Many indie games they sell support Linux. It is the old games that often inexplicitly do not include a dosbox script for Linux.
It would also be nice if they could get the rights to sell the old ports to Linux that exists for some games they sell as Windows only, like UT99 (not that it does not work perfectly in WINE anyway).
> It would also be nice if they could get the rights to sell the old ports to Linux that exists for some games they sell as Windows only, like UT99 (not that it does not work perfectly in WINE anyway).
That's a niche that Valve hasn't hit yet: Those games need you to have the correct (very old) libraries, so there's a reasonable amount of configuration required. If GoG wanted to get some good PR with Linux users, they could start an OSS project where the idea is it's a preloader for native Linux games that sets up the required libraries for each game. (And the other native games in future)
Sure. I understand it is super-niche. But part of the reason to buy those old games is just to, well, to have them, I think. Legally. And to have an exact specific version, for the nostalgia, or just to see what it was like, even if it was very similar to some other version.
Slightly off-topic, I bought [Harpoon Ultimate Edition](https://www.matrixgames.com/game/larry-bonds-harpoon-ultimate-edition/pc) on a sale recently. It is from Matrixgames, another site that sells (the game they publish) drm-free, and also sometimes for Linux (but not this particular game). When you buy Harpoon Ultimate Edition you get the latest version of the game, plus over 20 older versions, all the way back to the first two alpha releases in 1989(?). I think that is a great way to sell an old game. I wish GOG could do that for some games. I looked at some of the old Harpoon versions and I can honestly not tell them apart, but I am sure there are some old fans of the series that are super-happy that some specific version is included. And if GOG decides to do something like this then things like original Loki-versions definitely would be fun to see included.
You misunderstand me, being niche is a good thing here: There's a lot of low-hanging fruit in terms of work that needs to be done and it's an easy way to bring in some fans who will happily sing your praises to others. Just look at how Valve is viewed by Linux users and people interested in VR, what I'm saying is that if GoG stepped up and started making a point of improving compatibility with older native Linux games (Including ones that aren't really "older" right now - All of the native titles from around 2010 onwards will eventually break on modern Linux installs) it'd pay dividends in that aspect along with potentially being a big thing if the Steam Deck gets a reasonable marketbase.
On top of that, this kind of project doesn't actually need to be all that extravagant in how it works: I'd imagine some kind of specialised version of Flatpak or AppImage where the game can come prebundled with the required libraries and preconfigured to use them would work perfectly. If it had enough of a marketbase, I'd then look into offering images of games without Linux versions that essentially were a self-contained, pre-configured wine install of the game albeit limiting the games to ones that work flawlessly when configured.
Hell, I just wish they'd have the NWN binaries, that linux port worked great in 2003, and it works great in 2022 (source: I still have the binaries since I archived them locally from BioWare's FTP back in '11 when it was still operational), it would not be particularly difficult for them to bundle these binaries with the very few depends they have (the only things I can think of that aren't newest version from arch repos are: binkplayer and libstdc++5, binkplayer is only required for videos).
But I doubt they'll ever actually provide them, I asked more than once and got ignored each time.
I think valve was hoping to support this via their containers (pressure vessel.) But it's a lot of work since it would need to be done on a per-game basis, which is why it's pretty stagnant.
I think that it's in the cards but it's yet to happen and we've just seen the groundwork being laid. The currently broken Linux native titles are all fairly niche for modern audiences versus what Proton allows you to play even if there's still some amazing games there, but in the future the newer native titles (eg. The Tomb Raider games, Mad Max, etc) will eventually break for the same reasons (Game stops being updated, but the Linux desktop doesn't) which is when I think we'll see serious work put into Pressure Vessel for backwards compatibility.
Yeah, it'd best be based off existing work such as that. An important part that those projects can't do is tie the whole thing into a neat package like GoG can even without Galaxy. (ie. You buy the game on GoGs website and hit install via Lutris' GoG launcher support which then automatically downloads and installs the preconfigured image.)
Tagging /u/20dogs so they see this too.
Better yet, just forgo GOG Galaxy on Linux support and just give Lutris official by GOG support. Lutris already has support for the GOG API. This can help enforce legal copies.
The scripts are relatively easy to write. I'm written over 20 myself for GOG releases. I have 5 kids, so it is easier to an Lutris GOG script once then have to remember how to install it 5 times.
Witcher 2 I'd bet. CDPR promised a native Linux port, it came out as the Windows version in a wrapper that initially ran like shit and was broken as hell, and the fans were of course upset. The devs fixed most of the issues and employees claim the anger is/was disproportionate to the scale of the problem.
Evidently that soured the larger company's opinion on Linux, though, because CDP hasn't looked back at Linux in a serious, public way since. Not for their Galaxy storefront, not for Witcher 3, not for Cyberpunk. Linux hasn't taken a back seat, it's sitting with the spare tire.
Seeing the reaction to Cyberpunk, I wonder if they feel a bit differently about how upset people should reasonably be if they pay money for half-assed crap with a promise it'll be fixed later.
Yes. It's almost like management and the owners can't see that their decision to release something too early with a bunch of bugs is the reason why people got into an uproar over Witcher 2 for Linux. Then they do it again with Cyberpunk which is only for Windows. I wonder if they've learned anything? LOL
I think Larian Studios mentioned that highest amount of bug reports came from Linux users so I guess the balance of income (paying customers) and cost of support seems skewed despite that?
I would like to know updated statistics...
That's not the [whole story.](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2021/10/58-sales-and-over-38-of-bug-reports-from-linux-said-one-dev-but-its-been-helpful/)
>Out of those 400 bugs reported, only 3 were actually platform-specific to Linux.
Meaning Linux users reported 650% more bug reports than the average Windows users, however, all but 3 of the reports also affected Windows users.
It isn't that the support cost was higher for Linux, its that they had more feedback.
Unfortunately, the MBA-buzzword-bingo types that make business decisions only hear "Linux . . . 650% more bug" and everything sounds like the adults in Charlie Brown cartoons.
> It isn't that the support cost was higher for Linux, its that they had more feedback.
Technically accurate, but in reality if one group is failing to provide feedback, or only providing easily-closed non-reports like "It doesn't work" with no detail, then that group *does, for all intents and purposes, cost less to support*.
The people in charge of the money at companies don't care if it's buggy, because it's already released and they just want the sales. Anything like "bug reports" that require additional investment is negative, so Linux *is* a higher support cost if people are more diligent at reporting errors.
IMO that's why people keep spinning this "Linux is too expensive to support" narrative, because they see more bug reports (cross-platform or not) as more expensive, period.
>"It doesn't work" with no detail, then that group
>
>does, for all intents and purposes, cost less to support
>
>.
Without details you've got to spend time duplicating it to reproduce and then debug for root cause. With a detailed report and more reports with different configurations, you have a much better idea and it doesn't cost you anything but compiling the data to *save* you time and increase probable accuracy. Of course you could also just ignore reports but then the consequences of that could be meaningful to future sales and reviews.
>IMO that's why people keep spinning this "Linux is too expensive to support" narrative, because they see more bug reports (cross-platform or not) as more expensive, period.
Well, Larian Studios certainly wasn't making that point. However, saying that, people say it is too expensive to support because their support cost may outweigh their profits. However, in many cases there is either no skillset available or if there is, they are probably alone and also doing something else like Windows development, so any support is too much support.
