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General discussionAnnouncement: Big Preorders & Launch Day Releases Coming!(4041 posts)(4041 posts)
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Posted February 21, 2014
The DRM-Free Revolution Continues with Big Pre-Orders and Launch Day Releases!

Good news! GOG.com is going to bring you more fantastic launch day releases, preorders, and other exciting new content from some of our favorite developers. We've lined up 3 big titles that we will be bringing to GOG.com in the next couple of months for sale or preorder that we think will be hits with all of our gamers; and we have more equally exciting games coming up soon.

If you've been a member of the site for a long time, you may recall that when we launched sales of The Witcher 2 on GOG.com, we had to add in regional pricing. The game cost different amounts in in the US, the UK, the European Union, and Australia. We're doing something like that once again in order to bring you new titles from fantastic bigger studios. Since we don't accept currencies other than USD on GOG.com right now, we'll be charging the equivalent of the local price in USD for these titles. We wish that we could offer these games at flat prices everywhere in the world, but the decision on pricing is always in our partners' hands, and regional pricing is becoming the standard around the globe. We're doing this because we believe that there's no better way to accomplish our overall goals for DRM-Free gaming and GOG.com. We need more games, devs, and publishers on board to make DRM-Free gaming something that's standard for all of the gaming world!

That brings with it more good news, though! As mentioned, we have three games we're launching soon with regional pricing--two RPGs and a strategy game--and while we can't tell you what they are yet because breaking an NDA has more severe penalties than just getting a noogie, we're confident that you'll be as excited about these games as we are. For a limited time, we will be offering anyone who pre-orders or buys one of them a free game from a selection as a gift from GOG.com, just like we did for The Witcher 2.

If you have any questions, hit us up in the comments below and we'll be happy to answer (to the best of our ability).

EDIT: Since we've answered a lot of the common questions already here (and lest you think that we've ignored you), it may be handy for you to check out the forum thread about this and search for staff answers by clicking this link here. (hat tip to user Eli who reminded us that the feature even exists. :)
Posted February 24, 2014
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OldFatGuy: ...I think instead of arguing over the "slippery slope fallacy" a better debate would be over just how much of increase in likelihood it is. If some are arguing that now it's a 75% (by their choice of words or whatever) I would think it's completely fair for someone to respond "Wait a minute, you're overdoing it a bit. I'll agree the likelihood increased, but I disagree it increased that much" instead of this "the slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy, you don't know what you're talking about."
I don't think we can assign a realistic (has something to do with the real value) value of the likelihood since we don't have enough information for this. In a statistical sense we would need to have a lot of nearly identical examples and then see how many of them introduced DRM sooner or later. Since GOG was so much of an exception. No way. We would just get an average opinion, which doesn't have to have anything to do with the real probability of GOG going DRM within a certain time frame. Nobody really knows or can estimate how all this will play out, not even the guys at GOG.com themselves.

The slippery slope is surely not helpful. But the disappointment about introduction of regional pricing and the poor communication (stupid message, taking a video down) stays.

My opinion: 75% chance of introducing at least some kind of DRM on some games on GOG within the next three years. But this is just a guess.
Posted February 24, 2014
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JohnnyDollar: If they are indeed "big", then some of the gamers here that keep up with the latest news should come up with something I would think.

It depends on how far out they are, though. They said preorders and coming months. Is the first one a month + away with the others to following over the next several months?

The only explanation that I have if they are indeed these big AAA games, is that the tentative release dates are still a ways off. That still doesn't sound right. If we take the announcement literally, then we should have an idea or short list of a few of the big games in development that are projected to be released Q1-Q2 of this year. I haven't gotten around to researching myself.
Here's what TET said on Friday in relation to the subject.

So, what other games due to be released are in the same league as Divinity: Original Sin?
Posted February 24, 2014
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crazy_dave: ... Regional Pricing done right is potentially more fair than even the flat rate price - however, it all too often is not. ...
Probably not done right then. I have the feeling we just also should give a bit of a definition what we mean by fair.

