fully DRM free and regional pricing, so they did as well.
As far as I'm concerned, regarding fully commercial products, so not counting free and donationware, the pay once model is the proper one. Want more money for your stuff coming in the future, put more effort into it, creating full expansions, not little DLC, and/or maybe massive patches seriously improving the product, which will trigger renewed interest.
Other than that, I guess one could have microtransactions or small paid DLC for purely cosmetic things or other stuff that can give bragging rights, and those who care for such things might as well pay up, but shouldn't be a difference between paid and unpaid in terms of actual gameplay. So those microtransactions would act as a sort of donationware.
But, otherwise, see above. This is just one of many straws.
QFT. Again.
Yep, exactly, that's when they violated a core principle. Actually the "goodies" one was implied, under "customer love", but the pricing was right there, specifically, and a mere half a year before there had been that conference where they specifically said they had to reject Take Two and Capcom because they were asking them for some small concessions and they will not do that. To quote exactly, “The moment we will betray our values, the whole GOG will explode and that’s the end of it.”
QFT (well, assume I quoted all of it, this is messy enough already) Sometimes the slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy, but in GOG's case, they have proven time and time again that it's the right one to use. Or, in other terms, useful to play Littlefinger's game when it comes to GOG... Do hope it'll serve us better than it did him though.

You know this can be looked at in similar manner to this...

In the beginning it was just one game with disabled MP that you could not play.
In the beginning it was just one game that got patched days/months/years after the steam version.
In the beginning it was just one AAA game that GOG got in a years time.
In the beginning it was just one game that became hard to track updates for.

My point is thus... nothing ever stays the same. To cherry pick things you disagree with like Galaxy or regional pricing, or region locks, ignores all the benefits those things provided. Like quicker patches, like easier patching, like more AAA games, like games with actual supported MP services.

Why should GOG cater to people who dislike microtransactions and not people who don't mind them? Why should GOG not let the market decide? I've never known microtransactions to be a GOG principle, they have asked users how they felt about them in the past... they have stated they don't currently accept them on the indie page but I've not seen them state that they would never ever release a game here with them.

That's when we come back to the image GOG users have built in their mind that told them... GOG is the good guy they would never follow that proven successful business model that is perhaps considered anti-consumer. Yes GOG is partly to blame for that. But the truth is GOG is a business as I said first and foremost.

Nothing stays the same forever, nor should you ever want it to....
People really need to stop harping about Gremlins Inc. You get a offline version that is the exact same game in single player. If it was combined with the original there would be zero difference to any other game here. Of all things to harp over this one isn't worth it.

It's the circle of life....

It's not the exact same game, because the DLCs don't work with it. To be honest, I don't even care about the DLCs, but they introduced always-online content to GOG.

Please point me to the many AAA games that we got, because of these changes. Somehow I can't find them. The rest is debatable too. There were always developers that didn't provide patches (or months later than on Steam) and there still are. And there have always been games with working multiplayer mode (it's possible without Galaxy) and there are still some that don't support Multiplayer outside of Steam (last example No Man's Sky).

Just curious but as far as starter pack goes why didn't they give a patch like MGS V did with its dlc. Could be mistaken but the patch for MGS V was just to enable files already in there. Those who play multiplayer will just need a dlc check while showing them available cards or whatever. Isn't this feasible?

Edit: would have avoided the flack it received to some extent right?

Yes it is. Only difference is the online items drops don't happen in the offline version for obvious reasons. The DLC was designed for the mutliplayer aspect not single player therefor they were never intended to be used in the single player offline version.

The dev already stated though that any signifcant changes or new content for the single player portion would also carry over to the offline couterpart.

Some people just can't wrap there heads around the fact that not all conent that comes here is going to be made to be perserverd for use at all times. In those situations you have the power to not buy.

Really? Have you seen the increase in AAA games that last few years? I never said brand new AAA but just off the top of my head...

Obivion
Fallout 3
Fallout New Vegas
Saints Row 4
Saints Row 3
Darksiders
Darksiders 2

Need I go on? Most of these games released after Galaxy andmany of the sites changes people complain about and GOG has stated many times these changes made getting these type of games easier.

As far as patches and online MP... is it perfect? No nothing is but there is no denying that the situation is imporving in a large part due to these changes, especially Galaxy.

I've seen a lot of patches now end up on Galaxy at the exact same time as Steam, something that never happen before Galaxy and may not have happened at all.

We got games like Absolver that are using Galaxy for crossplay with Steam offering a full online MP experience. Do you honestly think that would have happen if not for the easy to use API's that Galaxy provides?

No, they shouldn't. It should allow LAN play or direct IP, and not just Galaxy. DRM-free isn't ONLY "different single player game bundled with it".

