DRM-Free or "half-product, half-service games". Pick one of two. They'll never mix. Rather than waste time trying to make this Defective By Design (tm) stuff work, I'd rather see missing games from their parent company (Square Enix) like Quantum Conundrum, The Turing Test, etc, brought here instead. Sold as complete products not half missing "services", just with the DRM removed. (Like GOG used to do before they got all confused...)

It probably won't be good, so...that's a good question. My best guess: that online content won't work, while offline.

We saw how bad thing got w/ Might & Magic X, when their servers got pulled by Ubi: Ubi delisted the game, as it didn't really work properly AT ALL anymore, b/c it still would phone home to Ubi servers.

I know what has happened to games like Darkspore, when that got pulled - yep, you've got yourself a game-coaster, as that was online-only.

Knowing our luck & especially given today's trends, the owners of the IP (whether it's IOI or not) would probably re-release the game as a part of the Hitman Reboot Trilogy Remastered Collection...and we'd have to re-buy it all again.

That's, of course, provided....that game-streaming services like Xbox console Game Pass and/or Xbox for PC Game Pass don't murder the so-called "game-buying" thing that we're used to doing.

This joke is probably the only good thing to come out of this

I've just been told by a friend of mine who puchased Hitman that he was able to access unlocked weapons and starting points even when being offline. Could somebody explain or test this?

Techraptor seems to be confused. Let me dispel their confusion using their previous article:

"The Offline Profile feature now allows you to use any unlockable items that you've earned in the game while online"

So, you still need to go online to unlock the items in the first place.

Okay, but techraptor also said that this "feature" is not available in the GOG release. So it seems as if they are wrong and at least GOG offers the "best " version available, right?

To be fair, that doesn't seem to have been such a high bar to overcome...

dayum all the 1 star reviews and then this...

www.eurogamer.net/articles/2021-09-25-hitman-gog-release-sparks-drm-row-review-bombing-accusation
GOG says "we will not tolerate review bombing" after Hitman release sparks online DRM backlash

That's why I said they are confused. Offline support doesn't mean that you can unlock things offline.

I guess the other issue here is the fact that GOG was about the preservation of games. At the moment who can really say for sure if they are anymore. Having single player content drm'd in any shape or form strictly goes against that principle. It is neither fun or pleasing to know that a portion of a game could be Dark Spore'd out of existence.

Ah yes, now I understand. Thank you one more time for clarification.

I am incredibly pleased to see that Kotaku have reported on this issue. Frankly GOG have no-one but themselves to blame for this mess. In principle I don't agree with review bombing but having looked through the reviews they are mostly a truthful representation of the product. If GOG had engaged with the community in a productive way this could have been mitigated. GOG took 3 or 4 days to respond to the community and implied that we, the paying customer, were the problem. GOG mislead the community and went against their own policies by accepting a game heavily tied to DRM on their platform.

If the future of GOG is to accept DRM then that's OK. Make an official announcement and I, with I am sure many others will take our money elsewhere.

I don't know what is going on with CDPR and GOG but they are making a worrying habit of misleading their customers. Back in 2017 you said this:

"Worry not. When thinking CP2077, think nothing less than TW3 — huge single player, open world, story-driven RPG. No hidden catch, you get what you pay for — no bullshit, just honest gaming like with Wild Hunt. We leave greed to others."

Now fast forward 4 years and you have made a mockery of this statement.

I rather not click on Kotaku, the bloggers who kept shilling woke politics in gaming, and regularly claimed that gaming is dead and that we're all toxic "white" scum.

get your gamergate bullshit out of here.
Its not needed nor is it relevant or correct.

Thats the truth though Kotaku often had and still to a unreasonable degree push that last I checked early this year