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General discussionIntroducing Games in Development(760 posts)(760 posts)
(760 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted January 28, 2016
Excellent hand-picked games, 14-day refund policy, always DRM-free.

We want GOG.com to be the home of games that are both excellent and really worth your time.
In today's gaming world, we're seeing more and more titles that become hits before development dwindles down. We want to give you a way to enjoy what these games have to offer, a way that's comfortable and fair to you — the GOG.com way: that means evaluating each and every game, a 14-day no-questions-asked refund policy, and more.




That's why today, we're introducing the first five games in development:
Starbound (-33%)
Ashes of the Singularity (-25%)
Project Zomboid (-40%)
TerraTech (-30%)
The Curious Expedition (-15%)







The GOG.com way.
First and foremost: we're hand-picking only the games we can truly stand behind. Offering a selection of the most promising titles, and those most highly requested on the Community Wishlist, is our way of avoiding bloat and ensuring that every game will be worth your time.

It takes some confidence to discover games that are still being shaped — and to build that trust, every game in development comes with a simple refund policy: 14 days, no questions asked. It doesn't matter if you're having technical issues, if you don't think the game is sufficiently fleshed out, or if it simply doesn't click with you — all games in development can be returned for any reason within 14 days of purchase.

The GOG Galaxy client should also come in handy for games in development. It lets you control updates manually if you want, while the rollback feature allows you to easily restore any earlier version of your game if an update breaks something or makes unwanted changes. For games in development, rollback will also track and create historical snapshots throughout a game's development. That means you can always revisit any point in a game's history — for fun, or for science.






It's your call.
For those of you who prefer to wait for the final release, nothing will change. Once a game leaves active development, we will be making the announcement and giving the newest release proper exposure. Basically, business as usual.






More info.
Surely you have questions. You'll find many of the answers in the <span class="bold">games in development FAQ, including more details on the new refund policy. Our User Agreement has also been expanded to accommodate games in development — check out sections 6.12, 6.13, and 6.14 to find all the new information.




Enjoy your time with games in development!
Post edited January 28, 2016 by Konrad
Posted January 31, 2016
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BKGaming: And define DRM? The only issue here is there are many many competing definitions of DRM and GOG does not clearly define what they view as DRM. You may think you know what DRM is but somebody else might see it differently. Where as you clearly know what a nut is and so do I, because it's clearly defined what a nut is.

This why I say GOG is partly to blame, GOG needs to come out and say this is how we define DRM free and this is what we consider DRM free. Then people will accept it or move on.
GOG is entirely to blame. They promise no DRM of any kind. Without a specific definition provided, the only logical interpretation is "no DRM, however broadly defined". If they want to narrow it down, they should have first layed it all out in the open fair and square, and then introduce games that are only 100% DRM-free according to that narrower definition. It's too late for that, but the FAQ should be altered to properly explain the actual situation ASAP. And that change (or "clarification") should be made known to the world loud and clear on the front page, not as a silent alteration to the FAQ. So that everyone knows exactly what kind of 100% DRM policy GOG actually has.
Post edited January 31, 2016 by Breja
Posted January 31, 2016
I'm wondering how many more years PZ will be "Early Access"... ^^
Posted January 31, 2016
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BKGaming: And define DRM? The only issue here is there are many many competing definitions of DRM and GOG does not clearly define what they view as DRM. You may think you know what DRM is but somebody else might see it differently. Where as you clearly know what a nut is and so do I, because it's clearly defined what a nut is.

This why I say GOG is partly to blame, GOG needs to come out and say this is how we define DRM free and this is what we consider DRM free. Then people will accept it or move on.
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Breja: GOG is entirely to blame. They promise no DRM of any kind. Without a specific definition provided, the only logical interpretation is "no DRM, however broadly defined". If they want to narrow it down, they should have first layed it all out in the open fair and square, and then introduce games that are only 100% DRM-free according to that narrower definition. It's too late for that, but the FAQ should be altered to properly explain the actual situation ASAP. And that change (or "clarification") should be made known to the world loud and clear on the front page, not as a silent alteration to the FAQ. So that everyone knows exactly what kind of 100% DRM policy GOG actually has.
Well I do agree with you that they should be more clear but that's neither here nor there. Users are also to blame. DRM use to be simple to me, if a game used a system like SecuROM to control users then it had DRM. DRM was whatever was used to attempt to control piracy. Galaxy in itself is not used to control piracy, neither is the Galaxy api. It's a way for developers to quickly and easily provide online play during development. Now however users claim just about anything that get's between them and the game as DRM regardless if it's actually used to control users in an effort to prevent piracy. Which is why I don't agree with this being DRM.

GOG seems to align closely with my views on DRM... but everyone has kind of formed there own view. As I've said before the mentality of online play has always been what is hot or what is in... after the game fall out of popularity so does online play. Online MP is not meant to be an everlasting feature.
Post edited January 31, 2016 by user deleted
Posted January 31, 2016
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Lodium: Also, asking for drm free multiplayer games is simply impossible
id like you to show me one if you mean it exist.
Impossible? There are a lot of games which provide dedicated servers which everyone can run.