It's not different it's the same sigleplayer minus online item drops. It's basically a fork of the orginal game because the orginal was designed as an online only game and the dev didn't want to change that so the forked it to offer the same experience in an offline enviorment.

Oh, something very much on topic actually. $5.89 seemed like an odd price, but wanted to see the pricing matrix posted for confirmation. Now that it was and I see that the base price is $4.99, notice anything missing?

Edit: Oh, just a site bug it seems, credit is there if you try to check out. Interesting bug though. Maybe triggered by the fact that they can't have the DRM-free and no connection thing there, and removing that somehow removes this bit as well?
And again, using what got on GOG because of them giving up on principles to argue against those caring for the principles far more (or entirely instead of) getting more and more popular games. If anything, that's strengthening the point, pointing out games which shouldn't have been on GOG. But maybe if they'd have stuck to their guns a few of them would have eventually made it here under the old terms, while now none did.

Well it's pointless to argue against stubbornness. One of this days I'll find out that you are against smoking as well, right?

Huh?

(Some of this is a bit rambling, and the logic probably isn't perfect.)

Mmmm, I guess, in a way, some of this depends how much "control" one personally wants over where GOG goes in the future.

If one wants DRM-free installers, one can still buy DRM-free games here, currently, and back them up if you think GOG will remove them. (The issue of outdated games is something that does bother me, though.)

If one wants to just spend money (especially a lot of money) to try to shape GOG's business plan in a specific direction (as I think vulchor and others did), that may be a different matter and different mindset. That is something I'm not necessarily a fan of in general.

Some of that has to do with an investment in GOG. I may be wrong, but I don't think it's a stretch to say some people in this thread had an emotional investment in GOG (which resulted in a financial investment for some), which I'm not sure is ever a really healthy thing, though perhaps unavoidable in some cases, like if GOG's business plan for the future is one of the top things you're worried about yet you don't work at GOG. That said, I don't know anything about the lives of people in this thread so it may be presumptuous.

Speaking to folks in general, please do feel free to buy elsewhere of course, but any business can turn into a "monster". Times like these might be a good time to focus on oneself and not on things outside one's control. I say this as someone who used to be pretty invested in Good Old Games (and it actually took some time for me to get used to GOG not meaning anything), then finding game rights.

I wonder if any of this has to do with an "individual" vs. "group" mentality, at all. Like, on an individual level, we can each pick and choose what games we want to buy here, putting some thought into the process ("If I buy this, am I supporting DRM-free? Outdated games? Microtransactions?") On a group level (group meaning GOG, the company of 50-100-ish people I think), we can use or figuratively dispose of the whole company because the overarching "group" is taking a trajectory that we think will be bad in the future.

Anyway, I think it's worth trying a little devil's advocacy. I guess I didn't really buy into GOG's "DRM-free revolution" marketing because I've never been that affected by DRM, I found the Good Old Games more interesting, and I've never had much money to put towards a cause. *shrug*

I've never understood why people here get so mad about online games having DRM via login accounts. I've even seen games here that have full DRM-free single player campaigns but have online servers which require a log-in and folks give the games bad ratings solely because of that. This is the same kind of mindset that goes into partisan politics; people adopt a certain way of thinking and are absolutely unwilling to compromise, even when it makes complete sense to make exceptions in certain situations.

I've played games via LAN parties, private servers, etc. where I could easily trust everyone not to cheat and where it makes sense for game saves to be saved locally on the user's computer, there are no additional fees to play, etc. I would hate to see DRM added to games such as these where it is completely unnecessary.

Yet there are some genres, like MMORPG's, where having a login account and online game saves really is the only way to ensure that gameplay is fair for everyone and limit cheating. Also, where it makes sense that there are some additional fees or micro-transactions to help fund the devs and encourage regular, sometimes massive updates. I've quit several MMORPG's because of servers that were insecure, or where too much information was saved offline on users' computers and they could easily edit their stats via CheatEngine or something like that. I'm not going to spend time "grinding" for experience just to run into Billy The Cheater in a PVP match and lose because he maxed his stats in some file editor.

The argument against this game seems to be that they should just sell the game at a single price and all cards should be unlocked for everyone or unlocked in-game only. I guess then you can just play offline/online whenever you want, etc. I think they should maybe release a version like that also (so long as I'm not playing against these people with my regular account.) Personally, I like some assurances against cheaters, and heck... I don't mind spending some money on a game if I'm really into it. I also like the deck-variety and challenge that comes from encountering other players that don't have every single other card in the game unlocked, and the excitement of opening a pack and getting something that truly feels valuable. This is another genre where online DRM makes sense, in my opinion.

I think Devs should be able to have the choice of how they want to monetize their game, but that's just me. Players similarly have a choice of whether or not they want to buy it. If you don't like it, play something else...there is a crap-ton of DRM-free games to choose from if the very idea of online accounts is that offensive to you.