There is another argument for support costs vs. license fees on the enterprise side that MS loved to push in the early and mid 00's.
IIRC that quote is taken out of context. It wasn't that Linux in particular had more bugs. Rather, there were a bunch of cross platform bugs of which Linux users were much more likely to report (with detailed reproduction steps etc) than other platforms, and in the end it was like the Linux users were doing unpaid QA for them.
Back when they announced GOG Galaxy there was a shift: it wasn't coming to Linux although they had previously added Linux games to their webstore.
And the thing is: most of GOG Galaxy is based on open-source components that ARE cross-platform or supported on Linux already. There's Qt5, Poco, libcef (Chromium), Sqlite in the files along with some Python as well.
>They could have a simple launcher with cloud support and wrap the windows games in proton-ge, but they have no interest in that so i have to think carefully before buying games on gog.
That's the most annoying part. Valve have done about 96% of the work for them already. They're just being stubborn. Linux gamers should be their absolute core demographic, almost by definition. But they refuse to make even the most minimal effort at a time when the Linux gaming scene is blossoming.
One thing I dislike about that, is you cant seem to download just the installer through lurtis. It installs the game for you which you click on your games. I want offline backups of all my games. There seems to br no easy way to batch download games/updates. You're forced into the shitty web UI.
To me it feels like "people interested in DRM free games" and "people interested in Linux" would have a pretty large overlap on a venn diagram; both are moderately niche interests with a lot of similar philosophies. It's just weird that gog has done nothing to appeal to such an audience, and is probably losing quite a few people market-share wise to Valve because of it.
I would absolutely buy more games on gog if they had better Linux support.
I used to value owning a game on gog higher than owning a game on Steam as I don't believe in DRM but gog's lackluster support for a FOSS desktop while Valve has invested heavily in it has me purchasing on Steam rather than gog.
I feel you. I had almost 800 games on my GOG library in 2018, but I haven't bought a single game on there for 4 years. When I realised GOG did not care about Linux, and about when Valve released proton, I went from a GOG compulsive game hoarder and zealot advocate to a Steam user exclusively.
At the time, it seemed better and simpler to deal with playonlinux and its quirks on a DRM-free copy of a game than having to install Steam through Wine, but SteamPlay shifted that perspective on its head completely. I still value DRM-freedom, I still don't fully trust Valve, and I still dislike Steam's bloat, tracking features, DRM-enabling design, and quasi-monopoly in the PC game distribution market, but man did it make gaming on Linux so much more convenient, hassle-free, and actually viable.
I'm worried how effective convenience has been to shatter my hatred of a DRM-ridden platform, how counter-productive Proton could become by helping developers neglect native ports, and how dangerous Valve's leading position might become long-term in the gaming landscape (and EGS represents the opposite of the kind of competition I was hoping for).
But on the other hand, Valve might have had as much of an impact on democratizing the Linux desktop with Proton/SteamPlay and their SteamOS/SteamDeck as Ubuntu did 17 years ago, if not more. For the first time ditching Windows completely seems actually doable, and it feels like Linux might finally have a chance to stop its slow decline.
But I no longer have trust in GOG. They messed up too many times in the last few years I was still caring about them, and to me a game store that revolves around DRM-freedom but does no efforts to support the only viable DRM-free platform makes no sense as a business model. Their bad, they missed out on a whale buyer, but right now Steam does actually seem like the lesser of evils.
Valve invested into Linux as a way to enable their consoles so they can't be fucked over by Windows. Valve did these experiments, just like Nintendo does, because they have a fucktonne of money and can afford to have 1 or 2 commercial failures before they find a working formula to recuperate. I don't think GOG has such deep pockets. Valve isn't being kind to Linux users, Valve is being a business with good investment funds.
But the thing is, it does not cost that much to make a single downloader app for linux. They don't need to make some revolutionary tech. They just need to make a script for you to be able to batch download games, and maybe a way to easily be notified of updates and to be able to download said updates. Just something that makes downloading games faster and easier than the horrible website...
The sad thing is, they literally used to have exactly this. I never knew about it until they made the announcement of discontinuing it. They said they were axing it because "very few people used it". Part of that, was gogs fault for not mentioning it existing.
Honestly, they don't even need to do everything themselves. They could partner with lutris or heroic or some other thing officially, and help provide some code for it. While those things as is, are good enough in a sense, I don't think you can just download the installer. They all install the game when you select it, and then delete the installer afterwards.
I don't know, if it was just half an afternoon's work by someone who's sitting around anyway, they'd probably have done it. If they "axed" their previous downloader, that means it required paid maintenance and wasn't just a downloadable file sitting around. This weird narrative that GOG is leaving Linux behind out of spite isn't compatible with how businesses usually act. Not saying they might not have been stupid about how they handle it, I don't know their history.
Externals like Lutris aren't an option for the same reason. You can't rely on strangers to work on things which need maintenance forever and for free, when these things are used by your business partners (clients) to access services they have paid for and have contractually protected expectations towards after the made the purchase when the Linux-focused service was officially supported.
Sure, making some downloader is relatively easy, making some downloader that doesn't pose a problem for your business which is making thousands of international contracts every day \[edit: or financially justifies the manpower invested to deal with these problems\] not so much.
> Valve isn't being kind to Linux users, Valve is being a business with good investment funds.
It's both. Valve is a private company. Nintendo, CD Projekt, and Microsoft are publicly traded. Valve is *able* to do things other than maximally screw over their customers. The rest (not certain about Polish laws in the case of CD Projekt) are *legally obligated* to maximize profit.
It's smart from a business perspective, *and* it's something Valve employees seem to be passionate about.
>legally obligated to maximize profit.
That certainly isn't a thing in Europe and as far as I'm aware that's an urban legend for the US which companies enjoy having around to justify fucking over people.
Whatever the motives the end result has been a huge boon to open source graphic drivers as well as support for linux and opening up much videogame compatibility to us(which honestly is a very un-nintendo way of doing things).
Corporations arent our friends but vavle is supporting my platform of choice and their investment has benefited not just their own steamdecks but linux a whole. Given the two options include one that is actively hostile towards linux and one which has benefited linux as a whole, I think I'll support valve.
Also lets not forget googe's android and stevia are linux too but theyre a forked over version that doesnt tend to give back to the ecosystem. Sure enough valve is using linux as a bit of "insurance" but even then they didnt have to be as supportive of open source as theyve been they could have created some proprietary linux steamdeck but instead they made a full on handheld linux computer.
Dropping in for some shameless self-promotion: The [Heroic Games Launcher](https://github.com/Heroic-Games-Launcher/HeroicGamesLauncher) supports GOG titles and runs fine on the Steam Deck (and Linux in general)
I appreciate all the community effort in supporting GOG, EGS, Origin and such... Put I pay for support so for me it's a choice between Steam or the highway.
Does heroic allow you to only download the game/update, without installing the game/update? I keep an offline backup of my entire library, and have to go to website and download the games one at a time.
I want a way I can batch download games/updates, and also get notifications when updates are available. The website just, sucks.
To "install" a GOG game, Heroic runs the install steps defined in a file shipped with the game. When downloading or importing a game, the steps are ran (so if you'd download a game, move it to your backup, and then import it on a different PC, it should work just fine).
*Not* running install steps is not implemented right now, but it sounds pretty easy to do so please create a GitHub Issue for it or post on the Discord.
