It appears things aren't going overly well for game store GOG at the moment, under increasing competition they're starting to feel the heat.
First of all, in a report on Kotaku, GOG recently confirmed that they let go a bunch of staff. They claimed it was only "around a dozen of positions" while also bringing in new staff in other positions. Fair enough, that all sounds quite normal in the business world.
However, Kotaku spoke to an ex-staff member who basically said GOG haven't been doing so well financially. That seems to now be somewhat backed up a little, as GOG just announced today that they're ending their Fair Price Package program. This was the system that users could get wallet funds back on purchases, if the price of the game was more expensive in their country compared with North America.
What's also interesting in this announcement from GOG, is that they said they were able to cover the extra cost from it in the past and still turn a "small profit" which is no longer the case. As they say "With an increasing share paid to developers, our cut gets smaller.", so it sounds like they will at some point reduce their cut from developers (sound familiar?).
Their current plan for the Fair Price Package program is to continue it until 31st of March, so you have until then if you made use of it. Any funds you're given, will remain with you for 12 months so they won't vanish right away.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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I'm a Steam user, mostly due to points already mentioned elsewhere in this thread: ease of use, auto-updates, Valves investments into Linux, having all games in one place etc. In my opinion going back to GOG manual downloads and manual updates is like coming from Linux package management and going back to Windows installers, shrug. The DRM-free stuff seems quite important for some people, I think it is a marketing feature to have some distinction/usp's to other stores more than anything else.
That said, I really don't want GoG to close shop doors. I like that they value and keep good old games "alive". They don't invest into Linux like Valve, I guess they simply can't do this even if they wanted considering the low number of Linux users, but they are supportive and offer Linux visibility. This is already a lot more than other stores. I want Valve to succeed, to prosper and to get rewarded for their Linux investments. But equally I want GoG in a healthy state. I think both can and should happily co-exist (together with itch.io).
(Most important, without GoG we would miss a lot of heated discussions here ;))
Last edited by jens on 27 February 2019 at 10:14 pm UTC
That said, I really don't want GoG to close shop doors. I like that they value and keep good old games "alive". They don't invest into Linux like Valve, I guess they simply can't do this even if they wanted considering the low number of Linux users, but they are supportive and offer Linux visibility. This is already a lot more than other stores. I want Valve to succeed, to prosper and to get rewarded for their Linux investments. But equally I want GoG in a healthy state. I think both can and should happily co-exist (together with itch.io).
(Most important, without GoG we would miss a lot of heated discussions here ;))
Last edited by jens on 27 February 2019 at 10:14 pm UTC
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GOG needs to up their game on Linux support. As people have stated, there needs to be a Galaxy client for Linux. But as a Linux user I've also noticed that GOG has completely failed at supporting Retro DOS games on Linux. Perfect example: Wing Commander 1/2/3/4/Privateer, Strike Commander, Wing Commander Armada, Wing Commander Academy. All of these games run in Dosbox. All of these games run in Linux in Dosbox. All of these games are on the GOG store. But none of them have been packaged for Dosbox on Linux. Instead they have launchers for Windows and Macintosh. Now whether that's because EA is blocking them from releasing Linux versions or not, I don't know. But at least an explanation from the staff would be nice. Similarly games like Freespace 2, Descent 1/2/3, Unreal Tournament 2003/2004 all have Linux builds but no support from GOG. It'd be nice if someone would actually step up and provide some basic support for Linux titles.
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Quoting: DMJC(…) Freespace 2, Descent 1/2/3, Unreal Tournament 2003/2004 all have Linux builds but no support from GOG. (…)It is not that easy:
- AFAIK there was no Linux version of Freespace 2 until the community efforts to improve the engine after the source code release, so it is unofficial.
- The official version of Descent 1/2 is Dosbox based. The native versions are unofficial.
- Descent 3 has an official Linux version, but that was made by Loki and was owned by Loki. They are not allowed to distribute it.
- I don't know why Unreal Tournament 2003/2004 is missing, but it's probably Epic's fault.
When they sold the original NWN they didn't sell Linux version as well, although I remember that it used to work very well (unfortunately I don't like the game).
