If it's such a small move as to not even post it as a NEWS thread, then this must mean that GOG finally added the features that were missing from the Downloader to Galaxy!

As far as I know:
1) single click download of all offline installer files for each platform (and another one for all extras),
2) checking if the files selected for download are already present or not at the download directory (so as to not download them again unnecessarily and not needing the user to manually check if the latest version is present),
3) checking the content of said files making sure there are no errors in it, and re-downloading only the necessary part of them if there were any (the Downloader even re-downloads part of the file if it was somehow damaged for reasons other than the network connection malfunctioning).

All points of great importance to me and that have been working perfectly fine until now without GOG breaking a sweat over it, so it must be great to finally have them in Galaxy! No sarcasm here at all, I really do want a nice featured "launcher / multiplayer manager / whatever else you'd like to call it" from GOG.

Checking... (I'm installing Galaxy 2 for the first time to check for this, I've only used v1 so far)

[30 minutes later... some of us live in the fringes of the developed world.]

Oh shiny, I like the interface better than Steam's, that's for sure.

So, back to business: NOPE...

Point 2 (and of course 3) were not implemented. From the user side, downloads work almost the same as downloading with a browser (with the exception it automatically sorts into a folder for each game, as did the Downloader). The only difference I see from v1 is one click to download installers and extras, but maybe that had already changed in v1 since the last time I had used it.

This is really "Good News" if I've ever seen them!

Not even a checksum to be seen. Even most people offering free software (gratis and/or open source) post some checksum for you to check your download.

A real "gold" nugget from the support article linked to in the OP of this thread: Yeah, I'm using one: the GOG Downloader.

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I really didn't want to buy into the critics in the posts above. Yes, I read you all and you are right.

I'm uninstalling Galaxy, cancelling my plans to buy anything else here until further notice, and this will probably be my last forum post unless there is a radical change in how things are being managed.

It's not just about downloads of course. It's been downhill for quite some time now, but this is the first decision from GOG that really puts me off.

I will download my files, and check occasionally for updates. Good bye.

Welp...knew this was coming. The Downloader was my preferred way to grab and install games off here way back in 2011 and I preferred it to Galaxy since starting games installed via Galaxy forced the client to start up. I don't know if that's changed.

*deep sigh* I'll miss its reliability, that's for sure.

It sure would have been nice if you had bothered to tell us that most of the GOG Downloader features are in Galaxy.

1. On the left side of the Galaxy client select All Games. This should cause the main part of the client to show your full library. It may take a minute or two to populate the list if its the first time Galaxy is run.

2. Select a game. This will take you to the games Galaxy page.

3. At the top of the page to the left of install is the extras button. Select it.

4. The games page in Galaxy should now show all of the download options including the Backup Installer.

5. It looks like it will dump everything in \GOG Galaxy\Games\*Game Title*\!Downloads. I don't know how to change the default download directory.

Hope this helps.

If this causes you to lower your purchases here, be sure to give feedback to Support:

click the Support button -> scroll to bottom -> on the left, click "Contact Us" -> fill it out as you see fit but remember to not get angry at Support people specifically.

This might be the ideal opportunity to improve the downloading process for your GOG customers wishing to backup their purchases via the browser or the Galaxy app. As mentioned in one of the posts above...

1. Please implement a convenient one-click option for downloading a backup of game installers and associated extras.

2. Please include file checksums so that we can easily verify the integrity of our downloaded backups.

3. Please create a notification system alerting GOG customers of newly updated offline game installers in their personal library, so we know which files we need to backup and which files we have already backed up.

Thank-you.

That figures. I used it exclusively to download all my games. The last time I tried to use Galaxy to download a backup copy all I ended up with was wasted bandwidth and a corrupted file. I was tempted to give Galaxy 2 a try but it doesn't support windows 7, WTF The majority of the games on here still support windows 7? No linux Galaxy yet either after HOW long?

The reasons for continuing to spend money here are drying up fast.

I agree with your three specific points and felt a strong urge to repeat them. ;) Hope you don't mind.

Probably would have been better to retire it once Galaxy or the website gets some of the functionality of Downloader? Such as the easier means to download everything/patches/dlc/bonus content all in one move?

new users don't even see the page, only way you can really find it is by search engine and searching gog downlaoder. the only people that use it now are either knew about, word of mouth or mainly linux. after 6 years i'm pretty sure it died down a whole alot.

i only used it about a week before the first gog galaxy came out so for me it kinda just skipped over me in a way
i actually hated it because what moved me was network speed, my house didn't have fast internet so 12Mbps shared with 1TV, 3 computers, 3 phones so it was one of the reasons i moved swiftly over to galaxy 1.0

so ya that's my story on why my idea is different

I can maybe see why they might disable it, though....it saves on any time/money needed(if any) to support it or answer any support tickets on it.
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Questions to all:

Does anyone know roughly how many were still using it(I assume it had to be low enough to cause GOG to disable it)? I know those who don't use browsers much likely used it a bit, and some of those who liked any automation it provided.