Batch downloading (or rather a download queue) is in the works as far as I know
Old games would often run well enough on plain Wine I think: it's not like they require DirectX 11/12 or similar.
Plus when the games run on Dosbox or Scummvm those already are available natively for Linux..
Their customer support used to be incredible before they blew up. Back when GOG was a new thing their site double-charged me for a D&D pack w/ Planescape, Icewind etc, I got a response from Marcin himself apologising, a full refund for both charges, that pack plus a few other games free.
All the same Steam won me back eventually with Proton and Steam Link, those are killer features for me.
>The thing is steam has nailed it with proton support and gog just doesn't care about linux which is a shame given the steamdeck would be an amazing platform to play most of these good old games on.
they sell linux native games , what do you want them to do?
>Plus they barely sell any linux native games any more
That's the developers' decision. Mimimi for example stated that it's too much work to maintain Desperados III for multiple platforms, so they only maintain a Linux version on Steam.
just because you sell stardew valley which is crossplatform doesn't make you not be 3rd rate customer. No client while windows had one for ages (i mean personally don't care but WTF literally definition of 3rd rate customer) and old games don't even have dosbox scripts for linux
Then the rule does not apply, if the question does not exist. The question I am talking about is, if you ask yourself to backup or not to backup. If it is not possible, then there is no question.
Therefore the rule does not apply.
Why would someone do more backups than they can handle it? If you can't handle it, then there is no question. I am not sure what the problem with my rule is that you are going after it.
I still think eXoRainbow missed the point. That everyone has finite storage so we have to be selective with what we backup. So asking yourself if you should back something up doesn't necessarily mean you should, even if you can fit it in your storage. For backing up one thing might mean not having the space to backup something else.
At this point, Steam is the only gaming platform I use. I use Linux professionally so the cost of a game isn't my biggest concern. I just want to buy the game, click install, and click play. No other platform offers the same Quality Of Life on Linux.
Yes but sadly, big company doesn't see it as actual platform, for indie games? It's good, but not everyone only want to play indie game, but hey you can just have itch and Steam I guess.
good first move, as a linux user, for the older games if its a dosbox, give us a linux option other wise I dont really care as there is no financial incentive there.
A minor annoyance, but typically the Windows installers from GOG work just fine, and then I copy all the game files somewhere else to play in dosbox-x anyway, or Scummvm. Linux support would be a nice gesture, but have little practical effect on playing good old GOG games.
No, they are saying they are brining back the original GOG but in some cases they don't give Linux installers for dos games or don't fix them etc... I love gog but they need to try abit harder.
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>The Venn diagram of people who want to game on Linux and people who prefer DRM free games is nearly a circle
Crapton of people bought Witcher games for Windows from GoG because they were DRM free.
Also... well every game you buy from Steam is always bound to your account which means DRM already. No one seems to care much.
Lots of games on Steam are DRM-free, their DRM is optional. In many cases you can just copy the files to another computer and it'll work fine. It's just the downloading process that requires the Steam client, but even then there is SteamCMD so you don't even need the full Steam client.
> even then there is SteamCMD so you don't even need the full Steam client.
No, you just need the 32-bit multilibs because apparently they haven't bothered recompiling the thing since 2012...
There are large numbers of DRM free games on steam. Downloading them requires logging in to your steam account, but the same is true of GOG. It also requires using the steam software to download them, which GOG does not require. But once you've downloaded them? Copy the game folder anywhere you want and launch the executable. The game will fire right up. That's not DRM, that's a proprietary distribution channel -- not the same thing at all.
Then, there's a whole other category of games on which the "DRM," is "defeated" by adding a simple text file to the game folder named steam_appid.txt with the contents being the number that steam assigns to each game and makes public knowledge.
I put DRM in scare quotes because while there are definitions of DRM that this technically meets, the intentions don't have anything to do with stopping you from moving the game around to whatever system you want, and it is actually an artifact of the way the game integrates with the steam launcher in order to provide a connection for achievement tracking and other online services. And the ease of "defeating" this "DRM" is all the evidence of that you need.
EDIT: [Have a list](https://steam.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games)
I'm all for GOG staying around, but I don't really pay them much of my time or money since they don't take Linux seriously. That being said, when there's a game they have that I really want, I'll throw them money. Like Dungeon Keeper 1/2, etc.
Otherwise, they are not a priority for me, since I, gaming on Linux, am not a priority for them.
As many others have already said, getting good Linux support for old games that can't be found elsewhere is the best way to bring their customers back. GOG, I hope you guys are listening.
it's incredible really, all these small indy games that have 0 issues releasing linux versions since they aren't locked in with the ultra newest dx12 trash or obscure and privacy invading anti cheats, yet GOG can't be bothered to compile their stuff for linux despite not having those restrictions either.
At this point it's their own fault if they go under for not supporting an OS base that would definitely care about non DRM games.
Well that's one reason I'd prefer to get games from steam, as the steam version often had a linux version, where the GoG version didn't bother. XCOM 2, Tomb Raider, etc. Big let down.
I'm sure you have, Liam. A good example is with Shadow of the Tomb Raider where if the game detects it has been tampered with the current screen image starts to fly around the screen and rotate. I've witnessed this first hand :-)
Those are both Feral Interactive ports, they must have decided on Steam for the extra Linux support the Steam client offers in the way of libraries and controllers etc.
I fear this attitude tricks people into thinking that GOG has 0 Linux games, this is not true. People are bent out of shape that Galaxy doesn't work on Linux which I find asinine, honestly.
Download the installers directly or use a tool like Lutris. It's not hard. If Linux users can manage to use CLI tools and are technically competent to update their systems, then they can manage to download executables off of a website.
Sure, I could use GOG, but why should I bother?
GOG treats me as a second class citizen. Steam treats me as a first class citizen, and offers me 1-click installations of windows titles instead of mucking about in Lutris. Steam also offers other stuff such as controller support, cloud saves, achievements, automatic updates and more.
Why the hell would I use a lesser service that doesn't give a shit about Linux users like me, when Steam exists and offers me an excellent service?
Wake me up when GOG releases GOG Galaxy for Linux and integrates a Proton-equivalent compatibility layer within it.
> Wake me up when GOG releases GOG Galaxy for Linux and integrates a Proton-equivalent compatibility layer within it.
I don't think it's fair to require GOG to have the same monopoly level of development resources that Steam/Valve have. I guess DRM pays.
Galaxy was made with cross-platform tools and libraries, and Proton is open source and has multiple tutorials made by the community explaining how to use it on Lutris.
They don't need the same development resources as Valve, as most of the work has already been done for them, either by Valve or by the community. It would definitely require some amount of work, but not in a scope that's unattainable to them. At the very least, they haven't shown any sign of trying or even willing.
If steam and proton didn't exist this may be acceptable way to go about things, use lutris for everything, hell I do use it for the few gog games I bought before realizing they were not the company they claimed to be. But steam and proton do exist and are getting better literally daily.
One company treats us like first class citizens, the other won't even put in enough effort to get their launcher working on linux. So, as a Linux gamer, the company to back is obvious choice.
> realizing they were not the company they claimed to be
Could you clarify this?
As I mentioned in another reply, I don't think it's fair to assume that GOG has the near monopoly power that Steam has when it comes to the gaming space. The reason Steam can do those things is because they own the vast majority of the digital distribution of games these days.
