Hmm... That's an interesting point.

It's weird. Banks have the biggest influence in your life, yet it's the hardest to go legally up against. I mean, I can understand the reasons somewhat. Banks are important for an economic development and all that. But damn!

And it isn't even the legal side. The practical side alone is a nightmare. Try paying legal fees if the bank sits on your money. Or what even a successful pursuit will do to your credit rating ...

That makes no sense. No one is forcing publishers and developers (aside from their publishers of course) to use Steam, PC gaming worked before Steam and it will work after Steam. On the other hand, if you want game X and it's a Steamworks title your only choice is either to use Steam or not to buy it. Somewhere in management there has to be a point where someone made a concious decision to force Steam onto the user.

Wasn't Alan Wake a Steamworks title?

that makes no sense. game developers sitting in a meeting "hmm we have this game but we'd rather "force" something on users for no reason. yeah sounds good." some game developers probably choose steam for social services like friends and achievements and stuff, some probably want drm, but some probably also pick it because it's really popular and it will help them sell games. in that case they don't "want" steam for its features, they want it because it's popular.

So they shouldn't use the method of delivery that's popular? They should instead please you?

no, that's what the other person is saying. i'm fine with it.

While it's sad that we don't see more of them here. The truth is that I don't really care, the more interesting games are either indie or kickstarter ones - the commercial games are really boring today, there's like one or two cool ones per year. That's why gog is my favorite distribution platform, I get to play games that have something to them.

You all those cinematics in new games? I skip them! They are rarely interesting and they look worse than the Hollywood CGI we see so what's the point? It's just one example of wasted money that could have gone into more important stuff.

Riiiight, because there is no way that this social nonesense could be optional. If they really cared about what their customers want they would give them the choice. Not all people are the same, some like something, some don't and some just don't care.

I really don't know what you're trying to get at now. All I'm saying is you seem to be ignoring that fact that Steam is hugely popular, which in itself might be a motivation for developers using it.

My problem is that Steam is the only way to play those games, not just one way. Publishers are not using it because they like you but because it is the most accepted form of DRM.

You apparently don't know how software development actually works, that couldn't be more wrong. That's the main reason why I am convinced that GoG really should develop and offer an optional client.

Heck if Microsoft had a clue they should have created long ago a digital distributor agnostic game launcher/updater/with achievement/etc... either integrated in Windows (or downloadable) with freely available APIs allowing all game publisher to integrate in it... but the only thing they managed to come up with was the mostly broken and closed GFWL and the ridiculous windows 7 game launcher...

As someone who is mainly here for the nostalgia/good old games, I wouldn't have much interest in new GOG games, unless I get a new computer soon and they're able to compete well with Steam sales.

That said, maybe GOG should consider looking into that territory more. We have Alan Wake and a few other AAA new games here, and more could certainly come. However, at the same time, GOG would want to consider how they would handle such a big expansion, with support, sales, release dates, etc.

Of course I don't. I'm just repeating what the devs say. Especially the Spacechem dev said something about Steam making patching and maintaining a game very easy.

Microsoft want that and the Windows 8 store is another attempt to do so. They just suck at it.