You can either spend 10 bucks on a pile of microtransaction money in EA's new Dungeon Keeper freemium game, or you can spend 10 bucks and get bothoriginal Dungeon Keeper games on GOG. It's your choice, but when EA says "100 real dollars is the best value", it's a lie.
You can either spend 10 bucks on a pile of microtransaction money in EA's new Dungeon Keeper freemium game, or you can spend 10 bucks and get … moreboth original Dungeon Keeper games on GOG. It's your choice, but when EA says "100 real dollars is the best value", it's a lie.
Time to get your Geiger counters out of storage and venture back out into the nuclear fallout, as a familiar series of wasteland survival RPGs comes back from the radiation.
It's Valentines Day, and GOG has cooked up a much better sale than last year. First off, we've got the usual "Sliding scale on all D&D games" sale, with 80% off being the magical number this time. We've also got a ton of multiplayer games, including System Shock 2, the Trines, Alpha Centauri and even Dungeon Keeper 2 for up to 90% off. But wait, if Dungeon Keeper 2 is on sale, Dungeon Keeper Gold must be, right? Well... no. Dungeon Keeper Gold is not part of this sale, because for the next 48 hours, Dungeon Keeper Gold is absolutely free. Finally, a free-to-play Dungeon Keeper game that doesn't suck! FYI, the rules for getting free games has changed, you now have to apply for it and they'll add it to your account for you. It sucks, but it's the only way to keep from killing the servers again.
It only took a couple of minutes for the game to show up on my account, so it's not that bad even if you're desperate to play it instantly. (And if you were, you probably would have paid for it a long time ago.) (Unless you just heard about it for the first time and are all "OMG, this sounds like the best effing game ever!!!".)
GOG has booked a number of brand new, big name releases and will be offering them up for pre-order. However, to get these games, GOG has had to abandon their one price policy, so these new games will have regional pricing.
Edit: Oh goody. GOG's regional pricing is not a one off thing, this is policy going forward. One that will probably come back to bite them when it comes time to renegotiate with the big publishers.
A sad day. They were right to attempt 'no international pricing'. If they start with that, Daedalic will happily jump into it and rip off their German speaking clientele via gog.com as well. Granted, there probably won't be a studio as audacious as Daedalic (I don't think we'll see a 150% price increase just over the German border with other devs) but still this is really disheartening.
And for what? For just "three big titles" (two RPGs and one strategy game) in "months"? Three, seriously? I don't know what these "big titles" are supposed to be; judging from gog.com's previous announcements (remember "the" May?), they could still be majorly bullshit games, but even if they aren't, gog.com has already made a bad decision with that.
GOG says that international pricing is "rapidly becoming the standard". That is absurd. It has been the standard for decades in video game history, Steam did that crap from minute one, and NOW would be the time to change that.
/edit: Been reading through some of EnigmaticT's comments over there. I do hate international pricing - mostly because I've seen devs like Daedalic abuse international pricing in an absurd way. But I don't give a shit about the usual Euro equals Dollar conversions, they can do that if they please, no problem. I just hope they will at least retain that they have four and only four different pricing territories in their system, that alone should counter a lot of the abuse I've seen these last years. If gog.com wants to try it, well, let's see that action.
But these games better be good and plenty, seriously.
GOG has booked a number of brand new, big name releases and will be offering them up for pre-order. However, to get these games, GOG has had t… moreo abandon their one price policy, so these new games will have regional pricing.
Edit: Oh goody. GOG's regional pricing is not a one off thing, this is policy going forward. One that will probably come back to bite them when it comes time to renegotiate with the big publishers.
But I don't give a shit about the usual Euro equals Dollar conversions
...I care. Usually because if they do it with Euros, they do it with Pounds as well, so we pay something like 40-50% more than we should. It's insane and I honestly thought GOG was the one place I wouldn't have to do that. Fuuuck...
...I care. Usually because if they do it with Euros, they do it with Pounds as well, so we pay something like 40-50% more than we should. It's insane and I honestly thought GOG was the one place I wouldn't have to do that. Fuuuck...
