Or alternatively, GOG provides you an optional client that checks if your GOG games are up to date. Which is something I've been asking them to do. For instance, the _optional_ Humble Bundle Android client works that way, it checks if the HIB .apk files you have on your Android device are up to date, and if not, offers you to download the ones where there is a new version available.

I'm very happy that the HIB Android client is fully optional even for the download but especially the installation part, because the client has restrictions I don't like. For example, I can't tell it to download the installers (.apk) files to my external empty 32GB microSD card or install them from there, but it insists using only the 16GB internal memory for all storage and operations. That's just idiotic, but fortunately I can manually move the .apk files to the external microSD card, and install them from there manually.

If you couldn't care less if you lost e.g. your Steam game collection, all the power to you. Maybe you didn't like the Steam games that much to begin with and don't mind losing the thousands of euros you used over the years to buy them.

I, on the other hand, want to still keep some of my customer rights to myself for stuff I have purchased, even if I have other things to worry about in life as well. In fact, I prefer DRM-free games so that I have one less thing to worry about, as simple as that.

Isn't Blizz owned by Activision?

The people who keep defending DRM in games all the time, and trying to ridicule people who'd rather buy their games without DRM. It seems as if these people are overly annoyed of e.g. GOG users who prefer DRM-free.

I think the people mentioned by the OP qualify. After all, they are asking how does one dare to request for a DRM-free version of a game, and calling him a pirate for wanting something like that.

If they were e.g. "DRM-agnostic", I presume they would just shrug their shoulders on someone else wanting a DRM-free release, and say something like "Huh? Whatever floats your boat, I guess... I'm fine with my Steam DRM version, but I don't mind if someone else wants his without DRM.".

And both of them belong to a french company by the name of---Nevermind, they split from V-whatever recently. I just wish Kotick had been ripped in the split as well.

Yeah, we all would have preferred that. Especially the people working for him. But Knee is right. Battle.net is a Activision property, like the rest of Blizzard. So it's surprising that they're not doing more with it. Or at least it would be if they gave the slightest damn about the PC.

I still watch my VCR tapes on a real VCR .....


I still have an Apple II+ and an Atari 2600 in my garage.

And I run Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows XP, Windows 2000, and Openstep in a hardware emulator (Virtualbox -- free, opensource software -- https://www.virtualbox.org/) on linux. And I could install Windows 95, Dos (but why bother with dosbox?), and Windows 98 if I needed to. Most of the time I run software in Wine anyway if it's supported.

I'm not worried about my digital hardware breaking.

But I am worried about DRM in my operating system preventing me from installing future versions of my operating system in Virtualbox, but I am not worried about not being able to play my GOG games 50 years down the road. Especially when I found out I could play Supreme Commander in both Virtualbox and WINE shortly after it came out.


.....but I almost never listen to my cassette tapes, mostly because my taste in music has changed. I could if I wanted to, though.

Well, like I said above, I think many of those people are so mentally dependent on these games and these publishers that they end up defending everything they do. I've come to realise that many of them are so unprincipled that the way they lash out at people who don't buy DRM'd games on principle is simply a reaction of jealousy that they themselves don't have the same sort of self-control.

It's like a smoker who will often lash out at non-smokers collectively, blaming them for the inability to smoke in pubs and restaurants now.

So, how do they differ from "Pro-DRMFree" people? To me, both parties are the same, lashing out to each others for the other being wrong?

Who are you guys even talking about? Can you give some examples? Sounds like you're talking about an extremely small group of people with unreasonable opinions hardly worth mentioning. You see those on both sides of the isle, there's anti-DRM folk who's froth at the mouth is only matched by their lack of actual knowledge of the topics they spit it at.

For two things at least:

- The anti-DRM people don't seem to populate the Steampowered forums to tell everyone there how wrong they are for liking Steam (DRM). On the other hand, many pro-DRM people still seem to flock to DRM-free sites like GOG to tell everyone how wrong they are for wanting more DRM-free releases.

- As far as I can tell, anti-DRM people in general want a choice. They are generally not e.g. saying that there shouldn't exist a DRM-version of the game too, for those who want their game with DRM for some reason.

Pro-DRM people are against choice, for some reason they don't want there to be an optional DRM-free release, but feel people wanting something like that are filthy pirates.

There may be some anti-Steam people who don't want e.g. GOG games appear on Steam (e.g. Gorky 17), but that is different from being anti-DRM.

hmm... valid points, though I don't believe the first one really counts... I'm not sure if you ever really own a game... and can't you just use the exe. file in the games data to launch it instead of steam?

But I do understand your distrust of cloud saves, makes total sense but isn't there away not use cloud saves? I don't think I have any games that require cloud saves on steam.

To be fair that kind of thing really should be left to the bars and restaurants. If a bar's business is based on the fact that patrons can smoke freely then forcing them to change simply because people don't like smoking is absurd. I have no problem with a bar or restaurant enacting a no smoking policy themselves, and they often do, which is why I find legislation to that effect to be redundant and reeks of social engineering.

That metaphor(edit:sorry, simile) applies more aptly for us, by the way. We're the smokers(DRM-free advocates) lashing out at non-smokers (people who don't care) collectively, blaming them for our inability to smoke in pubs and restaurants now(blaming them for our inability to buy AAA DRM-free games now).

Ok. For example "Obvious pirate is obvious"-people mentioned here, who apparently are against a DRM-free release.

SimonG is a another prime example too, he doesn't even hide it.

Depends if the anti-DRM folks are against a DRM-version of a game existing at all, or only want a choice, ie. a DRM-free release on top of the existing DRM-release.

I wouldn't mind an always-online Diablo 3 existing, if Blizzard offered also a PC version where the single-player part is fully offline. If someone wants his Diablo 3 with always-online DRM, fine. I don't.

Ummm, no, unless we wanted to deny them their DRM-games at the same time. It shouldn't affect them at all if we also had a DRM-free release, or even if the DRM-free release was the only release there is. After all, you don't need forced DRM for cloud saving, friends lists etc.

That's not an example of someone saying that though, it's word of mouth from someone who claims someone said it.

Either way it's an obviously ignorant statement hardly worth taking serious. DRM-versions are pirated just as much as non-DRM versions. If someone thinks wanting no-DRM versions = wanting to pirate it, that's just ignorance. If anything the DRM is a means to curb second hand sales.

We are a minority lashing out at a majority because their behaviors have directly affected us.

Non-smokers directly affected a smoker's ability to smoke indoors in places which allowed it.

People who have no opinion or are ignorant of DRM have directly affected our ability to purchase games free of DRM, they're still buying games after all.

We're demanding choice. Smokers are also demanding choice.

It's pretty apt.

edit: forgot an apostrophe