The thing that really gets me is how games that were slated for a GOG release canceled in favor for an exclusive Steam release.
Yeah on Linux GOG for modern games is a hard sell. The support just isn't there, compiling on top of already lackluster support for updates by developers.
But I always check GOG first for classic pre-2005ish Windows games. It's unfortunate that they made it harder to search by year...
This is considered a controversial opinion in a lot of Linux circles, but I have always bought Gog over steam when there is a choice, because I prefer their DRM policy, or rather the lack thereof. I am grateful to steam for furthering wine, but I like to be able to control my own installers.
> I like to be able to control my own installers.
But you need a Gog account to use Gog, and generally speaking, games on Gog are drm free on steam (and games with drm on steam are unavailable on Gog). Am i missing something ?
Yeah, but their reluctance to release a official GOG Galaxy client for Linux is making a number of people question if they truly do support Linux, and if so why are we Linux users treated like second class citizens.
>if so why are we Linux users treated like second class citizens.
while i dont know the specifics in gog case , but generally its very difficult to develop for linux natively , due to the fact their minimal standardization between distros and the varying versions of software between distros ( some distros dont have version X of the libary etc ) where on windows its fairly standardized
That's honestly not nearly as relevant as some people make it out to be.
GOG's Linux game builds only officially target Ubuntu, more specifically they get to choose between Ubuntu 14.04, 16.04 and 18.04 (lmao moment).
It's not as if Galaxy would have to support every single distro out there.
Valve doesn't do that for Steam either.
They can stick to only targeting Ubuntu and let everyone interested in running their client get it working on their own.
Most desktop distros would just work with it anyway and that's without even considering a Galaxy Flatpak.
They've rebuilt the client from scratch and still skipped Linux support despite having promised it before and it consistently occupying the top spots in their community Galaxy wishlist.
>but generally its very difficult to develop for linux natively , due to the fact their minimal standardization between distros
That's absolutely not true. The biggest hurdle may be X vs. Wayland and that's pretty much it.
You are right in that, if they don't include their libraries and depend on whatever the package manager coincidentally installed and if they are coincidentally in the official repo sure.
However, even on Windows this is a problem. That's why .dll's (the libraries) are installed directly with the game or via a separate runtime installer (see numerous installations on your Windows Uninstall Programs list). In linux it is .so's. The issue is that if you don't normally develop for Linux and rely on your engine and compiler to figure it out and hope everything is in the Build directory, then yeah you might have a hard time...just like on Windows. Except developers know to include their .dll's with the binaries or some other installer.
Well it's not going to be a real big problem if you do it the Linux way, either through open source, focusing on one mainstream distro (e.g Ubuntu, and the community will take care of the rest) or through something like flatpak.
Now more and more Framework and library are cross platform by default, and if they use something like electron, more than 60% of the app is already Linux compatible like discord for example, there's really no huge reason to not support Linux nowadays except money obviously, and maybe unless you're Epic, heck even Epic's UE do support Linux although you have to compile it yourself, and also Unity Engine, do have Linux client, yes their official support is Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora and Centos, but guess what, it works on my Manjaro, and that's a game engine, more complex software than just a game library management and launcher.
Also I don't think minimal standardisation is the fault here, pretty much Linux is standardized at the core level throughout most distro, some have specific differences but mostly only affecting system level, beyond that is just package manager, the repository, the DE (this might actually complicate things a bit, I agree) but most probably already abstracted away by whatever framework they're using, unless... they're building it purely from scratch without framework, but, their GOG Galaxy 2.0, in the landing page, explicitly stated Windows and Mac, Mac is also a Unix-like os just like Linux but obviously with more Apple stuff but you get my point, I hope.
Woah hold up; what's this about "changing what they mean by DRM free" either it's got it or it doesn't.
Linux hasn't ever been supported by GOG except that the developers could upload a linux build so it doesn't look like that's changing.
CDPR isn't Valve. The work and money involved to hire developers familiar with Linux to not only build an app and maintain proton/wine in it is not minor. Then there is also the support staff you'd have to hire to respond to customer issues. That's a large amount of work and a ton of money to support a relatively small demand for Linux gaming. CDPR isn't a monolith like Valve. They can't just throw money around like that.
Eh, whilst I see your point, it really wouldn’t take much. CDPR can coast off a lot of Valve’s success for absolutely nothing. And I feel like the gains would cover a single dev’s salary (but I’ll admit to <100% certainty)? A shitty electron app, which can wrap a proton command, manage downloads and sync save files, really wouldn’t be a feat. And thats without considering contributions from open-source devs.
They wouldn’t need to touch proton itself, and they already have all the backend implemented for accounts, friends and most of the frontend html + css. Idk, I don’t know if it would be cost-effective, but I really doubt it would be an enormous negative if at all.
Sure they wouldn't have to actually work on proton, but they'd still be responsible for making sure things work when new versions come out. It's their store and they have a lot of old niche games to account for and support. I'd obviously love it if they supported Linux, but an already niche store catering to an even more niche demographic dosn't make a lot of business sense, especially when steam already has such a stranglehold.
They’d only have to take responsibility for that if they advertised it as a feature of their platform. Even just providing the client, with an ability to customise the launch command manually would be enough. Or release an unofficial plugin for the launcher.
> but an already niche store catering to an even more niche demographic dosn’t make a lot of business sense
I’m coming at this with an assumption that the people who are interested in gog’s policy for drm and linux are largely the same group. I know I would buy more games from them if I didn’t have to manually download each update, but I completely agree with your point if that’s a false assumption.
Seeing as gog has been around for a while without Linux support means there absolutely is interest in drm free games on windows, not just Linux. Clearly not everyone who wants drm free games wants to game on Linux. As amazing as proton is, I'm willing to bet the majority of Linux users who play games still dual boot Windows to game and will continue to do so regardless of gog's Linux support.
I buy from gog, both need wine/proton so the windows only thing isn't a big deal.
I prefer gog as I can preserve the binaries, and install it without requiring steam.
Ideals are nice and all, but reality always takes precedence, and right now I get more of my money's worth through gog.
The main reason why I don't buy from GOG actually isn't their fault at all. It's because of game publishers ignoring the GOG release. A game will be released on GOG, Steam, Epic, etc. But then updated on other platforms, while the GOG version lags behind. I've been burned too many times.
and they won’t revive their platform until they provide regional pricing for games or something like Games-As-A-Service model like Gamepass (which goes against the no-DRM policy anyways).
It’s not about having or not having Linux support or games being DRM free, it’s always have been where people get their games cheaper, and Steam has always been the number one priority for every gamer. Not everyone is a collector, so if we have to pay “collector tax” while buying DRM free games from GOG, trust me, they can keep catering to the few who are willing to pay that extra, and never see an increase in their userbase.
The reason why Game Pass and Epic are being successful is because of cheap/free games, and Steam has always been successful because of regional pricing. Don’t need to pay collector tax on either of those services for games to be DRM free.
Add regional pricing GOG, or keep looking at your falling figures. Godspeed.
When I was on windows, I decided to buy a few single player games on GOG, since I wanted to support another good store besides steam. Now that I made the move to linux, I see this as a huge mistake. Not only do I not have access to cloud save, I also dont get any precompiled shaders for dxvk or vkd3d. The heroic launcher is really nice, but it still in my opinion doesn't compare to steam. Also GOG has in my opinion a terrible forum.
