Looking for the new X game from Egosoft I noticed the company is afraid of a GoG release. Previous games, like X3 and X-Rebirth have been released on GoG but it took multiple years.

I checked the Egosoft discussion forum for their new game X4 and every topic about a GoG release quickly gets shut down by the mods. Because sooner or later someone is going to admit to piracy is their excuse and GoG and piracy are related according to Egosoft. It's ridiculous, I want to buy their new game but not if it has (Steam) DRM.

Similar experiences? Only Warhorse studios comes to mind with their delayed release but that was only two weeks.

As I understand it, it's a general trend that games, when they are outdated, gets a GOG release. Like, we just got The Bureau: XCOM Declassified.

Well, that's what Good OLD Games was supposed to be for.

While it's a sad state of affairs, it's not that alarming really. If GOG can keep getting older games, there's always new (to GOG) games coming to GOG catalog - and each game gets old at some point, although the definition of old is undetermined.

OTOH, GOG should allow more indie games into the catalog. Much of the best gaming these days is indie.

Not sure I understand your explanation as to why the threads get locked? If the thread gets derailed with talk about piracy, then it makes sense that it should be closed. But if an innocent user is just asking about a possible GOG release, while there's no sticky thread already making the developer's stance on the matter clear, and that thread gets closed with no motive given, then we would have motive for outrage. Maybe some links with examples would help, MasterW.

This is a personal opinion, but as long as they promise to release the game DRM-Free, I have no problem with developers/publishers releasing only on STEAM, or using DRM, for the first 3-6 months. This way the developers are satisfied that they protected their product from piracy, and we get a great, bug fixed, content complete, DRM-free product. I still haven't received a compelling argument as to why this wouldn't be an ideal solution.

The threads do not derail into piracy discussion but the stance of Egosoft is that discussing a possible GoG release will inevitably result in a piracy discussion. There are multiple topics about GoG on the Egosoft forum where no one mentions piracy, except the mods and immediately close the discussion. The publisher has no official stance on GoG.

Delaying a game is nonsense, protection with DRM does not work as most game are cracked on release date.

Example 1: https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=399120
Example 2: https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=396318

Wasn't the latest X game largely online anyway?

This is surely a conflict of interest for everyone wanting to play certain games but preferring them DRM free. However, the reason might not be that ridiculous. GOG and piracy could be related for all we know. Or Egosoft might have other reasons to be "afraid" of GOG.

In the end, it's their decision to choose the places where they sell their products. If they don't want to, you could appeal to them, but I doubt it will change much. A lot of good games are not on GOG, unfortunately.

Hmm, not sure there. Goold Old Games was supposed to bring back good games not sold at all anymore, not re-releasing games here that have been selling somewhere else for a long time. It certainly keeps the average age of the releases here high, but it's not really the same and probably wasn't the intention of GOG when they started. They would probably have been happy with Good New Games too.

When you think about that most games make most of their profit in a relative short period after release, then this means that GOG won't make much from these re-releases (gets a rather small piece of the cake) and correspondingly won't grow and get more competitive. It's certainly bad for GOG and probably also bad for customers who would prefer to play games DRM free.

In the end, it's not even sure a game ever comes to GOG.