Then let me rephrase and detail: Of course I care about the Dollar equals British Pound conversion, that's an atrocity. Dollar equals Euro is not a problem in Germany - in Slovakia however, it's a desaster, as 20$ is a ridiculous price tag over there generally. Prices should be LOWER there.
gog.com could not achieve this kind of fairness with a lack of regional pricing options. Opening up to international pricing would solve that problem... if businesses acted ethically, cough cough.
Some countries ended up with the short stick in gog.com's pricing yesterday, and that short stick will be handed around a bit right now. International pricing isn't really the issue, fairness is. And fairness wasn't all there yesterday as well.
But I don't give a shit about the usual Euro equals Dollar conversions
...I care. Usually because if they do it with Euros, they do it… more with Pounds as well, so we pay something like 40-50% more than we should. It's insane and I honestly thought GOG was the one place I wouldn't have to do that. Fuuuck...
The first of the three new pre-orders, Age of Wonders 3, is available for pre-order. You know, I was kind of hoping that if GOG was going to sell out their principles, we'd be getting some big name, triple-A releases out of the deal. Not... this.
An extended Age of Wonders 3 - Deluxe Edition, featuring a full soundtrack and the Dragon's Throne standalone scenario, is available for $44.99, £34.99, or €44.99. As a special pre-order bonus, both versions include the Elven Resurgence, a standalone scenario DLC.
I refuse to believe that THIS atrocious shit is the reason for regional pricing. No, seriously, I don't BELIEVE it.
"Big name publishers" and "triple A games", that was the wording of the news. So I'm still very much waiting for both.
Maybe if the strategy game is bollocks, the two RPGs are worth anything...
1954: Alcatraz is finally on GOG.com. It's an adventure designed by Gene Mocsy (the co-writer of Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island) through his development studio Irresponsible Games, co-developed by Daedalic. It has two playable characters, a man who tries to escape from Alcatraz prison in 1954, and his wife, who is running from gangsters who are looking for the money that her husband stole. It has multiple solutions to puzzles, that have different consequences for the characters.
I've really been looking forward to this, ever since it was first announced in 2012.
Oh, and it's not GOG.com related but it is on the subject of Gene Mocsy, so I have to mention this. If you have an iPad, check out The Perils of Man Chapter One. It's a free adventure game about risks and consequences with a steampunk vibe, and it's awesome (the puzzles are pure classic adventure and the story is really interesting so far). It's developed by IF Games and has dialog written by Gene Mocsy and a game design by Gene Mocsy and Bill Tiller (Curse of Monkey Island lead artist and founder of Autumn Moon, which developed A Vampyre Story and Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island).
IF Games said they would like to possibly port it to Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux if there's enough interest, and asked people to express interest for these ports on their forums.
And, GOG.com has come to a fair compromise for regional pricing. If a publisher requires GOG.com to have regional pricing instead of worldwide pricing, GOG.com will now give you store credit (and until they have that functionality implemented $9.99 and $5.99 gift codes) to cover the difference between the US price in those countries that have to pay more.
Specialty sale time! GOG is running their Luck of the Irish promo, essentially a pick 5 bundle, but with the twist of "instead of the list of games, you can try your luck at getting a random game from our secret list for only 2 bucks a chance". Games on the secret list appear to come up prioritized to your wishlist so... might be worth doing. Though somehow, combining a drinking holiday with a system designed for impulse purchases sounds like a bad idea.
That's a lot of good deals. I dont think Jack Keane has been anywhere near as cheap before, except when it was in a bundle recently?
Didn't know you were still around by the way.
@Gibbeynator wrote:
GOG is running their Luck of the Irish promo, essentially a pick 5 bundle, but with the twist of "instead of the list of games, you can try your luck at getting a random game from our secret list for only 2 bucks a chance". Games on the secret list appear to come up prioritized to your wishlist so... might be worth doing.
So tempted to try the luck draw. Oh, what the heck. I'll chance it and see what I get.
OK, so I got Puddle... not exactly what I was hoping for (but looks like it could be fun).
I've played through about half of Puddle and it's a pretty novel concept. For me it got extremely tedious fast though. And the controls are a bit awkward, to put it mildly.
@Gibbeynator: Yeah, I don't think I've been outside general chat here for at least half a year. I only stop by to check on a few threads though, and don't really spend a ton of time here.
Linux support is officially coming to GOG at some point this year. This is a much better policy change than "That's some nice worldwide pricing you're enjoying there, Germany. It'd be a shame if we took that away".