Fair = All people pay less in total (then worldwide prices are the fairest because the purpose of regional pricing is to maximize profit)

Fair = The price is according to the effort to create the product (worldwide prices again are the fairest option)

Fair = You pay more if you can pay more (regional prices might do the trick but often do not, for example when Canada pays considerably more than the US which is not really justified)

Fair = Everybody pays according to his/her purchase power (then neither worldwide prices nor regional prices, because the poor in the rich regions are the losers as well as the rich in the poor regions the winners of regional pricing)

Fair = Nobody feels ripped-off (as in the GOG video) (worldwide prices)

Fair = Lowest bureaucratic overhead (worldwide prices)

Fair = No discrimination of origin, sex or religion (worldwide prices)

It seems to be difficult to say that regional pricing really is a clear way for more fairness. It seems mostly be connected with fragmenting the market and increasing profit potentials. In the worst case everything just gets more expensive everywhere.
Post edited February 24, 2014 by Trilarion
Posted February 24, 2014
So, and the reason i should keep buying my games here is because...?
Posted February 24, 2014
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dabrain00: So, and the reason i should keep buying my games here is because...?
Some idealistic notion that you "own" your DRM-Free games. But you do that in every other DRM-Free shop.. Even steam has some DRM Free games...
Posted February 24, 2014
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ChrisSZ: ...Don't expect any big new titles without regional pricing in future....
Hmm, not sure about this. Witcher 2, a big new title at its time, was regional priced but there was a worldwide the same price sale about 2-4 months after release ($30). I remember that because I bought it there (to support CD Projekt but not to support regional pricing) and played it two years later when my hardware had catched up. At this time I could have paid $10 for it. So I guess I gave $20 as a gift to CDP.

This time I can do this strategy again. I will buy Witcher 3 in the first sale (at least 30% off) with worldwide equal prices, whenever this happens. If it never happens, then never.

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dabrain00: So, and the reason i should keep buying my games here is because...?
Because all the others aren't better.
Post edited February 24, 2014 by Trilarion
Posted February 24, 2014
With the Witcher 2 GoG actually offered free games as make up for the unfair pricing, can we expect something like that again ?

Unlike other sites I respect GoG enough to not use any workarounds, but i also won't be buying things that are not priced equal, unless there is some kind of make up.
Posted February 24, 2014
I think that not every future game will be unfairly priced. I hope that GOG keeps fighting for the same prices worldwide and is not starting to raise prices on their own for specific countrys if there is no demand from the publisher. But if a game is unfairly priced, you can still ignore and don't buy it. If GOG wouldn't make this regional pricing policy you wouldn't see these games here on GOG anyway. So you can decide if you are willing to pay a bit more for a DRM free version of a game or not.
Or you can simply use VPN. ;-)
Post edited February 24, 2014 by Silverhawk170485
Posted February 24, 2014
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JohnnyDollar: If they are indeed "big", then some of the gamers here that keep up with the latest news should come up with something I would think.

It depends on how far out they are, though. They said preorders and coming months. Is the first one a month + away with the others to following over the next several months?

The only explanation that I have if they are indeed these big AAA games, is that the tentative release dates are still a ways off. That still doesn't sound right. If we take the announcement literally, then we should have an idea or short list of a few of the big games in development that are projected to be released Q1-Q2 of this year. I haven't gotten around to researching myself.
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HypersomniacLive: Here's what TET said on Friday in relation to the subject.

So, what other games due to be released are in the same league as Divinity: Original Sin?
That statements provides a little more flexibility. I was going to say that Dark Souls II has been mentioned. It's a couple of weeks out and I would be shocked if GOG managed that. That would be the ultimate, but I don't see it happening.

There's a few. I don't think Divinity OS had a big budget, so it would be fair to list other similar titles. Wasteland II is one, but I think that was coming here all along. Project Eternity is suppose to come here as well. I'm guessing those two won't require regional. Age of Decadence, probably no regional. Grim dawn is Steam only.

