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GOG.com Not Really Gone

Posted by samzenpus on from the stepped-out-for-a-minute dept.

gspr writes "On Sunday, Slashdot and many others reported that DRM-free games site GOG.com was shutting down. Now the site is back, revealing that it was all a hoax. According to the site: 'Now it's time we put an end to all the speculations once and for all. It's true that we decided that we couldn't keep GOG.com the way it was so we won't. As you probably know by now, GOG.com is entering its new era with an end of the two-years beta stage and we're launching a brand new GOG.com with new, huge releases.' So it was all an advertising stunt."

7 of 276 comments (clear)

  1. DRM demonstration by MDHowle · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It was all a demonstration of what inevitable happens to DRM media.

    1. Re:DRM demonstration by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It was all a demonstration of what inevitable happens to DRM media.

      And targeted at consumers of non-DRM media: The message was "We operate on a shoestring, so buy it from us while we're still around to sell it." (Not a bad message, come to think of it. You'll buy that game now, not six months from now, since you don't know if the seller will be around six months from now. And if you do buy it now, because it's DRM-free, you'll at least have it six months - or six years - from now when you finally get around to playing it.)

  2. Annoying, but I can live with it. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Long happy sigh of relief. As a long time and VERY loyal customer, I'm going over there and buying a couple of the games I've had my eyes on.

  3. Re:Unintended consequences by Daetrin · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is the second time GOG has treated me in a somewhat crappy manner, though at least this time i've got a lot of company. (Yay?) However i'm not willing to boycott them permanently because of this stunt since they're the only ones trying to do the no DRM thing, even if they are sometimes asses about the way in which they do business.

    However i do think i shall compare their catalog to Impulse's, find several games i want that both sites have, purchase those games from Impulse, ("Age of Wonders" seems like a good place to start) and then be sure to inform GOG about what i did and why i did it. Being DRM free can only make up for a certain amount of bad behaviour in other areas.

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  4. Re:Annoying stunt, but still glad they're here. by h4rr4r · · Score: 2, Interesting

    They meant closing down the beta service, they left that out for excitement or whatever some marketing moron thought.

  5. It sort of serves the GOG community right by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    For 2 months the GOG forums have been rife with posts about how their birthday event better live up to expectations, or else (else is always ominously undefined). I think many customers were getting a little annoying. Living 2-3 days thinking GOG might be gone probably grounded a lot of these folks and imo it serves them right. I've purchased a ton of stuff from GOG and will continue to do so, since they're still offering the product that I want.

    I was depressed when I saw the notice not because I wouldn't be able to redownload some games I'd lost in a hard drive crash but more because there's no other company like them. GOG folding would be essentially saying, "Okay, Steam wins." Steam sucks in my mind, if that's online game sales, count me out. I already feel marginalized for enjoying PC games (even if I do have a 360), I'd be left with only indie titles sans DRM on my PC. I like my indie titles but I also like some of the big releases and the classics.

    I think there might have been a couple of behind the scenes reasons for doing this and all in all, it will benefit GOG in the longrun. It probably cost them some goodwill in the short term, but if the cost is low enough that's not de defacto a show stopper.

  6. Re:Unintended consequences by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    My mind is often boggled by how people get really upset by marketing stunts yet are fine with problems that actually matter. People love Steam yet it has regular phone-home style DRM (oh your internet went down, you can't play your games for awhile then), and people still buy games with limited installs. Yet a company with a decent service has their marketing department drop the ball and suddenly people are shouting "Boycott".