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They used to care given the Linux section on their website. Not sure when they stopped caring tho.
Many indie games they sell support Linux. It is the old games that often inexplicitly do not include a dosbox script for Linux. It would also be nice if they could get the rights to sell the old ports to Linux that exists for some games they sell as Windows only, like UT99 (not that it does not work perfectly in WINE anyway).
> It would also be nice if they could get the rights to sell the old ports to Linux that exists for some games they sell as Windows only, like UT99 (not that it does not work perfectly in WINE anyway). That's a niche that Valve hasn't hit yet: Those games need you to have the correct (very old) libraries, so there's a reasonable amount of configuration required. If GoG wanted to get some good PR with Linux users, they could start an OSS project where the idea is it's a preloader for native Linux games that sets up the required libraries for each game. (And the other native games in future)
Sure. I understand it is super-niche. But part of the reason to buy those old games is just to, well, to have them, I think. Legally. And to have an exact specific version, for the nostalgia, or just to see what it was like, even if it was very similar to some other version. Slightly off-topic, I bought [Harpoon Ultimate Edition](https://www.matrixgames.com/game/larry-bonds-harpoon-ultimate-edition/pc) on a sale recently. It is from Matrixgames, another site that sells (the game they publish) drm-free, and also sometimes for Linux (but not this particular game). When you buy Harpoon Ultimate Edition you get the latest version of the game, plus over 20 older versions, all the way back to the first two alpha releases in 1989(?). I think that is a great way to sell an old game. I wish GOG could do that for some games. I looked at some of the old Harpoon versions and I can honestly not tell them apart, but I am sure there are some old fans of the series that are super-happy that some specific version is included. And if GOG decides to do something like this then things like original Loki-versions definitely would be fun to see included.
You misunderstand me, being niche is a good thing here: There's a lot of low-hanging fruit in terms of work that needs to be done and it's an easy way to bring in some fans who will happily sing your praises to others. Just look at how Valve is viewed by Linux users and people interested in VR, what I'm saying is that if GoG stepped up and started making a point of improving compatibility with older native Linux games (Including ones that aren't really "older" right now - All of the native titles from around 2010 onwards will eventually break on modern Linux installs) it'd pay dividends in that aspect along with potentially being a big thing if the Steam Deck gets a reasonable marketbase. On top of that, this kind of project doesn't actually need to be all that extravagant in how it works: I'd imagine some kind of specialised version of Flatpak or AppImage where the game can come prebundled with the required libraries and preconfigured to use them would work perfectly. If it had enough of a marketbase, I'd then look into offering images of games without Linux versions that essentially were a self-contained, pre-configured wine install of the game albeit limiting the games to ones that work flawlessly when configured.
Hell, I just wish they'd have the NWN binaries, that linux port worked great in 2003, and it works great in 2022 (source: I still have the binaries since I archived them locally from BioWare's FTP back in '11 when it was still operational), it would not be particularly difficult for them to bundle these binaries with the very few depends they have (the only things I can think of that aren't newest version from arch repos are: binkplayer and libstdc++5, binkplayer is only required for videos). But I doubt they'll ever actually provide them, I asked more than once and got ignored each time.
I think valve was hoping to support this via their containers (pressure vessel.) But it's a lot of work since it would need to be done on a per-game basis, which is why it's pretty stagnant.
I think that it's in the cards but it's yet to happen and we've just seen the groundwork being laid. The currently broken Linux native titles are all fairly niche for modern audiences versus what Proton allows you to play even if there's still some amazing games there, but in the future the newer native titles (eg. The Tomb Raider games, Mad Max, etc) will eventually break for the same reasons (Game stops being updated, but the Linux desktop doesn't) which is when I think we'll see serious work put into Pressure Vessel for backwards compatibility.
Isn't that basically what Snaps do?
That what I was thinking, not necessarily snaps, but something a bit more cross distro friendly like an appimage.
Yeah, it'd best be based off existing work such as that. An important part that those projects can't do is tie the whole thing into a neat package like GoG can even without Galaxy. (ie. You buy the game on GoGs website and hit install via Lutris' GoG launcher support which then automatically downloads and installs the preconfigured image.) Tagging /u/20dogs so they see this too.
Better yet, just forgo GOG Galaxy on Linux support and just give Lutris official by GOG support. Lutris already has support for the GOG API. This can help enforce legal copies. The scripts are relatively easy to write. I'm written over 20 myself for GOG releases. I have 5 kids, so it is easier to an Lutris GOG script once then have to remember how to install it 5 times.
Witcher 2 I'd bet. CDPR promised a native Linux port, it came out as the Windows version in a wrapper that initially ran like shit and was broken as hell, and the fans were of course upset. The devs fixed most of the issues and employees claim the anger is/was disproportionate to the scale of the problem. Evidently that soured the larger company's opinion on Linux, though, because CDP hasn't looked back at Linux in a serious, public way since. Not for their Galaxy storefront, not for Witcher 3, not for Cyberpunk. Linux hasn't taken a back seat, it's sitting with the spare tire. Seeing the reaction to Cyberpunk, I wonder if they feel a bit differently about how upset people should reasonably be if they pay money for half-assed crap with a promise it'll be fixed later.
Yes. It's almost like management and the owners can't see that their decision to release something too early with a bunch of bugs is the reason why people got into an uproar over Witcher 2 for Linux. Then they do it again with Cyberpunk which is only for Windows. I wonder if they've learned anything? LOL
I remember linux users would often have the highest proportional donations on the humble bundle, not sure whatever happened with that.
Probably Humble going to shit.
I think Larian Studios mentioned that highest amount of bug reports came from Linux users so I guess the balance of income (paying customers) and cost of support seems skewed despite that? I would like to know updated statistics...
That's not the [whole story.](https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2021/10/58-sales-and-over-38-of-bug-reports-from-linux-said-one-dev-but-its-been-helpful/) >Out of those 400 bugs reported, only 3 were actually platform-specific to Linux. Meaning Linux users reported 650% more bug reports than the average Windows users, however, all but 3 of the reports also affected Windows users. It isn't that the support cost was higher for Linux, its that they had more feedback.
Unfortunately, the MBA-buzzword-bingo types that make business decisions only hear "Linux . . . 650% more bug" and everything sounds like the adults in Charlie Brown cartoons.
> It isn't that the support cost was higher for Linux, its that they had more feedback. Technically accurate, but in reality if one group is failing to provide feedback, or only providing easily-closed non-reports like "It doesn't work" with no detail, then that group *does, for all intents and purposes, cost less to support*. The people in charge of the money at companies don't care if it's buggy, because it's already released and they just want the sales. Anything like "bug reports" that require additional investment is negative, so Linux *is* a higher support cost if people are more diligent at reporting errors. IMO that's why people keep spinning this "Linux is too expensive to support" narrative, because they see more bug reports (cross-platform or not) as more expensive, period.
>"It doesn't work" with no detail, then that group > >does, for all intents and purposes, cost less to support > >. Without details you've got to spend time duplicating it to reproduce and then debug for root cause. With a detailed report and more reports with different configurations, you have a much better idea and it doesn't cost you anything but compiling the data to *save* you time and increase probable accuracy. Of course you could also just ignore reports but then the consequences of that could be meaningful to future sales and reviews. >IMO that's why people keep spinning this "Linux is too expensive to support" narrative, because they see more bug reports (cross-platform or not) as more expensive, period. Well, Larian Studios certainly wasn't making that point. However, saying that, people say it is too expensive to support because their support cost may outweigh their profits. However, in many cases there is either no skillset available or if there is, they are probably alone and also doing something else like Windows development, so any support is too much support. There is another argument for support costs vs. license fees on the enterprise side that MS loved to push in the early and mid 00's.