A NDA was mentioned with these being a surprise. We've got Age of Wonders III coming in 5 weeks to Steam. but that's no surprise.

That's stuff off of the top of my head. I would need to do a little surfing to get more.
Posted February 24, 2014
I don't have the time to read through the thread, so sorry about that, but I would like to say this: one of the best things about GOG is the flat price structure - I know I'm paying the same amount like my friend in the UK and my colleague in the USofA. I know there won't be issues with gifting. I know there won't be DRM.

Truth be told, I likely won't be buying any new game anytime soon, but that is beside the point. The point is, I don't want to get into the situation where I need to jump through hoops to get the fair price, which has happened on other stores already. I'm not saying GOG is going to do this, but I know I don't want it to, ever.
Posted February 24, 2014
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Reaper9988: With the Witcher 2 GoG actually offered free games as make up for the unfair pricing, can we expect something like that again ?
Probably initially to smooth over the transition. They mentioned with the 3 titles you'd get a free game to 'compensate'.

To be honest, given the higher regional prices for 'big games' with equally big prices no doubt, I'm pretty sure the extra profit they get from the regional pricing alone will cover the 70% they have to pay for the one 5.99 or 9.99 game they'll be offering as compensation, GOG won't even loose out by offering that.
Post edited February 24, 2014 by Pheace
Posted February 24, 2014
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dabrain00: So, and the reason i should keep buying my games here is because...?
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Trilarion: Because all the others aren't better.
And all the others puts DRM, always online or region lock... But yeah, when in Rome, do as the Romans do. Right?
Posted February 24, 2014
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Crosmando: Will GOG be re-pricing everything in the store according to this new regional thing, or will the only regionally priced games be specific ones from publishers who only do regional pricing?
at the beginning, only 3 games will be regionally priced. But this is a pilot to get more publishers on board, who previously balked against flat price.

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Crosmando: Will any classic old games that come to GOG in the future be regionally priced?
New classics depends on the publisher. If they insist on regional pricing, so be it. For classics already in the catalogue - not to begin with, but there are no guarantees what will happen when contracts are up for re-negotiation. It then becomes part of the negotiation between that publisher and gOg

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Crosmando: How will the regional pricing be enforced, will someone simply be able to change their location in account settings to get cheaper games? Will it track the IP of the user to determine which price to charge? Are GOG aware that such methods aren't exactly very effective?
No comments here.

Only thing to add - in the initial period they will still charge you in US$, but mark up the price of the game accordingly depending on region. So if a game cost $40 in the US it may cost $55 in the EU. Compared to other DD stores who charges you in the currency of the region, this means that gOg games will be slightly dearer, as you will will pay the markup of the game to fit in with other stores + the conversion fees from bank/PayPal. This is temporary, though.
Post edited February 24, 2014 by amok
Posted February 24, 2014
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This is the worst piece of news I've ever read about GOG. Fair pricing was one of the biggest reasons I'd buy something at GOG, more so than no-DRM. If that policy is reversed then I see absolutely no reason to continue supporting the service. I can get games on Steam at the same price as the cheapest of regions through the use of 3rd party sites. That's not possible with GOG.

If the argument is that you either have to accept regional pricing or not feature these games at all then the answer should obviously be to not feature those games. GOG didn't make me feel ripped off compared to customers in the US due to it's fair pricing. Now I do.

"We wish that we could offer these games at flat prices everywhere in the world, but the decision on pricing is always in our partners' hands, and regional pricing is becoming the standard around the globe." The way I'm reading this is that regional pricing will not be a one time things but will become the norm in the future.

I really hope GOG reverses this decision and again make a public commitment to fair pricing.

A disappointed customer.
Posted February 24, 2014
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amok: at the beginning, only 3 games will be regionally priced. But this is a pilot to get more publishers on board, who previously balked against flat price.
And when publishers will push for DRM? Who's to say what's next? Once you're ready to give up "core values" you have no more values.
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Community
General discussionAnnouncement: Big Preorders & Launch Day Releases Coming!(4041 posts)(4041 posts)
(4041 posts)