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General discussionWhat will become of Gog in the future?(52 posts)(52 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted January 24, 2022
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tfishell: That's a good point. It's just hard for me to figure out who'd buy GOG when it makes such little money. I think you or somebody else have mentioned THQNordic, I suppose that's possible.
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MysterD: Since Microsoft had them on their stage for E3 a few years back as a super big deal, I'd guess Microsoft would buy them. Plus, they have the $ to certainly buy-out CDPR and GOG.

Heck, M$ bought Zenimax/Bethesda and also Activision-Blizzard out, for crying out loud.

Plus, M$ seems to be the New Super-House of RPG's anyways - also already w/ Obsidian, InXile, and Bethesda on-board. Adding CDPR to their catalogue would be bananas for them.

Also, putting Witcher series and Cyberpunk 2077 on Game Pass would be huge for them.

I'm certainly not fond of exclusive-ness for obvious reason (i.e. I think gamers should play games anywhere they really want and can, TBH, thinking that's the best approach so all gamers can play) - but exclusives do sell consoles and making any of those titles and/or future sequels for Witcher games and Cyberpunk games exclusive to X-Box Console and X-Box for PC would be HUGE, shutting out their competitors (i.e Sony and Nintendo).

I'm certainly not fond of big companies gobbling everything & anything up and all for obvious reasons - but, this to be is the most logical buy-out if CDPR and GOG needs $, whether we like it or not.

Of course, I'd rather CDPR and GOG remain as they are right now, not with anyone but themselves.

EDIT:
There's also Phil Spencer wanting more emulation and preserving the legacy of old games by "legal means of emulation", too - so yeah, that could be another factor for them to chase CDPR and GOG too.

See this - https://www.vg247.com/phil-spencer-legal-game-emulation-preservation
Well, CDPR and gog are separate, might buy one or the other or both. I can’t see M$ wanting cyberpunk, unless it’s simply to annoy Sony.

I would not trust M$ or this Phil Spencer (when did he leave location, location, location?). Emulation them would mean windows/Xbox emulating competitors games. Just another monopoly move. Perhaps they should start by getting all their old projects working before moving further, games for windows dead for instance.
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Timboli: What right-thinking company would take on DRM-Free?
While DRM-Free is great for those of us customers who love it, it is a very big limiting factor to attracting game providers and selling games.

In fact, if GOG are in dire straits now, you can put that down to the difficulties in solely supporting DRM-Free, and the actions they have taken in regard to that. Not saying they have always made the right choices, just that it has been difficult for them, and perhaps there has been a level of desperation, which often doesn't lead to smart thinking.
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Magnitus: I won't delve in the motivation of GOG and it's parent company (desperation/greed, etc).

But yes, maintaining long term ownership of gaming titles (both keeping them accessible online and keeping them working with future OSes) is a non-trivial endeavor that is more akin to a service than a fixed product that you sell.

This is why I'm feeling uneasy about GOG just selling games and then not charging any recuring fee for keeping them available online and updated (or supposedly doing so for the later case anyways). As long as they keep selling, it kinda works I guess, but as they acrue an increasing backlog of sold titles with their userbase, that model will either collpase or start showing cracks (as it has done already I believe) if they don't sell an ever increasing amount of titles.

As such, I think its in the interest of anyone who has a sizeable backlog with GOG to just pay a recuring service fee to GOG for them to host the games online and work more closely with developers to get the latest updates of the games and keep those games working with upcoming os releases, sometimes after the developers themselves have lost interest in their games.

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nightcraw1er.488: As for drm free, you are fighting a losing battle. The world is moving further away from drm free or ownership, in fact, I don’t see 10 years down the line people owning anything at all, it’s simply a rush to the lowest common denominator. Even drm free games have gated content, crippled systems (mods for example), added requirements etc. just as consoles are removing all physical media, pc gaming is moving to streaming. Heck one day soon you just stream everything to a contract rented tablet, there will be nothing else.
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Magnitus: I think interest in ownership of intellectual property has always been proportional to the degree of attachment with said intellectual property.

You will always have a percentage of the populace that cares about such things (might not be a dominant percentage, but it will always be there) regardless of the current climate.

For everyone else, various events will cause more mainstream interests in ownership to wax and wane.

Atm, online services like steam and Netflix have proven reliable and cheap, causing a waning of interest in owership, but you are always one crisis away from that interest resurfacing.