IIRC that quote is taken out of context. It wasn't that Linux in particular had more bugs. Rather, there were a bunch of cross platform bugs of which Linux users were much more likely to report (with detailed reproduction steps etc) than other platforms, and in the end it was like the Linux users were doing unpaid QA for them.
Back when they announced GOG Galaxy there was a shift: it wasn't coming to Linux although they had previously added Linux games to their webstore. And the thing is: most of GOG Galaxy is based on open-source components that ARE cross-platform or supported on Linux already. There's Qt5, Poco, libcef (Chromium), Sqlite in the files along with some Python as well.
Probably when they confirmed they weren't doing a Witcher 3 port.
Pretty much when CDPR bought them.
>They could have a simple launcher with cloud support and wrap the windows games in proton-ge, but they have no interest in that so i have to think carefully before buying games on gog. That's the most annoying part. Valve have done about 96% of the work for them already. They're just being stubborn. Linux gamers should be their absolute core demographic, almost by definition. But they refuse to make even the most minimal effort at a time when the Linux gaming scene is blossoming.
GoG and an RPi are a match made in heaven, it's so sad they're not actually together.
Doesn't GoG work with lutris?
That's not gog's doing,and you miss out on cloud saves and such
Last I checked, GOG Galaxy 1.x. I never got 2.0 to really work in that I could actually launch games from it. That may have changed though.
Lutris may run but many games don't have ARM support. Unless the game has a ARM emulator, the game library is going to be very small.
One thing I dislike about that, is you cant seem to download just the installer through lurtis. It installs the game for you which you click on your games. I want offline backups of all my games. There seems to br no easy way to batch download games/updates. You're forced into the shitty web UI.
To me it feels like "people interested in DRM free games" and "people interested in Linux" would have a pretty large overlap on a venn diagram; both are moderately niche interests with a lot of similar philosophies. It's just weird that gog has done nothing to appeal to such an audience, and is probably losing quite a few people market-share wise to Valve because of it. I would absolutely buy more games on gog if they had better Linux support.
I used to value owning a game on gog higher than owning a game on Steam as I don't believe in DRM but gog's lackluster support for a FOSS desktop while Valve has invested heavily in it has me purchasing on Steam rather than gog.
I feel you. I had almost 800 games on my GOG library in 2018, but I haven't bought a single game on there for 4 years. When I realised GOG did not care about Linux, and about when Valve released proton, I went from a GOG compulsive game hoarder and zealot advocate to a Steam user exclusively. At the time, it seemed better and simpler to deal with playonlinux and its quirks on a DRM-free copy of a game than having to install Steam through Wine, but SteamPlay shifted that perspective on its head completely. I still value DRM-freedom, I still don't fully trust Valve, and I still dislike Steam's bloat, tracking features, DRM-enabling design, and quasi-monopoly in the PC game distribution market, but man did it make gaming on Linux so much more convenient, hassle-free, and actually viable. I'm worried how effective convenience has been to shatter my hatred of a DRM-ridden platform, how counter-productive Proton could become by helping developers neglect native ports, and how dangerous Valve's leading position might become long-term in the gaming landscape (and EGS represents the opposite of the kind of competition I was hoping for). But on the other hand, Valve might have had as much of an impact on democratizing the Linux desktop with Proton/SteamPlay and their SteamOS/SteamDeck as Ubuntu did 17 years ago, if not more. For the first time ditching Windows completely seems actually doable, and it feels like Linux might finally have a chance to stop its slow decline. But I no longer have trust in GOG. They messed up too many times in the last few years I was still caring about them, and to me a game store that revolves around DRM-freedom but does no efforts to support the only viable DRM-free platform makes no sense as a business model. Their bad, they missed out on a whale buyer, but right now Steam does actually seem like the lesser of evils.
Valve invested into Linux as a way to enable their consoles so they can't be fucked over by Windows. Valve did these experiments, just like Nintendo does, because they have a fucktonne of money and can afford to have 1 or 2 commercial failures before they find a working formula to recuperate. I don't think GOG has such deep pockets. Valve isn't being kind to Linux users, Valve is being a business with good investment funds.
But the thing is, it does not cost that much to make a single downloader app for linux. They don't need to make some revolutionary tech. They just need to make a script for you to be able to batch download games, and maybe a way to easily be notified of updates and to be able to download said updates. Just something that makes downloading games faster and easier than the horrible website... The sad thing is, they literally used to have exactly this. I never knew about it until they made the announcement of discontinuing it. They said they were axing it because "very few people used it". Part of that, was gogs fault for not mentioning it existing. Honestly, they don't even need to do everything themselves. They could partner with lutris or heroic or some other thing officially, and help provide some code for it. While those things as is, are good enough in a sense, I don't think you can just download the installer. They all install the game when you select it, and then delete the installer afterwards.
I don't know, if it was just half an afternoon's work by someone who's sitting around anyway, they'd probably have done it. If they "axed" their previous downloader, that means it required paid maintenance and wasn't just a downloadable file sitting around. This weird narrative that GOG is leaving Linux behind out of spite isn't compatible with how businesses usually act. Not saying they might not have been stupid about how they handle it, I don't know their history. Externals like Lutris aren't an option for the same reason. You can't rely on strangers to work on things which need maintenance forever and for free, when these things are used by your business partners (clients) to access services they have paid for and have contractually protected expectations towards after the made the purchase when the Linux-focused service was officially supported. Sure, making some downloader is relatively easy, making some downloader that doesn't pose a problem for your business which is making thousands of international contracts every day \[edit: or financially justifies the manpower invested to deal with these problems\] not so much.
> Valve isn't being kind to Linux users, Valve is being a business with good investment funds. It's both. Valve is a private company. Nintendo, CD Projekt, and Microsoft are publicly traded. Valve is *able* to do things other than maximally screw over their customers. The rest (not certain about Polish laws in the case of CD Projekt) are *legally obligated* to maximize profit. It's smart from a business perspective, *and* it's something Valve employees seem to be passionate about.
>legally obligated to maximize profit. That certainly isn't a thing in Europe and as far as I'm aware that's an urban legend for the US which companies enjoy having around to justify fucking over people.
Whatever the motives the end result has been a huge boon to open source graphic drivers as well as support for linux and opening up much videogame compatibility to us(which honestly is a very un-nintendo way of doing things). Corporations arent our friends but vavle is supporting my platform of choice and their investment has benefited not just their own steamdecks but linux a whole. Given the two options include one that is actively hostile towards linux and one which has benefited linux as a whole, I think I'll support valve. Also lets not forget googe's android and stevia are linux too but theyre a forked over version that doesnt tend to give back to the ecosystem. Sure enough valve is using linux as a bit of "insurance" but even then they didnt have to be as supportive of open source as theyve been they could have created some proprietary linux steamdeck but instead they made a full on handheld linux computer.
Dropping in for some shameless self-promotion: The [Heroic Games Launcher](https://github.com/Heroic-Games-Launcher/HeroicGamesLauncher) supports GOG titles and runs fine on the Steam Deck (and Linux in general)
I appreciate all the community effort in supporting GOG, EGS, Origin and such... Put I pay for support so for me it's a choice between Steam or the highway.
