http://steamcommunity.com/app/224960/discussions/0/846938350647267481/

And the plot thickens....

Sorry for the double-post, but the sheer, unadulterated irony of this couldn't be passed up. It's hilarious.

Fucking gobsmacked. No other word for it.

How does GOG stand on its IP being used in this way? Obviously not the game itself, but its compatibility tools...

Gog probably knows about this. Sqeenix can't be this stupid that gog does not know about this, right?

You know most compatibility tools most likely aren't GOG's either right? But Dosbox etc.

I think this pretty much confirms what we were expecting when we saw the same thing happen with the D&D games when Atari had them up on Gamersgate with the gog remnants in it. Part of the deal they seem to have is that the owners can take GOG's fiddling and publish it elsewhere as well.

Which in the long run means that GOG's workings are a temporary benefit only probably, especially when more and more publishers start taking advantage of that to sell their stuff elsewhere as well.

Also, another interesting note. It appears there's a Game-Hub for Tomb Raider 6?

Dosbox and ScummVM don't belong to GOG, that much is true. But there are a number of compatibility tools that GOG has used in its recent releases (GOGwrap, GOGlauncher) that do belong to GOG. And while I doubt that much can be done about publishers using GOG's work as regards compatibility settings, publicly available patches etc., these specific launcher/wrapper programs are GOG's copyright, and I very much doubt that they have given permission to use them on other platforms.

Given that we already talked about this on the D&D games well over a year ago I highly doubt that this has gone unnoticed by GOG, and there's been no indication that it was a miscommunication or problem of some sort.

I think it's far more likely that the contract stated that, no matter what changes GOG made to the Games, the games and it's derivative versions still remain the property of the publishers, and thus also the versions that GOG end up making. Perhaps there's some guaranteed exclusivity period as mentioned above already.

I'd be surprised if this wasn't mentioned in the contracts somewhere to be honest.

I suppose they weren't expecting users to look inside their steamapps folder and transmit their findings to the interwebs.

Oh dear.

I'll hold my hands up and say I used to love Steam. Saying that, tt was really the only digital distribution channel around, unless you were keen on paying 200% the price of boxed versions. I even loved the software and how it kept my games up to date. I couldn't envisage a future without Steam and today my account is worth $3K.

Then competition happened on several fronts.

First: Steam started to get very expensive for non-discounted games. People bitch about Origin's prices, but apart from a few £60 release day versions, they're not far off one another.

Second: their sales became less good. Everyone can see they're deliberately bumping up prices days before they discount them.

Third: the software causes problems, particularly when publishers have patch games in ways that break or fundamentally change games. Sure, you could set all games not to update automatically, but then what is the point of Steam? People getting their games from certain other channels have the advantage of being able to choose whether to download patches and some could even roll back (which is why I support GoG's new universal patching system).

Third, part B: every bugger wants you to download their special software. Steam doesn't keep my games in one place, it's a piece of DRM that I need to have running to play most of my games - even in offline mode. All these other softwares are the same. Take off the DRM, decouple the game from my account and allow me to add it to my own bloody software if I feel the need to catalogue all my games (I find a partition called Games does the same thing). Personally, I now have 5 software platforms with games on and the aforementioned partition for my GoG games and many of my GamersGate ones. If I want to play a DRM'ed game quickly, I need to have all of these software platforms startup with Windows (talk about bottlenecking) or manually start them as I need them (haven't found a fast one yet).

Third, part C: bloody pop-ups. Why do I go out of my way to install advertisement blockers on my browser, but happily download software that pops up advertisements to me between gaming sessions? Exit Through The Gift Shop? Sometimes I think the gift shop is the main attraction!

Fourth: the Workshop is an insult to modding. DRM is a restriction to what you can do through modding - stop pretending the Workshop is not only comparable, but a necessary upgrade.

Fifth: the community upgrade. Forums, in particular, are a mess.

Sixth: Greenlight. It is not the same as GoG's wishlist - it is a tool through which Indie publishers/developers are funneled and used to keep them keen. That's unfair. Valve deserve credit for giving the whole indie scene a platform, but they've pulled the rug now.

I can't think of any reason to buy on Steam any longer. The only advantage they have is their catalogue.

They should be smarter by now, every time something like this happens it takes no time at all to notice....

Problem with Origin for some of us at least is partly what you mentioned about also being high priced games especially near release, but more so that for Non-US/UK regions, the price drops come like ... half a year later than those regions, and a lot of the sales are US/UK only. So when US is looking at a sale with potentially $5-$10, we're often still staring at 30€

You know you can turn this off the second you've installed Steam right? Takes no effort at all.

Of course GOG knows this. This happened before with the D&D games. GOG makes the games run on modern hardware, they get an exclusive deal (for D&D it was a year), and then the pubs retain the rights to release them.

It wouldn't surprise me if GOG would surrender all changes anyway, as it would otherwise be a legal clusterfuck.

What is so funny about this, is that it is normally the other way around. GOG not releasing bundles and having higher prices and Steam beeing cheaper. Maybe SE accidentally gave GOG the Steam contract and vice versa XD!

With the games currently coming through Greenlight, I am very happy with it. I wish every publisher would need to go through it. Considering that I was very sceptical about it at first, I'm pleasantly surprised.

Fair enough, wasn't defending Origin (I detest Origin), just pointing out Steam and Origin are not worlds apart pricewise. Being non-US/UK, you seem to notice a difference, but Steam have a bad reputation on that front too (check out $1 vs €1 thread on their forums). Fairest pricing has to be GoG's - everyone pays the same.

I didn't, but I do now. Had a quick peek around Origin and GameStop and can't see the same option, but +1 for Steam allowing it to be turned off. Everything else still stands, though =D