I guarantee you that if Steam shuts down in a month (or change their access policy to be more restrictive) or Netflix loses some of its beloved series due to some freak occurance (ex: Yeah... we got hacked pretty deeply and "Stranger Things" and "Cobra Kai" are gone... like forever, sorry guys... did anyone by any chance do illegal copies?), you will have a ressurgence of interest in ownership.
These things already happen, services going down, drm preventing people playing etc. it’s made no impact to the growth.
Post edited January 24, 2022 by nightcraw1er.488
Posted January 24, 2022
low rated
avatar
MysterD: Since Microsoft had them on their stage for E3 a few years back as a super big deal, I'd guess Microsoft would buy them. Plus, they have the $ to certainly buy-out CDPR and GOG.

Heck, M$ bought Zenimax/Bethesda and also Activision-Blizzard out, for crying out loud.

Plus, M$ seems to be the New Super-House of RPG's anyways - also already w/ Obsidian, InXile, and Bethesda on-board. Adding CDPR to their catalogue would be bananas for them.

Also, putting Witcher series and Cyberpunk 2077 on Game Pass would be huge for them.

I'm certainly not fond of exclusive-ness for obvious reason (i.e. I think gamers should play games anywhere they really want and can, TBH, thinking that's the best approach so all gamers can play) - but exclusives do sell consoles and making any of those titles and/or future sequels for Witcher games and Cyberpunk games exclusive to X-Box Console and X-Box for PC would be HUGE, shutting out their competitors (i.e Sony and Nintendo).

I'm certainly not fond of big companies gobbling everything & anything up and all for obvious reasons - but, this to be is the most logical buy-out if CDPR and GOG needs $, whether we like it or not.

Of course, I'd rather CDPR and GOG remain as they are right now, not with anyone but themselves.

EDIT:
There's also Phil Spencer wanting more emulation and preserving the legacy of old games by "legal means of emulation", too - so yeah, that could be another factor for them to chase CDPR and GOG too.

See this - https://www.vg247.com/phil-spencer-legal-game-emulation-preservation
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nightcraw1er.488: Well, CDPR and gog are separate, might buy one or the other or both. I can’t see M$ wanting cyberpunk, unless it’s simply to annoy Sony.

I would not trust M$ or this Phil Spencer (when did he leave location, location, location?). Emulation them would mean windows/Xbox emulating competitors games. Just another monopoly move. Perhaps they should start by getting all their old projects working before moving further, games for windows dead for instance.
avatar
Magnitus: I won't delve in the motivation of GOG and it's parent company (desperation/greed, etc).

But yes, maintaining long term ownership of gaming titles (both keeping them accessible online and keeping them working with future OSes) is a non-trivial endeavor that is more akin to a service than a fixed product that you sell.

This is why I'm feeling uneasy about GOG just selling games and then not charging any recuring fee for keeping them available online and updated (or supposedly doing so for the later case anyways). As long as they keep selling, it kinda works I guess, but as they acrue an increasing backlog of sold titles with their userbase, that model will either collpase or start showing cracks (as it has done already I believe) if they don't sell an ever increasing amount of titles.

As such, I think its in the interest of anyone who has a sizeable backlog with GOG to just pay a recuring service fee to GOG for them to host the games online and work more closely with developers to get the latest updates of the games and keep those games working with upcoming os releases, sometimes after the developers themselves have lost interest in their games.

I think interest in ownership of intellectual property has always been proportional to the degree of attachment with said intellectual property.

You will always have a percentage of the populace that cares about such things (might not be a dominant percentage, but it will always be there) regardless of the current climate.

For everyone else, various events will cause more mainstream interests in ownership to wax and wane.

Atm, online services like steam and Netflix have proven reliable and cheap, causing a waning of interest in owership, but you are always one crisis away from that interest resurfacing.

I guarantee you that if Steam shuts down in a month (or change their access policy to be more restrictive) or Netflix loses some of its beloved series due to some freak occurance (ex: Yeah... we got hacked pretty deeply and "Stranger Things" and "Cobra Kai" are gone... like forever, sorry guys... did anyone by any chance do illegal copies?), you will have a ressurgence of interest in ownership.
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nightcraw1er.488: These things already happen, services going down, drm preventing people playing etc. it’s made no impact to the growth.
Yeah, my retail copy of The Godfather 2 from Origin which uses Securom doesn't work out-the-box; doesn't connect to its online activation servers to phone-home and activate.

Shenmue 3 from Epic and Steam don't work in offline mode either.
Posted January 24, 2022
low rated
avatar
MysterD: Since Microsoft had them on their stage for E3 a few years back as a super big deal, I'd guess Microsoft would buy them. Plus, they have the $ to certainly buy-out CDPR and GOG.

Heck, M$ bought Zenimax/Bethesda and also Activision-Blizzard out, for crying out loud.

Plus, M$ seems to be the New Super-House of RPG's anyways - also already w/ Obsidian, InXile, and Bethesda on-board. Adding CDPR to their catalogue would be bananas for them.

