Well said. While this at first appears to not directly impact the website, it is still an implicit endorsement of DRM (and anti-consumer practices in general, see Epic's recent history). Sadly, if previous threads are any indication, our complaints will probably fall on deaf ears.

With this change, to me it is beside the point whether the Epic store games you can buy through the GOG client are DRM-free or not. What is important here is that "GOG" (Galaxy) is starting to sell games which rely on another store's services and infrastructure, making their own store (and its services and infrastructure) less relevant.

So in a way this is similar to Humble Store or GamersGate.com starting to sell Steam keys: GOG is not trying to directly compete with the Epic store anymore, as in trying actively to convince publishers to release their games in the GOG store, in addition to or even instead of releasing them on the Epic store. Case in point: those "handpicked" Epic store games that you can buy through the Galaxy client, I presume it means GOG will not try to get them to the GOG store anymore, under any circumstances.

I could see a negotiation with GOG and some game publisher going like this:

GOG: So, would you be interested in selling your game on the GOG store on these terms?
Pub: Tell you what. What if we sell it only in the Epic store instead, and you can also sell it through your client to your customers as well?
GOG: (sigh) I guess that is better than nothing, at least we get our middleman cut there. Deal!

To give an extreme example: what if CDPR had announced before that Cyberpunk 2077 will be Epic exclusive, but "GOG users" can naturally buy and play it through Galaxy?

I guess it sounds logical to GOG that if people can launch and organize their Epic (as well as Steam etc.) games on the Galaxy 2.0 client, it is merely a topping on the cake that they can also buy the game through the Galaxy client, minimizing the need to separately go to the Epic client to buy the game. Especially if this was one of the most requested features asked for the Galaxy client.

But as said, GOG is kinda promoting their "competitor" there, especially if they start advertising and promoting those "handpicked" Epic store games on Galaxy. They are undermining the relevance of their own store and service. (My understanding was that the game itself and its updates in these cases come from the Epic service, so GOG Galaxy merely handles the purchasing and launching of the game.) The same pitfall which Humble Store and GamersGate entered.

Anyway, I am not starting some kind of "boycott" due to this, I will keep buying games from GOG that don't require any online client (Galaxy or Epic) for single-player, and can be downloaded from the GOG servers for offline use. I still vote with my wallet. I am just a bit uncertain now how much GOG (or CDP) believes in their own store and service anymore, the same that was evident with Humble Store and Gamersgate.com which reduced themselves mostly to Steam (and other store) key sellers.

Oh well, at least this doesn't affect my existing GOG games.

Oh wow, the tobacco industry defense. Never thought I'd see that used to defend GOG, but then again I never thought I'd see the day GOG supports DRM in any form either. Because they are doing that. No need to hide behind euphemisms.

Let's say we were talking about illegal ivory trade here, since exaggerating a point usually helps people see certain things more clearly.

GOG is a reputable place, they condemn the ivory trade and vow to never trade in ivory. That brings the support from a lot of people that are against the practice. Years later however, GOG includes a reference in their service to some other place that sells ivory, claiming it's all fine because they still don't sell it themselves, they just (maybe) take a small cut out of it. They also seem to be surprised by the outrage caused by the bending of their principles, because ultimately the consumer is to blame if they decide to buy ivory and they did nothing wrong. They're just advertising an external service with wrongdoings, while still being true themselves. If this (maybe) brings in money and people on their platform, how can that ever be wrong?

Edit: Added (maybe)s for clarity :).

That is an excellent analogy.

Entering the forums right now: https://i.imgur.com/e7qx6om.gif

What the hell? Have they given up on selling games on their own store?

Is there gonna be some kind of reciprocity from Epic? Is there even something that they could offer to GOG?

Soon the front page will look like the attachment.

Then why the heck, if they are so independent, was the old GOG Downloader removed, limiting our choices badly?

GOG should have sided with us, not Galaxy, which is clearly an outsider.
The GOG Downloader was an insider, just for GOG games.

