Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

GOG Announces Open Beta For New Game Distribution Platform

Posted by Soulskill on from the taking-advantage-of-valve's-stumble dept.

New submitter Donaithnen writes: Like many geeks, I'm against the idea of DRM in general and have championed GOG.com's DRM-free approach to selling games online. Yet like many geeks, I've also often succumbed to the temptation of Steam because of the convenience of tracking, installing, and playing my PC game purchases through the launcher (not to mention the compulsion of collecting achievements, and watching the total playtime for my favorite games (to my occasional dismay). Now, GOG has announced the open beta for GOG Galaxy, an entirely optional launcher to allow those who want (and only those who want) to have all the same features when playing GOG games.

10 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. Like multiplayer? by Sowelu · · Score: 2

    'Cause Steam integration for multiplayer is a pretty serious upgrade from the days of the good old Gamespy server search program.

    1. Re:Like multiplayer? by Qzukk · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Invitations are absolutely an awesome feature, but you know what would blow my socks off? If the GOG launcher handled all the bullshit firewall crap.

      I still get games where the authors have failed to bother to document the port(s) their server uses or where they think it's awesome to have the server start up on a random port from 1024 to 65534. Usually 30 pages deep in the game forum there's a thread where you find posts like "i forwarded UDP 19228 and the server showed up on the browser for 30 seconds but nobody could connect and I couldn't get it to show up again after a restart". If, along with all the other brilliant work GOG has done to get the games working in current versions of windows, GOG's launcher popped up a window like steams cdkey window that said

      Hosting a multiplayer game requires these ports:
          TCP 12421, TCP 12422, UDP 20000-20400
        [x] Use uPNP to request forwarding these ports on my firewall
        [x] Do not show this again
          [ OK ] [ Cancel ]

      I think my socks loosened a bit just thinking about it.

      --
      If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
  2. Cross Play by pavon · · Score: 4, Informative

    Crossplay-enabled games offer online play between GOG and Steam. Because where you buy your games shouldn't prevent you from playing with friends.
    Cross-play doesn't require any setup or configuration. Steam users won't need to create GOG.com accounts or install GOG Galaxy, while GOG.com users won't need to create Steam accounts. Just log in, launch your game, and start playing online!

    That is the killer feature, IMHO. I was scrolling through expecting to just ignore this like I did the downloader, but that actually provides something of value above what you can do with the website.

  3. Re:Watch this mutate into actual DRM by Donaithnen · · Score: 2

    Really? You're upset that they're releasing an _optional_ tool? If they were dropping the ability to download DRM-free installers for the games and forcing you to use the the launcher instead then i would be upset too. But that's not what's happening at all, so i'm confused as to why you're in such a bother.

  4. Re:Watch this mutate into actual DRM by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They can drop the 'optional' part at any time without warning.

    If you care, then make sure to save the installers for posterity. If they ever do institute DRM, which I doubt will happen but hey whatever, you'll still have the DRM-free installers.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  5. Re:What does GOG stand for? by Sowelu · · Score: 2

    I've paid five bucks for a game I already physically own so that I don't need to dig the CD out of the garage more times than I'd like to admit, and probably a lot of old CDs and low quality CDRs don't even work anymore, it's not like I've checked them in a decade or two. Used to pirate them (surely it's ethical if I still have the box?) but that's even more of a hassle. Convenience can be worth one hell of a premium, and who cares if I could have dug up a working wrapper or working DosBox configuration somewhere thirty pages down on a forum thread on archive.org? That's something those millenials have time for. Hell yes I'm willing to pay to not waste that kind of time.

  6. Re:The appeal of GoG for me by damnbunni · · Score: 3, Funny

    There are some serious stinkers on GOG.

    Daikatana, for instance.

    Someone actually put forth the effort to repackage Daikatana.

    Some men just want to watch the world burn.

  7. Shades of the LotR movies here... by Shadow+of+Eternity · · Score: 3, Funny

    "The DRM passed to Gabe, who had this one chance to destroy evil forever, but the hearts of men are easily corrupted. And the power of DRM has a will of its own. It betrayed Gabe, to the death of consumer rights. And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And from the year two thousand and three, consumer freedoms passed on only to GoG. Until, when chance came, DRM ensnared a new bearer. DRM came to the creators of GoG, who took it and swore it would be optional, and but as with all others it will inevitably consume them. DRM will give to GoG unnatural power over consumers. For as long as they hold such power it will poison their minds; and in the gloom of an admin's cave, it waits. Darkness creeps back into the filefolders of the world. Rumor grows of a shadow in the C:\, whispers of a nameless fear, and one day DRM will perceive: Its time has now come. "

    --
    A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
    1. Re:Shades of the LotR movies here... by black3d · · Score: 2

      Not really. When Steam first started, it had their Half-Life branch of games on it. It's disingenuous to say that because Half-Life was an existing offline game, so naturally remained DRM-free even once you activated your serial number on Steam, that Steam was trying to be a DRM-free platform. Steam always was, and still is, incidentally DRM-free in many cases, where publishers don't choose to implement Valve's (or their own) DRM. There's many games you can just copy the folder out and keep playing without firing up Steam. Comparing it to GoG who's entire selling point from day-1 has been the fact that all their titles are, and always will remain, DRM-free, is a miss.

      And besides, half those games which were available did actually have DRM, Let me qualify that - there were a slew of multiplayer-only GoldSrc mods (eg, Counterstrike, Ricochet, Deathmatch Classic, etc) which while you could play on local LAN, still required your active WON ID (or now, Steam ID) in order to play even on private online servers. Steam was needed to play CS 1.6 beta as it didn't support WON.

      Steam never tried to be specifically DRM-free. Both had DRM-Free games when they started. Both still do. GoG however, unlike Steam, only has and will only ever sell DRM-free games.

      --
      "The true measure of a person is how they act when they know they won't get caught." - DSRilk
  8. Re:Give it a whirl by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    especially if they beat out Origin and UPlay in the quality department.

    My dog left something on the lawn this morning which beats Origin and UPlay in the quality department.