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Lodium: Remember what i said
The host that are hosting the game can simply shut down
the ones that have joined are then screwed having lost all progression and items.
Which for most multiplayer games means a loss of only a few hours of gameplay. What loss is that compared to the permanent loss of the multiplayer mode in case of the shutdown of a central DRM protected server?
Posted January 31, 2016
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Narushima: Fanboys shot me down. GOG can do no wrong.
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Breja: Yeah. Unfortuantely GOG does have it's own zealots, who will gladly handwave anything away. After all, "don't like it, don't buy it", right? That's a magic spell that makes all the bad stuff go away.
If someone prefers to not see, as example Anno 1404, on GOG solely based on the multiplayer portion of the game and it's given requirements, then I dare to see that different as I'm not even remotely interested in MP.
Even more so, since MP on a 5 year old game in 98% of all cases (yes, there are exceptions to that rule) is usually dead and you have a hard time finding even 10 guys who want to play that, on any given day. The notion that this justifies skipping such a title, I dare to consider not consumer friendly and bad for business.

If someone now can't approve of that, because they value DRM-free that much more (or for any other reason), I dare to ask for a better solution from them. If the proposed solutions then include offering rentable dedicated servers (supply and demand / costs) or rewriting the network code on old games (which may not even come with the source code), I dare to claim it not feasible.

I don't consider early access (or the similar Kickstarter) as bad per se. Quite the contrary, I brought several examples where it was responsible for great games, that simply wouldn't exist without it. The notion that the gaming world would be better without early access / Kickstarter, I counter with Pillars of Eternity, Wasteland 2, Satellite Reign, Quest for Infamy, Book of Unwritten Tales 2.
If that makes me a GOG fanboy or zealot, I gladly accept that.

... and yes, for all the potential problems coming with early access (or Kickstarter), be it the risks involved, the unfinished state of the game, devs not being able to follow through, have a very simple solution for anyone not willing to cope with it: don't like it? Don't buy it.

After all, it's the gamers responsibility to inform himself if that new game he is about to buy appeals to him, if it's relatively bugfree and running on his system, be it through reviews / youtube / Metacritic / whatever - but for early access titles it's suddenly too much to ask?
Posted January 31, 2016
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nonsequitur: Two more points. (I'll start with the tl;dr)

First, almost all titles these days are released "unfinished." Gone are the days of old when you could expect that there wouldn't be patches and updates, when game play stayed the same from day one.
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Daliz: Which days of old are you referring to exactly? Gameplay changes were not that common that I remember but there has always been a lot of games that were released broken, even game-breaking bugs that would prevent completing the game. There were patches, but of course everyone didn't have an internet connection so they didn't know about them/couldn't get the patches.
(late reply) - I was one of the people who didn't have internet when I started playing computer games, and I didn't have a lot to spend on them. Usually, I waited until bug fixes were shipped with the game before I purchased them, unless it was possible to get around any bugs. Save often, in case of crash, restart as needed. Since the age of digital patches and automatic updating, the pressure to ship games that are really finished feels like it has changed drastically. Lots of broken games get sent out with a "we'll fix it later" mindset now, even with high price tags, and I just didn't get that feeling about the games I played long ago. (I know there were broken games, but then, as now, I try to find out as much as I can beforehand so I don't buy broken games. Bugs happen, and it's never 100% certain, but it's possible to get a decent feel for it most of the time.) Back then, consoles weren't connected to the internet, either, games for my ancient brick of a Game Boy are still the same today as when I bought the cartridges 20 years ago. There are upsides and downsides to the way things change over time. I'm adjusting, and so is GOG.
Posted January 31, 2016
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BKGaming: Then hold onto the old installers when you install a new version? It's really not required... as it I said it's just slightly more helpful.
You can only hold an older version when it was available since you have bought the game. When it has been replaced by a newer version before you bought the game Galaxy is required to get the older version. Only with Galaxy you have access to all versions.

At least that's my understanding of Thievs posts. I happily would become convinced of the opposite.
Posted January 31, 2016
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BKGaming: Then hold onto the old installers when you install a new version? It's really not required... as it I said it's just slightly more helpful.
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eiii: You can only hold an older version when it was available since you have bought the game. When it has been replaced by a newer version before you bought the game Galaxy is required to get the older version. Only with Galaxy you have access to all versions.

At least that's my understanding of Thievs posts. I happily would become convinced of the opposite.
Okay that may be true... still doesn't make Galaxy required. You never had access to old patches or builds anyway before Galaxy. It's a feature of Galaxy... if you want the feature you use Galaxy. Same with any other Galaxy feature. I could agree if they had that on the site before Galaxy and then said nope sorry only Galaxy gets this now. Then it would be required because you lost something you once had access to, but you never did. That's like saying Galaxy is required because you need it for achievements. It doesn't suddenly become required because it does something you would care about having.