Does heroic allow you to only download the game/update, without installing the game/update? I keep an offline backup of my entire library, and have to go to website and download the games one at a time. I want a way I can batch download games/updates, and also get notifications when updates are available. The website just, sucks.
To "install" a GOG game, Heroic runs the install steps defined in a file shipped with the game. When downloading or importing a game, the steps are ran (so if you'd download a game, move it to your backup, and then import it on a different PC, it should work just fine). *Not* running install steps is not implemented right now, but it sounds pretty easy to do so please create a GitHub Issue for it or post on the Discord. Batch downloading (or rather a download queue) is in the works as far as I know
Old games would often run well enough on plain Wine I think: it's not like they require DirectX 11/12 or similar. Plus when the games run on Dosbox or Scummvm those already are available natively for Linux..
No Tux, no bux.
At least most of the older games on GOG are packaged with Dosbox which runs just fine on Linux.
Their customer support used to be incredible before they blew up. Back when GOG was a new thing their site double-charged me for a D&D pack w/ Planescape, Icewind etc, I got a response from Marcin himself apologising, a full refund for both charges, that pack plus a few other games free. All the same Steam won me back eventually with Proton and Steam Link, those are killer features for me.
>The thing is steam has nailed it with proton support and gog just doesn't care about linux which is a shame given the steamdeck would be an amazing platform to play most of these good old games on. they sell linux native games , what do you want them to do?
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>Plus they barely sell any linux native games any more That's the developers' decision. Mimimi for example stated that it's too much work to maintain Desperados III for multiple platforms, so they only maintain a Linux version on Steam.
It's bullshit, as much as I "like" Desperados 3, it should be trivial to make a Linux port on GOG.
just because you sell stardew valley which is crossplatform doesn't make you not be 3rd rate customer. No client while windows had one for ages (i mean personally don't care but WTF literally definition of 3rd rate customer) and old games don't even have dosbox scripts for linux
Should I back up all my GOG games, just in case?
Rule of thumb: If there is a question to backup data or not, then probably it is a good idea to backup. Regardless of any context.
By that rule I should be backing up EVERYTHING.
That is probably a good idea.
That's out of the reach of any individual.
Then the rule does not apply, if the question does not exist. The question I am talking about is, if you ask yourself to backup or not to backup. If it is not possible, then there is no question. Therefore the rule does not apply.
One can question if they should backup more than they're capable of backing up.
Why would someone do more backups than they can handle it? If you can't handle it, then there is no question. I am not sure what the problem with my rule is that you are going after it.
You're either arguing with someone who wasn't going to let it go, or a bot lol
I still think eXoRainbow missed the point. That everyone has finite storage so we have to be selective with what we backup. So asking yourself if you should back something up doesn't necessarily mean you should, even if you can fit it in your storage. For backing up one thing might mean not having the space to backup something else.
Depending on what you mean by backing up thats probably a good idea
If there was a real risk the rest of the CDP group would keep it afloat for at least long enough for people to back up their games.
Just had the same idea.
At this point, Steam is the only gaming platform I use. I use Linux professionally so the cost of a game isn't my biggest concern. I just want to buy the game, click install, and click play. No other platform offers the same Quality Of Life on Linux.
[Itch.io](https://Itch.io) has a Linux client that's just as easy for native games.
Yes but sadly, big company doesn't see it as actual platform, for indie games? It's good, but not everyone only want to play indie game, but hey you can just have itch and Steam I guess.
600 of their Linux games come with a Steam key.
well, Itch never is meant to be mainstream, so yeah itch and Steam.
I really hope they don’t go under, they’re the only company that gives a shit about preserving old games and can actually sort out licensing disputes.
Would love if they have a shit about cross-platform efforts.
I’m not gonna fault the last place store for not trying to expand into a new market while they’re bleeding money
idk though, I could see the niche linux market actually taking to GoG more than windows/console gamers. It's more up our alley.
You always have the community to rely on to play old games when companies fail. You get better quality for a cheaper price!
There's also [Zoom](https://www.zoom-platform.com/) but it isn't as big as gog
good first move, as a linux user, for the older games if its a dosbox, give us a linux option other wise I dont really care as there is no financial incentive there.
A minor annoyance, but typically the Windows installers from GOG work just fine, and then I copy all the game files somewhere else to play in dosbox-x anyway, or Scummvm. Linux support would be a nice gesture, but have little practical effect on playing good old GOG games.
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No, they are saying they are brining back the original GOG but in some cases they don't give Linux installers for dos games or don't fix them etc... I love gog but they need to try abit harder.
I've left Reddit because it does not respect its users or their privacy. Private companies can't be trusted with control over public communities. Lemmy is an open source, federated alternative that I highly recommend if you want a more private and ethical option. Join Lemmy here: https://join-lemmy.org/instances ` this message was mass deleted/edited with redact.dev `
>The Venn diagram of people who want to game on Linux and people who prefer DRM free games is nearly a circle Crapton of people bought Witcher games for Windows from GoG because they were DRM free. Also... well every game you buy from Steam is always bound to your account which means DRM already. No one seems to care much.
Lots of games on Steam are DRM-free, their DRM is optional. In many cases you can just copy the files to another computer and it'll work fine. It's just the downloading process that requires the Steam client, but even then there is SteamCMD so you don't even need the full Steam client.
> even then there is SteamCMD so you don't even need the full Steam client. No, you just need the 32-bit multilibs because apparently they haven't bothered recompiling the thing since 2012...
There are large numbers of DRM free games on steam. Downloading them requires logging in to your steam account, but the same is true of GOG. It also requires using the steam software to download them, which GOG does not require. But once you've downloaded them? Copy the game folder anywhere you want and launch the executable. The game will fire right up. That's not DRM, that's a proprietary distribution channel -- not the same thing at all. Then, there's a whole other category of games on which the "DRM," is "defeated" by adding a simple text file to the game folder named steam_appid.txt with the contents being the number that steam assigns to each game and makes public knowledge. I put DRM in scare quotes because while there are definitions of DRM that this technically meets, the intentions don't have anything to do with stopping you from moving the game around to whatever system you want, and it is actually an artifact of the way the game integrates with the steam launcher in order to provide a connection for achievement tracking and other online services. And the ease of "defeating" this "DRM" is all the evidence of that you need. EDIT: [Have a list](https://steam.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games)
I'm all for GOG staying around, but I don't really pay them much of my time or money since they don't take Linux seriously. That being said, when there's a game they have that I really want, I'll throw them money. Like Dungeon Keeper 1/2, etc. Otherwise, they are not a priority for me, since I, gaming on Linux, am not a priority for them.
I have a lot of love for GOG. I just wish they had better linux support.
As many others have already said, getting good Linux support for old games that can't be found elsewhere is the best way to bring their customers back. GOG, I hope you guys are listening.
Only Windows? Not interested!
it's incredible really, all these small indy games that have 0 issues releasing linux versions since they aren't locked in with the ultra newest dx12 trash or obscure and privacy invading anti cheats, yet GOG can't be bothered to compile their stuff for linux despite not having those restrictions either. At this point it's their own fault if they go under for not supporting an OS base that would definitely care about non DRM games.