Jane Jensen's Moebius is now available to pre-order on GOG.com for 20% off the regular price. So, if you didn't back it on the kickstarter, you can pick it up.
I played a little bit of the alpha, and liked what I played of it so far. Pure classic adventure gaming goodness.
Night Dive said on Facebook that something will come into fruition in 3 days, it's probably not Lucas Arts sadly. it looks like their next release is Bad Mojo judging by previous hints.
For all you die hard DRM-free fans (or just one in particular), you can now buy Broken Age on GOG, and get 33% off for the next 48 hours. If you pledged high enough to get a Steam key... well, ask Double Fine if you get a GOG key too.
And I'm officially done with Night Dive. Whoever thought "Hey, let's waste everyone's time to hype a recovered game, but have it secretly be Harvester launching on Steam with us as the publisher" needs to be fired. Right now. I'll wait.
For everyone who has been waiting for this to show up on GOG to get into the series (which is a surprisingly large number of people, seriously, the sequel has a full recap of the first game in it), you can get The Journeyman Project: Pegasus Prime for the launch price of $7.99. You can also snag Buried in Time and Legacy of Time for 3 bucks each and play one of the best 90s adventure series that a non-LucasArts/non-Sierra studio put out.
Oh, and there's Risen 2: Dark Waters, in vanilla and Gold Editions, but who cares about that, there's an epic time travel adventure to begin!
Ladies and gentlemen, we have ourselves another popularity contest sale. Battle of the Games 2014 starts with a bunch of RPGs you probably already own and takes up to 80% off (more like 75% off since the only 80% off one appears to be The Witcher), and you get to vote on tomorrow's deal between two sets of shooters. Both sets will be on sale, but the winning set gets 75% off while the losing set gets 60% off.
GOG.com is now taking pre-orders for Blackwell Epiphany, the fifth and final game in the point and click detective adventure series by Wadjet Eye Games. It's $14.99 (the same price as it is at the Wadjet Eye Games store), but if you pre-order from GOG.com, you'll receive a GOG.com exclusive extended demo of the game.
Pre-ordering from Wadjet Eye Games will get you a Steam key for the game. Pre-ordering from either site will also get you more bonuses once they become available: behind the scenes videos, access to the video feed for the virtual launch party, and the game's soundtrack.
That's strike 2 for Night Dive, putting them squarely on my list of "companies to make sure I always set the slider to 0 on when I get their games in the Humble Bundle".
I was actually hoping the games would be the Humongous games (since Night Dive has been teasing them since Tommo bought Humongous at the Atari auction). Even though they're marketed for children, they (the Spy Fox games in particular) are quite fun, even as an adult.
That's strike 2 for Night Dive, putting them squarely on my list of "companies to make sure I always set the slider to 0 on when I get their games in the Humble Bundle".
While Steam is having their Activision weekend sale, GOG.com is having a weekend sale for another big publisher, with their Unbelievably Ubi sale that has over 40 Ubisoft games on sale for 60% off.
Uplay integrated games, i.e. all the newer Ubisoft games, are likely not to show up on gog.com for 10 years or two console generations after their release. Silly community features and forced multiplayer make extra sure that Ubi's present catalog would require quite some extra programming effort to even make it on gog one day.
For gog, Ubisoft is clearly on the downslope. Time to catch those last Uplay free pearls we can for quite a while. :(
While Steam is having their Activision weekend sale, GOG.com is having a weekend sale for another big publisher, with their Unbelievably Ubi sale that has over 40 Ubisoft games on sale for 60% off.
GOG.com is running their insomnia sale again, where they keep putting up games for up to 90% off (and if it’s anything like last time, some even free, but those are just about impossible to get) at a first come first serve basis, where once a game sells out at it’s sale price another one is put up, repeating, until the sale is over.
So, Daedalic has just been purchased by German book publisher Bastei Lübbe. How does that affect GOG? Well, now that Daedalic has the money to do so, they can make games without making distributor deals that force GOG to get games a month late without German localizations.
I will reserve judgement here. Bastei Lübbe is a strong partner financially, but it also is, very much so, a traditional publishing house. What if they decide they don't even want "difficult pricing policy" GOG - with Steam and the stone age of international pricing still around?