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TheRiddick Feb 28, 2019
Release GOG Galaxy for Linux, allow people to plugin proton to it. Pick up bonus sales and some extra PR points along the way, win-win, but it seems CDPR are not interested, probably still crying over the Witcher2 deal where people death threaten them or some nonsense.
Welcome to the internet CDPR is my response to that ordeal... world is 99% toxic online, regardless of platform.
Welcome to the internet CDPR is my response to that ordeal... world is 99% toxic online, regardless of platform.
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Quoting: TheRiddickRelease GOG Galaxy for Linux, allow people to plugin proton to it.
GOG games are quite easy to use with Wine. Instead of clients and etc. GOG could just bundle more games like they did with Flatout 2.
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 February 2019 at 1:43 am UTC
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Quoting: KlaasBut Dosbox runs on Linux. I think I have, uh, three games from GOG. Two of them are Master of Orion I & II, both of which were offered by GOG as Linux games, both of which run in Dosbox. And that's just fine.The official version of Descent 1/2 is Dosbox based. The native versions are unofficial.
Wasn't part of the point being made precisely that GOG could easily package for Linux many games that run in Dosbox, but has not done so?
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Quoting: ShmerlI was actually thinking, I suppose in the absence of Galaxy one sensible thing to do would be use Lutris, not just for Wine but for all games bought from GOG. Wouldn't get you all of what Galaxy does, but it would maybe help?Quoting: TheRiddickRelease GOG Galaxy for Linux, allow people to plugin proton to it.
GOG games are quite easy to use with Wine. Instead of clients and etc. GOG could just bundle more games like they did with Flatout 2.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 28 February 2019 at 2:04 am UTC
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Quoting: Purple Library GuyWouldn't get you all of what Galaxy does, but it would maybe help?
Galaxy has several components, which are confusingly all called Galaxy.
1. Galaxy HTTP API which allows updating games, pulling incremental deltas and etc. Galaxy client is using it for updates. However GOG need to explicitly enable it for each game on the backend. It doesn't work for Linux games (likely since they didn't yet "enable Galaxy for Linux").
2. Galaxy UDP based protocol which is used by games through its Galaxy library for multiplayer, achievements and so on. That can work with Linux games, as long as you have a). said Galaxy library built for Linux. b). some client running, that authenticates against their HTTP API. The library communicates with that client.
I.e. multiplayer only works together with client running, supposedly for encapsulating auth issues to it. There is a community implementation of such client, but it still relies on Galaxy lib (blob) and not all games are shipped with it.
All of that is called Galaxy, and part of that stuff is server backend, Lutris can't help with that.
What Lutris (or any community project) can do, is to be a UI around existing GOG downloaders like lgogdownloader and wyvern (or their library forms like Rust GOG crate). They figured out a way to emulate Galaxy updating, by using HTTP offsets in Linux installers, which are essentially indexable ZIP archives. You can pull individual files that way, and can also check if they changed before pulling. Not sure about chunks granularity there.
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 February 2019 at 2:27 am UTC
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References:
https://gogapidocs.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
https://gitlab.com/Yepoleb/comet
https://bitbucket.org/monkey0506/agsgalaxy/src
https://github.com/Sude-/lgogdownloader
https://github.com/nicohman/wyvern
https://crates.rs/crates/gog
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 February 2019 at 2:35 am UTC
https://gogapidocs.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
https://gitlab.com/Yepoleb/comet
https://bitbucket.org/monkey0506/agsgalaxy/src
https://github.com/Sude-/lgogdownloader
https://github.com/nicohman/wyvern
https://crates.rs/crates/gog
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 February 2019 at 2:35 am UTC
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Quoting: PangaeaQuoting: KlaasAt least the missing Linux version of Galaxy means that there are some clean installers.
This is why I hope Galaxy for Linux never materialises. At least as long as that doesn't exist, and they are trying to officially support Linux, they have a real reason to offer clean installers (although they have tried to put their filth in them too over the years, thankfully to big community opposition).
You can offer both, just as any package management tool does on any Linux distro.
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