Also aren't there alternatives(custom apps and scripts) as well that do the same thing that some use?
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Alternates List: Well it seems this answers at least part of one of my questions. Thanks for this. :)
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Also it seems BreOl has listed another alternative as well.....this will likely help some out here, I would think.
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And another possible alternate....thanks to all those who suggest them. :)
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And one more alternate to add to the pile....hopefully it can help someone. :)

(Note: This alternative needs Linux)

Customers are just a way for a business to make money.....we are not meant to be their friends and they usually are not meant to be ours.

That said, I do hope your bit here about not helping is just venting and that you're not(like another user who did so recently due to other issues) serious.

Not to sound too mean, but: If anything could say "I don't like change" more than this line here, I don't know what it is atm.

Asking first would've been nice, yes, but they likely had numbers available to show that disabling it was more beneficial than keeping it active.

Thing is they don't need to and shouldn't have to do such things....they are a business, NOT our family.....while it would be NICE if they did such things, I can see why they might do as they did.

As for colors on game pages/genres, that likely is very easy to implement and might cause some to go "ooh" and "ah" a bit.

Finally: does anyone else see the hypocrisy in some here?

When GOG gives us something(games, features, etc) people praise them to no end, yet when they take one thing away some are like "I'm never buying here again...this is a travesty of the highest order!" & stomping around like children.

Between such types and the ones suggesting this is some conspiracy to move everyone to galaxy and/or DRM(without much in the way of solid proof), I am beginning to think this IS a madhouse.

(Also the ones who have smaller libraries complaining about some extra clicks make me want to play Weird Al's "First World Problems" on auto loop)

(Note I don't have as much such issues with those expressing their doubts and such in a rational manner and acting more calm and collected)

I run one bat file (gog.bat) which does all these things:
- Downloads any new or updated game or extras/goodies files for the offline installers. I don't have to try track what has changed or I haven't downloaded yet, gogrepo does it automatically.
- Cleans my GOG game collection, moving away old obsolete installer files.
- Verifies that all my installers are still ok (no data corruption/bitrot).

Doing that with the GOG Downloader would take hours or days, and about 1000 or more mouse clicks. Plus I'd have to try to manually track what actually has been updated or I haven't downloaded yet, and also try to keep track which existing installer files in my hard drive have become obsolete. Meh.

If, however, I just want to download one game in order to install and play it here and now (and don't have access to that aforementioned local GOG installer collection), downloading with the browser is simple and good enough, even if I need to click a few more times in order to get a bigger multi-part installer.

I just don't see what would be the scenario where I'd really want to use the GOG Downloader, instead of the two options above. Also back when I still used the GOG Downloader, it seemed to fail quite often if I tried to mass-download lots of games (ie. when I later come back to it, the rest of the downloads are just greyed out and didn't get downloaded).

I don't recall Microsoft making a poll whether they should continue supporting Windows 98SE and XP from here to eternity. They had already decided beforehand that those products have only a certain lifespan after which the support ends. That is quite common in the software industry, old products are not supported forever.

Considering Galaxy has much of the same functionality as GOG Downloader, it just doesn't make any sense GOG would try to keep supporting both. If some people feel Galaxy is missing features that the GOG Downloader had, then it would make more sense people would request GOG to add those missing features to Galaxy, instead of trying to support two parallel official clients which can be used for the same purpose.

Yep, that was five years ago.

Yes, I suspect that they won't bother to answer. Luckily there are other sources of DRM-free games. I'll stay here for the forum, but I'll get my games somewhere else.

Some are likely afraid to learn something new(even if better for them overall) or are too "lazy" to want to make the effort.

(Of course some might not have the time as well or experience issues with the other alternatives, which is more understandable)

As I said in post 132 above, some(in general) will complain over anything when their lives are too "easy"(easier compared to the distant past of humanity or how it is in some third world countries, I mean)......GOG gave us one of the best presents in recent years(refund policy) and was VERY PRO CONSUMER and yet some still complained.

The thing is, some prefer other unofficial methods(other clients/apps) over galaxy to DL even offline installers, for various reasons.

Some dislike change(as said above), some don't want to learn something new(also as said above), and some just distrust anything "official"(clients/etc) entirely for reasons both good and bad.