Also, putting Witcher series and Cyberpunk 2077 on Game Pass would be huge for them.

I'm certainly not fond of exclusive-ness for obvious reason (i.e. I think gamers should play games anywhere they really want and can, TBH, thinking that's the best approach so all gamers can play) - but exclusives do sell consoles and making any of those titles and/or future sequels for Witcher games and Cyberpunk games exclusive to X-Box Console and X-Box for PC would be HUGE, shutting out their competitors (i.e Sony and Nintendo).

I'm certainly not fond of big companies gobbling everything & anything up and all for obvious reasons - but, this to be is the most logical buy-out if CDPR and GOG needs $, whether we like it or not.

Of course, I'd rather CDPR and GOG remain as they are right now, not with anyone but themselves.

EDIT:
There's also Phil Spencer wanting more emulation and preserving the legacy of old games by "legal means of emulation", too - so yeah, that could be another factor for them to chase CDPR and GOG too.

See this - https://www.vg247.com/phil-spencer-legal-game-emulation-preservation
avatar
nightcraw1er.488: Well, CDPR and gog are separate, might buy one or the other or both. I can’t see M$ wanting cyberpunk, unless it’s simply to annoy Sony.

I would not trust M$ or this Phil Spencer (when did he leave location, location, location?). Emulation them would mean windows/Xbox emulating competitors games. Just another monopoly move. Perhaps they should start by getting all their old projects working before moving further, games for windows dead for instance.
avatar
Magnitus: I won't delve in the motivation of GOG and it's parent company (desperation/greed, etc).

But yes, maintaining long term ownership of gaming titles (both keeping them accessible online and keeping them working with future OSes) is a non-trivial endeavor that is more akin to a service than a fixed product that you sell.

This is why I'm feeling uneasy about GOG just selling games and then not charging any recuring fee for keeping them available online and updated (or supposedly doing so for the later case anyways). As long as they keep selling, it kinda works I guess, but as they acrue an increasing backlog of sold titles with their userbase, that model will either collpase or start showing cracks (as it has done already I believe) if they don't sell an ever increasing amount of titles.

As such, I think its in the interest of anyone who has a sizeable backlog with GOG to just pay a recuring service fee to GOG for them to host the games online and work more closely with developers to get the latest updates of the games and keep those games working with upcoming os releases, sometimes after the developers themselves have lost interest in their games.

I think interest in ownership of intellectual property has always been proportional to the degree of attachment with said intellectual property.

You will always have a percentage of the populace that cares about such things (might not be a dominant percentage, but it will always be there) regardless of the current climate.

For everyone else, various events will cause more mainstream interests in ownership to wax and wane.

Atm, online services like steam and Netflix have proven reliable and cheap, causing a waning of interest in owership, but you are always one crisis away from that interest resurfacing.

I guarantee you that if Steam shuts down in a month (or change their access policy to be more restrictive) or Netflix loses some of its beloved series due to some freak occurance (ex: Yeah... we got hacked pretty deeply and "Stranger Things" and "Cobra Kai" are gone... like forever, sorry guys... did anyone by any chance do illegal copies?), you will have a ressurgence of interest in ownership.
avatar
nightcraw1er.488: These things already happen, services going down, drm preventing people playing etc. it’s made no impact to the growth.
CD Projekt S.A. Group owns both GOG and CD Projekt RED.
See the wiki - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CD_Projekt

I get most people don't want CDP S.A. in Microsoft's hands, but who else would really buy them out? Who else really got that kind of money? EA? UbiSoft? Sony? Nintendo? Valve?

Not sure if say Nordic-THQ or even Focus even have this kind of $, to buy-out CDP S.A. Group - especially since CP 2077 did blockbusters sales, by Week 1.

Cyberpunk 2077 and Witcher 3 would be a huge acquisition for any big-time company of those sorts.

The problem w/ people wanting ownership of games is that - well, are dev's and pub's going to give us that? I'm all for this, of course - but are they?

All they want to do is force client-app stuff, which also often act as DRM. With all these things utilizing servers for online games that can even act offline-style if they wanted to go that way (see Back 4 Blood or Hitman: WoA titles), will they opt for this? They force always-online for DRM purposes, monetization purposes, and other stuff. They force Achievements, MP, central servers, and other things that often are NOT ideal for the preservations of games - especially once servers get pulled.

My copy of Darkspore doesn't work anymore - thanks a lot, EA. My retail copy of Tabula Rasa is no good - thanks EA, for pulling the servers.

And w/ the state gaming is in - I could see every few years of so, companies do Remasters and Re-Releases or Remakes of everything - just to refresh and try to make $; especially the really popular IP's and/or real money-makers.