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No, life is too short to worry about the little things. By far my gaming collection is the largest on GOG but I'm not going to prevent myself from playing a fun game because it's only on a certain store... gaming is suppose to be largely about having fun yes? You sound like you lack critical thinking skills and just like to complain about everything.

GOG.com is not trading DRM as they are not that actual seller here, as you seem to at-least agree with. All of this is still primarily handled by the actual DRM store. We don't even know for a 100% fact that they even get a cut from this. This is largely based on what some website said that may or may not be accurate, GOG hasn't really confirmed this … but lets say for argument sake it is. This analogy loses merit based on the fact enabling DRM usage, as you view it, is not the same as enabling an illegal trade.

GOG has been clear since the launch of Galaxy 2.0 that this is a central hub for all gaming clients and all store fronts even those that support DRM, an is not simply for GOG games or GOG content. So in that sense, people should have been well aware that, while being developed by GOG, Galaxy was not simply a GOG focused product. Also Galaxy and GOG.com are not one in the same, and really should be viewed separately. So in that sense, GOG was very upfront that this client would deal in DRM. Also since you can disable practically anything you don't like, you specifically can opt out of these things.

But beyond that what is the alternative here? GOG wants to give Galaxy users that ability to have central gaming hub that can manage all of their games and a place where they can purchase games without needing to open 10 different clients. Lets say they offer this and don't take cut, instead they just offer it for 100% convenience. Does this suddenly become acceptable now with that small distinction? What exactly does that accomplish? Other then allowing other stores to profit from the work GOG has done?

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Disclaimer: I do not work for GOG.com, nor am I paid by GOG.com. All views expressed in this post are my own, and do not represent the views of GOG.com or it's employees. My views are expressed as a fan, gamer, and fellow GOG user... that is all. Thank you.

For me, there were a couple other very important things when I joined:

5) strong community participation by blues, you could get first class support on the forums; judas' wine thread was one of the key things that made me shop with GOG
6) they claimed to support linux

Now what has come of those? Yeah, after the Linko firing fiasco, they've largely cut all communications and all that's left of blues and moderation is a bunch of condescending c**ts locking threads and removing posts. That's not helpful.

As for Linux support.. well every Linux gamer on GOG knows what the situation is, with Linux versions of games no getting released here because GOG doesn't support Linux or because someone can't get it working or something. GOG used to go out of their way, making wine/scummvm/dosbox wrappers for games that didn't have native Linux support, now it's the opposite. Vangog left or got fired, judas has been silenced, games don't get released because Galaxy lacks linux support, etcetra. What a massive disappointment.

And speaking of Linko, that thing still rubs me the wrong way. In my world view, companies have social responsibility to take care of their employees and the environment they operate in. When they only do the legal bare minimum, I'm left with a sour taste. When companies fire their own people to please social media outrage lynch mobs, I get disgusted. It's hard to forget things like that.

Which is why I stated in the first place it is an exaggeration. What you fail to recognize is that for some of GOG's user base it pretty much amounts to the same thing, or at least is regarded in a similar manner and will bring about the same level of outrage.

IMHO, no, this never was acceptable. If GOG is trying to become "another Steam, just better", they are going to lose a large portion of their initial user base. Since you wanted to talk about realities, this is just another inevitable consequence of their general direction.

And also, just because games are about having fun and a good time does not really justify everything that's been happening in the industry lately. At least not to some of us.

Which get's us to the core of your complaint, it was never really about should GOG get a cut or not... it was is it acceptable for GOG to turn Galaxy into central hub for gaming and offer games from other services? Which is fair argument to be had for sure, but let's not pretend GOG getting a cut or not from this was the actual point of your analogy. You take issue with the entire concept.

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Disclaimer: I do not work for GOG.com, nor am I paid by GOG.com. All views expressed in this post are my own, and do not represent the views of GOG.com or it's employees. My views are expressed as a fan, gamer, and fellow GOG user... that is all. Thank you.