And I believe we'd be very wrong in assuming that bad publisher deals are off the table; for the Dark Eye license, for example, Daedalic will still have to go to its old source (old partners are supposedly still 'honored' according to the press release). Also and most importantly, Goodbye Deponia was self published. The decision to rob the game of its cultural identity on gog was in the hands of Daedalic and Daedalic alone.
Still: German voices have just been added to GOG's "Goodbye Deponia", in case anyone is still interested. Merry Christmas 2013! ;)
So, Daedalic has just been purchased by German book publisher Bastei Lübbe. How does that affect GOG? Well, now that Daedalic has the money … moreto do so, they can make games without making distributor deals that force GOG to get games a month late without German localizations.
After a year and a half long hiatus, the CDPR/GOG conference is back! CDPR will be showing off new details and pre-order bonuses for The Witcher 3, and GOG will have a big announcement regarding a super secret project. While they've said that it is absolutely not going to be GOG Early Access, don't count that out. We know they have GOG Wallet in the works, and GOG Client is still a very real possibility if they're planning on doing GOG Early Access. Personally, I'm still holding them to the comments they made in 2012. They said we'd be hearing about their next "big five" publisher at their next conference, so I'm expecting them to tell us about their next "big five" publisher next week.
It won't be new publisher deals as well though. However, I guess we might get a glimpse into gog's future functionality, i.e. the complete website overhaul.
Lastly: If GOG wants to survive, they have to be creative, first and foremost. With a hefty dose of chutzpa, Steam has introduced Early Access and somehow millions of customers have swallowed that (seriously, "pay in full way before the game is released", that's just a stroke of genius. We're talking Spaceballs' "instant cassettes" material here).
We can't completely rule out that GOG manages to present the same balls, yet in a different area of customer relations - and of course, without screwing said customers over.
Early Access is one of those things that should have worked, but didn't because devs either didn't understand or didn't care what it was supposed to be. It's supposed to be a program that lets you sell beta testing access to consumers, not a place where you can dump your unfinished game with a note saying "don't worry, it'll be fixed some day... maybe...".
It's not a misunderstanding. This service is and always was about selling games full price that do not yet exist.
Valve wrote: "You should be aware that some teams will be unable to 'finish' their game. So you should only buy an Early Access game if you are excited about playing it in its current state."
The word "beta" isn't used once in this marketing blurb written by an idiot who doesn't even know the difference between "it's" and "its" (and this text has been around for years now). The idea of a fixed point of "release" is communicated in quotation marks even, as is the idea of a "finished" game.
They are willingly and purposefully erasing the finish line (or "gold status") of games for developers and customers.
You're not buying on Early Access to betatest, but to play a game earlier than others do. That is how Valve defines the experience. They explicitly ask their customers to check out videos and screenshots first before they buy, because they will sure as hell not give them their money back. The game's current state constitutes your enjoyment, not the finished version! Valve takes the complete money of a traditional publisher and never offers its quality control or budgetary development guidance. OF COURSE with that much freedom, devs abuse the concept. But Valve takes 30% of that cake and rejects any responsibility to boot. That's a sensational way of creating money out of thin air, and it's a concept that's created to be abused - in my opinion, just like Greenlight.
Comments
You can either spend 10 bucks on a pile of microtransaction money in EA's new Dungeon Keeper freemium game, or you can spend 10 bucks and get both original Dungeon Keeper games on GOG. It's your choice, but when EA says "100 real dollars is the best value", it's a lie.
Yeah, I've heard about EAs 'new free Dungeon Keeper' shenannigans.
They'll win that worst company of America trophy three times in a row.
Because they really, REALLY want to.
Time to get your Geiger counters out of storage and venture back out into the nuclear fallout, as a familiar series of wasteland survival RPGs comes back from the radiation.
It's Valentines Day, and GOG has cooked up a much better sale than last year. First off, we've got the usual "Sliding scale on all D&D games" sale, with 80% off being the magical number this time. We've also got a ton of multiplayer games, including System Shock 2, the Trines, Alpha Centauri and even Dungeon Keeper 2 for up to 90% off. But wait, if Dungeon Keeper 2 is on sale, Dungeon Keeper Gold must be, right? Well... no. Dungeon Keeper Gold is not part of this sale, because for the next 48 hours, Dungeon Keeper Gold is absolutely free. Finally, a free-to-play Dungeon Keeper game that doesn't suck! FYI, the rules for getting free games has changed, you now have to apply for it and they'll add it to your account for you. It sucks, but it's the only way to keep from killing the servers again.