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nightcraw1er.488: Look, once and for all:
M$ will not release games here, they have their own store.
Ubisoft will not release their games here, they have their own store.
R* will not release their games here, they have their own store.
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Mjauv: ...yet games from all three turn up on Steam. They may have their own stores but they still need to attract the customers and those aren't very keen on hanging around on dead platforms such as Uplay or Uconnect or whatever it's called these days.

I'd wager that Ubisofts DD-platform runs a bigger risk of going away than GOG.
UbiSoft stopped putting newer titles on Steam since Division 2.

They've gone w/ Epic instead of Steam, since Epic only takes a 12% cut of sales (unlike Steam, who normally is 30%) and also since who knows what other kind of money Epic is tossing Ubi's way to stay away from Steam.

Rockstar still has yet to put GTA: The Trilogy - "Definitive" Edition up on Steam also.

Microsoft and EA have recently been putting more titles up on Steam lately, but they also flat-out require their own services on the Steam-version too (since a lot of games now build from the ground-up w/ their own 1st party services and require them - for activation, online stuff, etc etc).
Post edited January 24, 2022 by MysterD
Posted January 24, 2022
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nightcraw1er.488: These things already happen, services going down, drm preventing people playing etc. it’s made no impact to the growth.
The internet is less than 30 years old and widespread commercial internet maybe a little over 20.

We've had a little taste here and there, but nothing too serious yet. Just wait for it. Might take a while, but its a matter of time only.

People get false senses of security about the stability of the world's institutions. It takes some effort of will not to blow each other to pieces every couple of decades or so. I mean, they literally had to found the United Nations and the European Union to help prevent such a fiascos from repeating in Europe.

What does Steam, a centrally owned store barely over 10 years old, offer in terms of long term stability compared to that? The safekeeper of the world's gaming collections? I think not. More like a sad joke propagated by societies that seem rather ignorant of the world's history.
Post edited January 24, 2022 by Magnitus
Posted January 24, 2022
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nightcraw1er.488: These things already happen, services going down, drm preventing people playing etc. it’s made no impact to the growth.
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Magnitus: The internet is less than 30 years old and widespread commercial internet maybe a little over 20.

We've had a little taste here and there, but nothing too serious yet. Just wait for it. Might take a while, but its a matter of time only.

People get false senses of security about the stability of the world's institutions. It takes some effort of will not to blow each other to pieces every couple of decades or so. I mean, they literally had to found the United Nations and the European Union to help prevent such a fiascos from repeating in Europe.

What does Steam, a centrally owned store barely over 10 years old, offer in terms of long term stability compared to that? The safekeeper of the world's gaming collections? I think not. More like a sad joke propagated by societies that seem rather ignorant of the world's history.
I doubt Steam's going away anytime soon - Gabe could've sold a few times to EA, but hasn't. And that's what we actually know of. Who know what we don't know of, w/ who else tried to buy-out Valve.
See this - https://www.destructoid.com/ea-allegedly-trying-to-buy-valve-for-years/

Problem will of course be w/ all these required client-apps, server requirements some games have, DRM, and other software to get in the way - yeah, how are games going to work when there's so much non-sense involved?

What if Microsoft went away and Windows went away? Will all these games work on Linux? Which flavor of Linux? Or some other OS?

What if Tracer Tong and JC Denton pulled off the Lights Out ending from Deus Ex 1 for reals?
Post edited January 24, 2022 by MysterD
Posted January 24, 2022
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MysterD: I doubt Steam's going away anytime soon - Gabe could've sold a few times to EA, but hasn't. And that's what we actually know of. Who know what we don't know of, w/ who else tried to buy-out Valve.
See this - https://www.destructoid.com/ea-allegedly-trying-to-buy-valve-for-years/

Problem will of course be w/ all these required client-apps, server requirements some games have, DRM, and other software to get in the way - yeah, how are games going to work when there's so much non-sense involved?

What if Microsoft went away and Windows went away? Will all these games work on Linux? Which flavor of Linux? Or some other OS?

What if Tracer Tong and JC Denton pulled off the Lights Out ending from Deus Ex 1 for reals?
Ok, so assuming that Gabe is a benevolent dictator for life... what happens after he dies?

They had that for the longest time in Europe and in Rome. For a couple of decade here and there, you'd get a really good ruler and with it a little taste of Heaven on Earth and then, you roll the die and hope the next one in line isn't some psycho (often was).

Otherwise, yes, Windows is a problem. Linux is better. Its not as coherent as Windows, but its a more decentralized entity.
Post edited January 24, 2022 by Magnitus
Posted January 28, 2022
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gog will be fine, as long as they stay to their drm free philosophy.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionWhat will become of Gog in the future?(52 posts)(52 posts)
(52 posts)