Fair enough. And I never said it was, though for others that may indeed be an incriminating factor.

If it is true though, I can only think it will make things worse overall, in terms of PR, though I also agree with you... in a very cynical way. Since they are already "getting their hands dirty" in facilitating the sale of DRM, why let others take advantage of their work done in this direction? Why not also make some money off of it if possible? They are a business after all.

GOG do indeed seem to have some bizarre thing about portraying a "meta-launcher with Steam / Epic integration" as some radical new invention, despite those being around years. Reading between the lines, I really don't believe anyone originally involved with GOG's original DRM-Free mission is in charge of GOG anymore, instead being driven today by Shareholder Friendly Managers who have very a different priority. It's simply one of those things where going from 0 to 100 in one go would be too "shocking" so instead the brand gradually "evolves" in stages from:-

1. 100% DRM-Free ->
2. DRM-Free for single-player games ->
3. DRM-Free Offline installers treated as 2nd class citizens to Galaxy ->
4. You can now play other store's DRM'd games via Galaxy integration ->
5. Post-release patched in content for some GOG games can be unlocked only through Galaxy ->
6. We now actually sell DRM'd games directly but in a way we'll hope you believe aren't really 'ours' (even though they have our 30 day money back guarantee) ->
7. Ah, f*ck it. Let's stop pretending and go all in. Hopefully this last step won't be too shocking for those who found the move from 1 to 6 acceptable because we broke the transition up into small steps instead of one big jump.

It's a generally effective tactic. See many examples from Microsoft selling products to customers transition to selling services to 'consumers'. And from mobile stores testing the IAP waters with "but it's only cosmetics" to ending up drowning in an ocean of pay2win "Freemium" garbage...

There is a vast difference between offering the option to list and launch games bought from other stores on the same client, and adding the ability to actually purchase games from those other stores through that "GOG client".

The former is more like "Welcome to GOG.com. You can list and launch your existing games bought earlier from other stores on this same client, and buy more games from our GOG.com store!". This would be a bit like the ability to launch non-Steam games on the Steam client (which is possible, I've run e.g. GOG The Witcher 3 on the Steam client in order to use Steam's framerate counter with the game), even a bit more advanced.

The latter is "Welcome to Galaxy. From here you can buy and run games from various stores! (most of which are competitors to our own GOG.com store, but don't mind that, you don't really even have to know what gog.com is. We don't really care anymore from which store you buy your games.)."

Not sure if that was GOG's intention, but this does give a feeling GOG doesn't fully believe on their own service and ecosystem anymore, and doesn't want to directly compete with the other stores anymore, but rather succumbs to selling their competitors' games that run on their (not GOG's) service and ecosystem. GOG is lowering itself to being just a middleman client for other stores.

For instance, whatever those "handpicked Epic store games" are, how likely do you think is that GOG will still pursue trying to get those games also to the GOG.com store? I'd wager the chance is close to 0%. GOG has already decided that those games will be sold only through the "Epic store" section of Galaxy. Especially if GOG does get a cut from those sales as was said, it is probably even part of the deal that they will be off-limits for the GOG.com store.

As I said before, I don't think the main issue here really is whether GOG is selling DRM-free or DRM'ed games.

The biggest change here is that GOG is starting to sell games that you don't (apparently) even download from GOG servers and don't get updates from GOG. Games that use GOG competitors' services and servers.

So they are making their own store and service less relevant with this move (=the ability to buy games from "competing" stores using the "GOG client"). This same issue would be there even if all those "third-party games" were DRM-free and coming with a nice client-free installer. They still would come from Epic servers. It is as if GOG is now saying "We don't care from which store you buy your games, as long as you do the purchase with our Galaxy client so that we get the middleman cut".

I personally consider this even as a bigger change than if GOG would suddenly start selling games with Denuvo on its own store. This is as if they have partially lost faith in their own store and service, hence start selling games from other stores/services.