It only took a couple of minutes for the game to show up on my account, so it's not that bad even if you're desperate to play it instantly. (And if you were, you probably would have paid for it a long time ago.) (Unless you just heard about it for the first time and are all "OMG, this sounds like the best effing game ever!!!".)
GOG has booked a number of brand new, big name releases and will be offering them up for pre-order. However, to get these games, GOG has had to abandon their one price policy, so these new games will have regional pricing.
Edit: Oh goody. GOG's regional pricing is not a one off thing, this is policy going forward. One that will probably come back to bite them when it comes time to renegotiate with the big publishers.
A sad day. They were right to attempt 'no international pricing'. If they start with that, Daedalic will happily jump into it and rip off their German speaking clientele via gog.com as well. Granted, there probably won't be a studio as audacious as Daedalic (I don't think we'll see a 150% price increase just over the German border with other devs) but still this is really disheartening.
And for what? For just "three big titles" (two RPGs and one strategy game) in "months"? Three, seriously? I don't know what these "big titles" are supposed to be; judging from gog.com's previous announcements (remember "the" May?), they could still be majorly bullshit games, but even if they aren't, gog.com has already made a bad decision with that.
GOG says that international pricing is "rapidly becoming the standard". That is absurd. It has been the standard for decades in video game history, Steam did that crap from minute one, and NOW would be the time to change that.
/edit: Been reading through some of EnigmaticT's comments over there. I do hate international pricing - mostly because I've seen devs like Daedalic abuse international pricing in an absurd way. But I don't give a shit about the usual Euro equals Dollar conversions, they can do that if they please, no problem. I just hope they will at least retain that they have four and only four different pricing territories in their system, that alone should counter a lot of the abuse I've seen these last years. If gog.com wants to try it, well, let's see that action.
But these games better be good and plenty, seriously.
...I care. Usually because if they do it with Euros, they do it with Pounds as well, so we pay something like 40-50% more than we should. It's insane and I honestly thought GOG was the one place I wouldn't have to do that. Fuuuck...
Then let me rephrase and detail: Of course I care about the Dollar equals British Pound conversion, that's an atrocity. Dollar equals Euro is not a problem in Germany - in Slovakia however, it's a desaster, as 20$ is a ridiculous price tag over there generally. Prices should be LOWER there.
gog.com could not achieve this kind of fairness with a lack of regional pricing options. Opening up to international pricing would solve that problem... if businesses acted ethically, cough cough.
Some countries ended up with the short stick in gog.com's pricing yesterday, and that short stick will be handed around a bit right now. International pricing isn't really the issue, fairness is. And fairness wasn't all there yesterday as well.
The first of the three new pre-orders, Age of Wonders 3, is available for pre-order. You know, I was kind of hoping that if GOG was going to sell out their principles, we'd be getting some big name, triple-A releases out of the deal. Not... this.
I refuse to believe that THIS atrocious shit is the reason for regional pricing. No, seriously, I don't BELIEVE it.
"Big name publishers" and "triple A games", that was the wording of the news. So I'm still very much waiting for both.
Maybe if the strategy game is bollocks, the two RPGs are worth anything...
1954: Alcatraz is finally on GOG.com. It's an adventure designed by Gene Mocsy (the co-writer of Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island) through his development studio Irresponsible Games, co-developed by Daedalic. It has two playable characters, a man who tries to escape from Alcatraz prison in 1954, and his wife, who is running from gangsters who are looking for the money that her husband stole. It has multiple solutions to puzzles, that have different consequences for the characters.
I've really been looking forward to this, ever since it was first announced in 2012.
Oh, and it's not GOG.com related but it is on the subject of Gene Mocsy, so I have to mention this. If you have an iPad, check out The Perils of Man Chapter One. It's a free adventure game about risks and consequences with a steampunk vibe, and it's awesome (the puzzles are pure classic adventure and the story is really interesting so far). It's developed by IF Games and has dialog written by Gene Mocsy and a game design by Gene Mocsy and Bill Tiller (Curse of Monkey Island lead artist and founder of Autumn Moon, which developed A Vampyre Story and Ghost Pirates of Vooju Island).
