Huh? It sells WoW, SC2, D3, and the cassic games (including all expansions). And last I checked, the virtual items being sold here are marketed as DLC packages on other services, so they are the same thing basically.

Oh, you know what, Steam doesn't sell games either. They call those "Subscriptions" that allow you access to a particular feature of the service.

So yea, exclude everything except GOG. (y)

And how many people pay a monthly subscription for WoW?

That's their -biggest- source of income. Not game sales (well, except when they're just released.)

I'm not saying it doesn't. :P

The other services get most of their money from selling games, while Battle.net gets most of its money from recurring subscriptions. Just making a note of it.

I acutally love my big bulky frankenstein-self build and sewn together piece of desktop pc very much.
I've an android Phone and I do use it for work every day but I hate playing games on it.
So as I far as my personal prefences goes, call me a desktop fetishist but would happily exclude the damn pads from the "gaming PC" sector.
Pads are small, unconfortable and without proper input devices unhealty to operate.

I guess the label of "second-most relevant DD store" is very accurate for GOG.com, since they're now basically the only real competition to Steam left.

Sure, UPlay, Origin, etc. probably make more money. But since they mainly (only?) sell 1st-party stuff, they're not really a competition to Steam. People only go there to play the few games they otherwise can't get.

Yes, maybe Amazon and GamersGate make more money, but they largely only sell Steam keys, so they aren't in competition to Steam - they're just part of the Steam system, and without Steam they would be nothing.

Humble Bundle is probably on the same level income-wise as GOG.com, but their business model is so completely different, that it's hard to compare the two.

The ones that are left - DotEmu, Desura - are probably less successful than GOG.com. It got to the point that at least for Indie developers getting on GOG.com is almost as important as getting on Steam, I feel.

@Fesin: GamersGate just selling STEAM-keys? Sorry, but I've bought there also DRM-free games. Even "King Arthur 2" without any problems. And with a little trick the setup routine stay on the PC and can be saved. STEAM is no solution at all, in my opinion. It is only successfull, because mostly the people are lazy installing and updating their software.

My brain can't handle reading any more of that so called "Story"...

DRM is NOT good for legitimate owners of product, PERIOD.

I said "largely". Yes, they do sell Games that don't require games (not DRM-free though, even if you can trick their system), but they're still pretty much a glorified seller of Steam keys at this point, I would say.

Point is, they cannot be a competition to Steam, if they sell Steam keys.

Of course not. The question was how GOG, as a digital game distributor, compared to other sites, as digital game distributors. Battle.net sells 5 games? WOW, SC2, D3, D2, SC, W3. Wait no, it's 6. Plus their expansions (though SC, D2 and W3 may just be complete editions). Feel free to compare the sales of those to the sales of games on GOG.

And "Steam sells subscriptions"? Really?

Why do you have such a problem with people wanting to know how GOG stacks up to other digital distributors?
People should have just ignored you and responded to the actual question instead.

Have you read the stupid agreement that Steam has? It specifically calls users 'subscribers' and the games 'subscriptions'.

EDIT: And where did I say that I have a problem with anything? Oh, boy, apparently, if you mention that there are many things to consider when ranking digital distributors, you have a problem.

Nice logic there.

/off-to-watch-dreamhack

So Cliffy B is still a tool? Shocking. Next you're going to tell me that water is still wet.

Considering I own a high end gaming rig and an iPad Cliffy B's future is looking mighty fine for me. Studios will always close of course, poor financial management will do that to any business.

I hope he's not trying to say this is a bad thing because I'm about to break out the champagne!

Can you explain what you're talking about? Because the PC industry pretty much eliminated used sales and piracy also got reduced, and the prices are rock bottom (that's part of the reason there's less piracy).

That's the model Microsoft was aiming for, but with a an added benefit of allow used games sales, something that's not possible even in supposedly enlightened parts of the PC universe, such as GOG.

A lot of people already thought that the next console gen will be the last, and Microsoft was hoping that using a model that's closer to PC and mobiles, which are growing markets, would help reinvigorate the console.

http://i789.photobucket.com/albums/yy172/SebastianMehenka/HAHAHA_NO.jpg

Every year, all-new piracy record is broken, usually by Call of Duty. Fast interenets = more piracy. People do buy more games, if that's what you meant, but piracy also has gone up.