I do however agree that old patches and builds should be put on the site. I've stated that before.
Post edited January 31, 2016 by user deleted
Posted January 31, 2016
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BKGaming: It's a feature of Galaxy... if you want the feature you use Galaxy.
If it's available for your platform. ;)

I would have fewer problems with features exclusively provided by Galaxy when it would be available on all platforms. And having access to older game versions is quite a useful feature for games in development.
Posted January 31, 2016
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Lodium: Also, asking for drm free multiplayer games is simply impossible
id like you to show me one if you mean it exist.
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eiii: Impossible? There are a lot of games which provide dedicated servers which everyone can run.

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Lodium: Remember what i said
The host that are hosting the game can simply shut down
the ones that have joined are then screwed having lost all progression and items.
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eiii: Which for most multiplayer games means a loss of only a few hours of gameplay. What loss is that compared to the permanent loss of the multiplayer mode in case of the shutdown of a central DRM protected server?
See?
This shows that people have diffrent ideas about what drm free is.
You have the opinion that lan and private servers are drm free
i have the opinion its still drm ridden since i cant control anything that have to do about hosting and the ruleset if i join as a guest.

Time spent on a game is not universilly the same or some kind of standard.
Some people like to use longer time and some shorter time, it does not mean that the time spent is any more less valuable. regardless of how much time you have spent on it.

If you only have spent 2 hours on a game with multiplayer its still 2 hours that you wont get back or
time wasted on a charecter that no longer exist.

The only way of making a multiplayer game truly drm free is if you coud somehow save your progression etc
and then export it to another server/lan game
At least that is my take on a multiplayer drm free game.
Post edited January 31, 2016 by Lodium
Posted January 31, 2016
I bought cookies and chocolate
Posted January 31, 2016
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eiii: Which for most multiplayer games means a loss of only a few hours of gameplay. What loss is that compared to the permanent loss of the multiplayer mode in case of the shutdown of a central DRM protected server?
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Lodium: Are you joking or?
Time spent on a game is not universilly the same or some kind of standard.
Some people like to use longer time and some shorter time, it does not mean that the time spent is any more less valuable. regardless of how much time you have spent on it.
I meant not every multiplayer game is an RPG with permanent player stats. A lot of multiplayer games have matches which only lasts a few hours. And of course, when you want to play multiplayer games which last a lot longer it's always a good idea to only join games which are hosted by known players. ;)

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Lodium: If you only have spent 2 hours on a game with multiplayer its still 2 hours that you wont get back or
time wasted on a charecter that no longer exist.
The point was what is the loss of XX hours of gameplay compared to the loss of the complete multiplayer game mode.
Posted January 31, 2016
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Lodium: Are you joking or?
Time spent on a game is not universilly the same or some kind of standard.
Some people like to use longer time and some shorter time, it does not mean that the time spent is any more less valuable. regardless of how much time you have spent on it.
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eiii: I meant not every multiplayer game is an RPG with permanent player stats. A lot of multiplayer games have matches which only lasts a few hours. And of course, when you want to play multiplayer games which last a lot longer it's always a good idea to only join games which are hosted by known players. ;)

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Lodium: If you only have spent 2 hours on a game with multiplayer its still 2 hours that you wont get back or
time wasted on a charecter that no longer exist.
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eiii: The point was what is the loss of XX hours of gameplay compared to the loss of the complete multiplayer game mode.
In driving games you usally have cars or a profile
Still if the multiplayer goes down its still lost progresssion even if the time spent only alloted to a few hours
it does not matter what form of game it is.
the time spent is equal valuable.

One can argue however that online ranking
score list, Achivements ,etc is somewhat helping avoid/remedying this issue
Im not so sure about that myself.
i mean i still need to play the equal time spent if i join another hosted game to get to the same point i was before.
Post edited January 31, 2016 by Lodium
Posted January 31, 2016
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Lodium: This shows that people have diffrent ideas about what drm free is.
You have the opinion that lan and private servers are drm free
i have the opinion its still drm ridden since i cant control anything that have to do about hosting and the ruleset if i join as a guest.
You could host the game yourself. ;) But obviously we disagree about what DRM is. :)
Posted January 31, 2016
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Lodium: This shows that people have diffrent ideas about what drm free is.
You have the opinion that lan and private servers are drm free
i have the opinion its still drm ridden since i cant control anything that have to do about hosting and the ruleset if i join as a guest.
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eiii: You could host the game yourself. ;) But obviously we disagree about what DRM is. :)
Yes i can, but the people joining me as guests woud be facing the same issues.
Though most people wont see it that way and woud happily join another hosted game even if the potential of wasted gameplay is there.
Diffrent ideas and all that.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionIntroducing Games in Development(760 posts)(760 posts)
(760 posts)