IF Games said they would like to possibly port it to Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux if there's enough interest, and asked people to express interest for these ports on their forums.
And, GOG.com has come to a fair compromise for regional pricing. If a publisher requires GOG.com to have regional pricing instead of worldwide pricing, GOG.com will now give you store credit (and until they have that functionality implemented $9.99 and $5.99 gift codes) to cover the difference between the US price in those countries that have to pay more.
Specialty sale time! GOG is running their Luck of the Irish promo, essentially a pick 5 bundle, but with the twist of "instead of the list of games, you can try your luck at getting a random game from our secret list for only 2 bucks a chance". Games on the secret list appear to come up prioritized to your wishlist so... might be worth doing. Though somehow, combining a drinking holiday with a system designed for impulse purchases sounds like a bad idea.
That's a lot of good deals. I dont think Jack Keane has been anywhere near as cheap before, except when it was in a bundle recently?
Didn't know you were still around by the way.
I believe he only really hangs around here to post deals in this thread. Don't think he does much else.
If I leave general chat, I'm exposed to the endless minefield of "WHEN IS THE WALKING DEAD COMING OUT?!".
So tempted to try the luck draw. Oh, what the heck. I'll chance it and see what I get.
OK, so I got Puddle... not exactly what I was hoping for (but looks like it could be fun).
I've played through about half of Puddle and it's a pretty novel concept. For me it got extremely tedious fast though. And the controls are a bit awkward, to put it mildly.
@Gibbeynator: Yeah, I don't think I've been outside general chat here for at least half a year. I only stop by to check on a few threads though, and don't really spend a ton of time here.
Linux support is officially coming to GOG at some point this year. This is a much better policy change than "That's some nice worldwide pricing you're enjoying there, Germany. It'd be a shame if we took that away".
Jane Jensen's Moebius is now available to pre-order on GOG.com for 20% off the regular price. So, if you didn't back it on the kickstarter, you can pick it up.
I played a little bit of the alpha, and liked what I played of it so far. Pure classic adventure gaming goodness.
Night Dive said on Facebook that something will come into fruition in 3 days, it's probably not Lucas Arts sadly. it looks like their next release is Bad Mojo judging by previous hints.
For all you die hard DRM-free fans (or just one in particular), you can now buy Broken Age on GOG, and get 33% off for the next 48 hours. If you pledged high enough to get a Steam key... well, ask Double Fine if you get a GOG key too.
And I'm officially done with Night Dive. Whoever thought "Hey, let's waste everyone's time to hype a recovered game, but have it secretly be Harvester launching on Steam with us as the publisher" needs to be fired. Right now. I'll wait.
For everyone who has been waiting for this to show up on GOG to get into the series (which is a surprisingly large number of people, seriously, the sequel has a full recap of the first game in it), you can get The Journeyman Project: Pegasus Prime for the launch price of $7.99. You can also snag Buried in Time and Legacy of Time for 3 bucks each and play one of the best 90s adventure series that a non-LucasArts/non-Sierra studio put out.
Oh, and there's Risen 2: Dark Waters, in vanilla and Gold Editions, but who cares about that, there's an epic time travel adventure to begin!
Night Dive wrote this on Twitter yesterday:"In the near future we're going to get to preview our next release(s)! So... that is exciting. Right?"
Ladies and gentlemen, we have ourselves another popularity contest sale. Battle of the Games 2014 starts with a bunch of RPGs you probably already own and takes up to 80% off (more like 75% off since the only 80% off one appears to be The Witcher), and you get to vote on tomorrow's deal between two sets of shooters. Both sets will be on sale, but the winning set gets 75% off while the losing set gets 60% off.
GOG.com is now taking pre-orders for Blackwell Epiphany, the fifth and final game in the point and click detective adventure series by Wadjet Eye Games. It's $14.99 (the same price as it is at the Wadjet Eye Games store), but if you pre-order from GOG.com, you'll receive a GOG.com exclusive extended demo of the game.
