*trolls in* Hay guise ..

...

Is Steam DRM or not?

...

*trolls away down a hill*

It isn' just a lack of risk-taking that GOG has issues with: They also create problems or fail to appreciate what they got in the hand.

EG:

1 - Refusing to accept Zachtronic's latest game. Aside from potentially creating bad blood with a developer that has historically released games on the platform, it also resulted in skipping the release window by about a month or two. That permitted other vendors to receive the bulk of sales.

2 - When the AVGN Movie was released, GOG didn't sell the AVGN game, let alone bundle it with the movie. GOG wasn't doing any favors for the video service, along with losing out on the sequel to the AVGN game. Further, GOG may have had a shot at hosting seasons of the AVGN series - but didn't. Myopia and lack of initiative is on demonstration here.

3 - Refusal to sell One Finger Death Punch. Again, the developer is now developing a sequel. Want to wager what platform ISN'T going to sell it, let alone on release day?

4 - Turned down a notable company, Degica. They were willing to sell through GOG, and are a Japanese publisher. GOG failed to nab an opportunity to network with Degica, losing on potential connections and experience - along with a host of properties like: Mushihimesama, Luv-Muv, A-Train, RPG Maker, and many others.


GOG isn't just failing at being assertive, it is also willfully ignoring opportunity.

Point 4 is a big deal... A DRM-Free market for Japanese games is a huge deal, and a hell of an opportunity gone. Their website seems to be falling apart, but that is still an interesting market to get your hands on. And the games aren't just the usual things that people would turn down, either: shmups and other things we don't have alot of here on GOG that people are into.

But to be fair, they're all still risks, but 4.... They had a game on here: what happened?

Anyone who tries to defend GOG's curation at this point can officially kiss my ass.

Oh okay I thought it was made with the unreal engine.

You'd be surprised how many games don't enable DRM in Steam... I have a ton of games there that you can launch outside of Steam and Steam won't launch first, then the game, etc. It's up to the devs what to do there, while they don't publicize it, there are many who don't enable it for one reason or another, so yah... if they say they'll be no DRM in it, there won't be
I've given it a pass as of recent, but after this... it's really starting to rub me the wrong way again... so much competition creeping up with new stores from big names and GOG seems to keep tripping over its own two feet for what never amounts to seem to make any sense from an end user perspective

Name them.

The little chat app that could: Discord... yah, they don't position themselves as a DRM-free store, but their model is the same as GOG... a curated store with hand selected games... only their hand selection won't be limited to odd curation decisions and only to devs who are okay releasing their stuff DRM-free plus they're even pulling the rug out from underneath Steam by securing PC timed exclusives... stuff you can literally only get on either a console right now, or Discord on PC. Then there's the gaining popularity of itch.io as well as Kartridge that just launched... point is, this market is moving and GOG seems to make some odd decisions now and then that leave people scratching their heads... end users and developers alike

This is disappointing. I'd been looking forward to this for quite some time, though hopefully the game will still be released here eventually.

Oh please. This game has trainwreck written all over it. Some of you are acting like GOG have canned the sale of something relevant.

Considering all the classic Ultima games are already on GOG and this is a spiritual successor to those, then it would make sense for it to be here... much like The Bard's Tale IV makes sense to be here and is here... but what I/we feel about the game not coming here and how you feel it's going to be a train wreck is irrelevant, because we're all at the mercy of the almighty and elusive GOG curators... and we all know how fickle they can be, because there are a crazy amount of absolute turds currently on GOG, while at the same time there are also a crazy amount of critically acclaimed games that have gotten the boot (or can, if you will) by GOG... so both our opinions ultimately serve no purpose other than to create forum conversations where we all complain about or defend GOG's curation process... it wasn't the first and definitely won't be the last ;)

So now that I have checked my emails again I am fairly sure that there are no actual in-game content being left out from the GOG version and while it would be nice to be able to download the digital extras from GOG, there are just too many Kickstarter tiers with a different set of digital rewards to be practical to set up backer exclusive store pages for them here.

The real problem here is that developers keep offering too many backer exclusive digital tiers, and many times some of those rewards for a DRM-free game even turn out to be keys to redeem books or comics from third party DRM-services. My Bard's Tale IV rewards include a key to redeem HEX: Shards of Fate Exclusive Card Set from who knows where, maybe that made GOG realize that they are better off by not hosting any of the backer exclusive rewards than risking to be blamed yet again for abandoning their DRM-free stance?

The problem here is that once again developers seem to have forgotten to properly plan and make preparations for the DRM-free release and are now scrambling at the last minute over an unexpected delay. Even if that would have been totally GOG's fault, anyone with any sense would have either chosen to wait their GOG key instead of receiving the game from some not yet decided provider or the Steam version if DRM-free was nothing more than an afterthought for them.

Not good at all, I crowdfund games to get more DRM-free games sold on DRM-free platforms so with this latest announcement the developers have now totally sabotaged any chance for them to tell how many backers and new customers would have otherwise gotten the game from a proper DRM-free store.

I haven't really followed the game since the kickstarter. Has development since then not gone well?

I think there are two problems...

one is quite subjective, but it looks to me like most of the backers did expect different kind of game... which is like right of the creators, to deliver their own vision first, and one should probably give a chance, but somehow I'm not impressed too much by the result (judging by videos of open beta) and I'm in no hurry to find out (seems like decent 3D action platformer with some naive "physics" based gameplay, but nowhere near as sophisticated as they are trying to present it.. maybe for teenager looking into phone all his life it may be exploratory to figure out that wood does catch on fire well, but come on, most of the UU1/2 players are now 40+ and have highly likely much better idea how world works and what is "puzzle" for them).

The second is, that judging by the technical quality of beta which was ~month before release, it's quite likely it will go out very unpolished, but the OSE seems to have very hard deadline from publisher (or maybe they want it like that temselves), so 15th Nov it goes out. I may be wrong, but I expect some backlash just on the technical quality, but let's see, maybe they will fix most of it in some heroic crunch mode (the thing is, that some "bugs" are like "simple" to fix, like unaligned z-clashing of polygons, but if it's like hundreds per level, it will simply burn time).

And as linux user I have advantage that the availability of linux will be at least 30+ days delayed, so most of those modelling/texturing issues may be already fixed by then, if they will not stop fixing the game after release.... :)

It can't possibly be any worse than some of the absolute dogshit gog did release this year (i.e. Hello Neighbour, Monkey King, Milanoir, 60 Seconds, We Crappy Few, Soldier Of Fortune Payback) . Even if it sucks, it won't be the first and it won't be the last bad game here - with the difference that there's over 1000 people that want this game here. Besides, gog's reluctance to sell this game is screwing over the DRM-free backers who were hoping for a gog release.