To install and update games only. Without all that community, activity, friends crap...

Boah, is this a bloated and slow piece of software. Slows down my Mac if its running....

GOG's now following the "so long as it looks pretty it doesn't matter how well it functions" philosophy. To be fair, Valve did the same thing with its new Steam client that's terrible compared to the old one. I guess GOG felt left out and had to "improve" Galaxy the same way.

They already had that - GOG Downloader. How I wish its comeback. Clicking on individual installer download links might sound good, but it's not.

Yeah. Nothing's a viable platform anymore without being "social" and showing you all the latest stuff you need to buy. I already bought my games, just give me an unobtrusive error-free way to update and play my games without all the added nonsense.

I prefer the new steam client to the old one. it's more cohesive and looks better visually.

I agree. This really seems like a step backward. I'd be fine with 1.0 if they would fix the tagging system so that if you search for RPG and Space, you wouldn't get everything RPG (sword and sorcy etc) and all space (fighter sims, galaxy takeovers, etc). If it would actually filter games that you have containing both tags, it would actually be useful. I want to rpg children, then I don't get adult rpgs. It's not like filtering is a novel Idea, or that complicated.

All this friends and crap means I will never use Galaxy 2.0

I preferred the older Steam client to the newest one as well, but we all have our own preferences. For me, it just seemed easier to navigate before, and I have no need for all the "discussion tiles" showing up.

For the most part, I jumped ship from Steam to GOG when that change occured. I haven't tried Galaxy 2 yet, but from the videos and screenshots, it seems to be something I won't like. Might end up jumping to Launchbox if I end up not liking it... maybe I'll like it the new Galaxy. Won't know until I'm forced to use it.

I really, really hate seeing those damn "What's New?" tiles at the top of my Steam library that you CAN'T remove. At best, you can "ask" Steam to not show updates as often, but you've got to do it on a game-by-game basis and can't get rid of it entirely.

At least Galaxy 2.0 doesn't do that, but that's not exactly a ringing endorsement.

I agree, there should be an option to remove it. Also for some strange reason they removed the list view.

Yes! I liked the list view. Sure, it wasn't flashy, but it was functional. Sometimes I think designers forget that the primary thing is function, because if it doesn't function well, it doesn't matter how pretty the design is in the end.

Well, you're in luck because you can remove basically everything thanks to CSS.

Well, visually, I disagree, it doesn't fit with the look of the rest of the client or any part of the Steam website or anything else connected to Steam as a platform. The old library did fit with the rest of the client, and was simpler and more intuitive to use on multiple levels for most people. Functionally it's missing a bunch of useful features the old client had (including really basic stuff like being able to launch on the library page and actually have the last-played game's details showing). And it has persistent performance problems on a large number of PCs even after multiple post-launch attempts at fixing problems, with some systems that never had issues with the old client not even able to run it (including high-end nearly brand new systems where it's not a "stop using a potato" problem). Several performance-impacting functions which were supposed to disable in low performance mode were confirmed not to be doing so in beta, and they patched multiple problems of this type at least 3 times each after the official launch before fixing them. Then there's the still-present memory leak which has been shown on multiple occasions to cause system crashes and which they knew about before launch and still haven't done anything about.

And of course the fact that it's directly causing medical problems for a number of users, which is a pretty solid reason to say they should have put it right back into beta the moment they found out that was a problem. And I've seen confirmation that they knew it was a problem within days of the launch if not before, and my contact with support has led to it being made clear that the people responsible are not just failing to fix it but actively refusing to even try. And that's been ongoing for 6 months and they're still doing nothing about it.

So that's a bunch of good reasons why it should be optional at best and there's an even stronger case for the Steam client to belong in an "opt in only" state than there is for Galaxy 2.0, and there's no way I'd argue that Galaxy should be forced onto users like it is currently. Obviously, since I'm saying the exact opposite:
https://www.gog.com/forum/general_beta_gog_galaxy_2.0/open_letter_to_gog_and_message_to_support

I made this wishlist entry when the closed beta just started:
https://www.gog.com/wishlist/galaxy/gog_galaxy_lite_andor_gog_galaxy_legacy

A few days ago, I decided to "bump" it, and now it seems that it can get some votes.

Let's at least pretend that GOG takes the community wishlist seriously. (:

Related idea:

Bring back Galaxy 1.2 as "GOG Galaxy".
Keep Galaxy 2.0 as "GOG Universe" or something.

Old client is the basic/standard "just GOG" platform for users who want that.
New client is a multi-platform launcher supporting other storefronts' games alongside the ones GOG provides directly.

This would let them keep working on the obviously still in beta app that is obviously still in beta and not ready for release while allowing users who want the last stable app to remain stable and reliably accessible. It would also give users more freedom to control our experience, something that's been growing in need from gamers in recent times and has been ignored far too often by the competition GOG should keep trying to be better than.