Pre-ordering from Wadjet Eye Games will get you a Steam key for the game. Pre-ordering from either site will also get you more bonuses once they become available: behind the scenes videos, access to the video feed for the virtual launch party, and the game's soundtrack.
That's strike 2 for Night Dive, putting them squarely on my list of "companies to make sure I always set the slider to 0 on when I get their games in the Humble Bundle".
I was actually hoping the games would be the Humongous games (since Night Dive has been teasing them since Tommo bought Humongous at the Atari auction). Even though they're marketed for children, they (the Spy Fox games in particular) are quite fun, even as an adult.
It's nice to see Humongous Entertainment titles on Steam (plus 22 more to join them by the 6th of June). Hopefully they'll be coming to GOG soon.
Uplay integrated games, i.e. all the newer Ubisoft games, are likely not to show up on gog.com for 10 years or two console generations after their release. Silly community features and forced multiplayer make extra sure that Ubi's present catalog would require quite some extra programming effort to even make it on gog one day.
For gog, Ubisoft is clearly on the downslope. Time to catch those last Uplay free pearls we can for quite a while. :(
And I believe we'd be very wrong in assuming that bad publisher deals are off the table; for the Dark Eye license, for example, Daedalic will still have to go to its old source (old partners are supposedly still 'honored' according to the press release). Also and most importantly, Goodbye Deponia was self published. The decision to rob the game of its cultural identity on gog was in the hands of Daedalic and Daedalic alone.
Still: German voices have just been added to GOG's "Goodbye Deponia", in case anyone is still interested. Merry Christmas 2013! ;)
After a year and a half long hiatus, the CDPR/GOG conference is back! CDPR will be showing off new details and pre-order bonuses for The Witcher 3, and GOG will have a big announcement regarding a super secret project. While they've said that it is absolutely not going to be GOG Early Access, don't count that out. We know they have GOG Wallet in the works, and GOG Client is still a very real possibility if they're planning on doing GOG Early Access. Personally, I'm still holding them to the comments they made in 2012. They said we'd be hearing about their next "big five" publisher at their next conference, so I'm expecting them to tell us about their next "big five" publisher next week.
Wojciech Mroczek/GDoc of GOG told me.
Seriously, PERSONALLY told ME. So I do count it out for now.
But just in case they carry on with that idea, don't forget to sign that we've told them what would happen:
http://www.gog.com/wishlist/site/dont_implement_an_early_access_functionality
It won't be new publisher deals as well though. However, I guess we might get a glimpse into gog's future functionality, i.e. the complete website overhaul.
Lastly: If GOG wants to survive, they have to be creative, first and foremost. With a hefty dose of chutzpa, Steam has introduced Early Access and somehow millions of customers have swallowed that (seriously, "pay in full way before the game is released", that's just a stroke of genius. We're talking Spaceballs' "instant cassettes" material here).
We can't completely rule out that GOG manages to present the same balls, yet in a different area of customer relations - and of course, without screwing said customers over.
Early Access is one of those things that should have worked, but didn't because devs either didn't understand or didn't care what it was supposed to be. It's supposed to be a program that lets you sell beta testing access to consumers, not a place where you can dump your unfinished game with a note saying "don't worry, it'll be fixed some day... maybe...".
It's not a misunderstanding. This service is and always was about selling games full price that do not yet exist.
http://store.steampowered.com/earlyaccessfaq/
The word "beta" isn't used once in this marketing blurb written by an idiot who doesn't even know the difference between "it's" and "its" (and this text has been around for years now). The idea of a fixed point of "release" is communicated in quotation marks even, as is the idea of a "finished" game.
They are willingly and purposefully erasing the finish line (or "gold status") of games for developers and customers.
You're not buying on Early Access to betatest, but to play a game earlier than others do. That is how Valve defines the experience. They explicitly ask their customers to check out videos and screenshots first before they buy, because they will sure as hell not give them their money back. The game's current state constitutes your enjoyment, not the finished version! Valve takes the complete money of a traditional publisher and never offers its quality control or budgetary development guidance. OF COURSE with that much freedom, devs abuse the concept. But Valve takes 30% of that cake and rejects any responsibility to boot. That's a sensational way of creating money out of thin air, and it's a concept that's created to be abused - in my opinion, just like Greenlight.
Age of Empires. Let's hope Microsoft brings it back.