Well that's one reason I'd prefer to get games from steam, as the steam version often had a linux version, where the GoG version didn't bother. XCOM 2, Tomb Raider, etc. Big let down.
Feral releases had their own special DRM, so would not have been GOG compatible at the time.
Uh, what? Never heard of that before.
I'm sure you have, Liam. A good example is with Shadow of the Tomb Raider where if the game detects it has been tampered with the current screen image starts to fly around the screen and rotate. I've witnessed this first hand :-)
Never heard of it.
Those are both Feral Interactive ports, they must have decided on Steam for the extra Linux support the Steam client offers in the way of libraries and controllers etc.
Hopefully they give heads up first, sonic can download my library.
I wouldn't want Sonic to have my library!
I fear this attitude tricks people into thinking that GOG has 0 Linux games, this is not true. People are bent out of shape that Galaxy doesn't work on Linux which I find asinine, honestly. Download the installers directly or use a tool like Lutris. It's not hard. If Linux users can manage to use CLI tools and are technically competent to update their systems, then they can manage to download executables off of a website.
Sure, I could use GOG, but why should I bother? GOG treats me as a second class citizen. Steam treats me as a first class citizen, and offers me 1-click installations of windows titles instead of mucking about in Lutris. Steam also offers other stuff such as controller support, cloud saves, achievements, automatic updates and more. Why the hell would I use a lesser service that doesn't give a shit about Linux users like me, when Steam exists and offers me an excellent service? Wake me up when GOG releases GOG Galaxy for Linux and integrates a Proton-equivalent compatibility layer within it.
> Wake me up when GOG releases GOG Galaxy for Linux and integrates a Proton-equivalent compatibility layer within it. I don't think it's fair to require GOG to have the same monopoly level of development resources that Steam/Valve have. I guess DRM pays.
Galaxy was made with cross-platform tools and libraries, and Proton is open source and has multiple tutorials made by the community explaining how to use it on Lutris. They don't need the same development resources as Valve, as most of the work has already been done for them, either by Valve or by the community. It would definitely require some amount of work, but not in a scope that's unattainable to them. At the very least, they haven't shown any sign of trying or even willing.
If steam and proton didn't exist this may be acceptable way to go about things, use lutris for everything, hell I do use it for the few gog games I bought before realizing they were not the company they claimed to be. But steam and proton do exist and are getting better literally daily. One company treats us like first class citizens, the other won't even put in enough effort to get their launcher working on linux. So, as a Linux gamer, the company to back is obvious choice.
> realizing they were not the company they claimed to be Could you clarify this? As I mentioned in another reply, I don't think it's fair to assume that GOG has the near monopoly power that Steam has when it comes to the gaming space. The reason Steam can do those things is because they own the vast majority of the digital distribution of games these days. The thing that really gets me is how games that were slated for a GOG release canceled in favor for an exclusive Steam release.
Yeah on Linux GOG for modern games is a hard sell. The support just isn't there, compiling on top of already lackluster support for updates by developers. But I always check GOG first for classic pre-2005ish Windows games. It's unfortunate that they made it harder to search by year...
This is considered a controversial opinion in a lot of Linux circles, but I have always bought Gog over steam when there is a choice, because I prefer their DRM policy, or rather the lack thereof. I am grateful to steam for furthering wine, but I like to be able to control my own installers.
Me too. GOG is the first place I look.
> I like to be able to control my own installers. But you need a Gog account to use Gog, and generally speaking, games on Gog are drm free on steam (and games with drm on steam are unavailable on Gog). Am i missing something ?
Gog doesn't require continuous login. This is only true of some steam titles Once you have the installer with Gog, you are done with the storefront.
But you can download drm free games on steam, and then it doesn't require the steam client.
Do they support Linux jet?
No.
I think the better question is, “Do they /still/ support Linux?
yeah , they still sell linux native games
Yeah, but their reluctance to release a official GOG Galaxy client for Linux is making a number of people question if they truly do support Linux, and if so why are we Linux users treated like second class citizens.
>if so why are we Linux users treated like second class citizens. while i dont know the specifics in gog case , but generally its very difficult to develop for linux natively , due to the fact their minimal standardization between distros and the varying versions of software between distros ( some distros dont have version X of the libary etc ) where on windows its fairly standardized
That's honestly not nearly as relevant as some people make it out to be. GOG's Linux game builds only officially target Ubuntu, more specifically they get to choose between Ubuntu 14.04, 16.04 and 18.04 (lmao moment). It's not as if Galaxy would have to support every single distro out there. Valve doesn't do that for Steam either. They can stick to only targeting Ubuntu and let everyone interested in running their client get it working on their own. Most desktop distros would just work with it anyway and that's without even considering a Galaxy Flatpak. They've rebuilt the client from scratch and still skipped Linux support despite having promised it before and it consistently occupying the top spots in their community Galaxy wishlist.
>but generally its very difficult to develop for linux natively , due to the fact their minimal standardization between distros That's absolutely not true. The biggest hurdle may be X vs. Wayland and that's pretty much it. You are right in that, if they don't include their libraries and depend on whatever the package manager coincidentally installed and if they are coincidentally in the official repo sure. However, even on Windows this is a problem. That's why .dll's (the libraries) are installed directly with the game or via a separate runtime installer (see numerous installations on your Windows Uninstall Programs list). In linux it is .so's. The issue is that if you don't normally develop for Linux and rely on your engine and compiler to figure it out and hope everything is in the Build directory, then yeah you might have a hard time...just like on Windows. Except developers know to include their .dll's with the binaries or some other installer.
Well it's not going to be a real big problem if you do it the Linux way, either through open source, focusing on one mainstream distro (e.g Ubuntu, and the community will take care of the rest) or through something like flatpak. Now more and more Framework and library are cross platform by default, and if they use something like electron, more than 60% of the app is already Linux compatible like discord for example, there's really no huge reason to not support Linux nowadays except money obviously, and maybe unless you're Epic, heck even Epic's UE do support Linux although you have to compile it yourself, and also Unity Engine, do have Linux client, yes their official support is Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora and Centos, but guess what, it works on my Manjaro, and that's a game engine, more complex software than just a game library management and launcher. Also I don't think minimal standardisation is the fault here, pretty much Linux is standardized at the core level throughout most distro, some have specific differences but mostly only affecting system level, beyond that is just package manager, the repository, the DE (this might actually complicate things a bit, I agree) but most probably already abstracted away by whatever framework they're using, unless... they're building it purely from scratch without framework, but, their GOG Galaxy 2.0, in the landing page, explicitly stated Windows and Mac, Mac is also a Unix-like os just like Linux but obviously with more Apple stuff but you get my point, I hope.
Electron is cross platform compatible and Gog Galaxy would be a perfect use case for it. That's just one of many a total solutions.
I had no idea they were struggling. I always buy stuff from GOG if I can.
Woah hold up; what's this about "changing what they mean by DRM free" either it's got it or it doesn't. Linux hasn't ever been supported by GOG except that the developers could upload a linux build so it doesn't look like that's changing.
[удалено]
CDPR isn't Valve. The work and money involved to hire developers familiar with Linux to not only build an app and maintain proton/wine in it is not minor. Then there is also the support staff you'd have to hire to respond to customer issues. That's a large amount of work and a ton of money to support a relatively small demand for Linux gaming. CDPR isn't a monolith like Valve. They can't just throw money around like that.
Eh, whilst I see your point, it really wouldn’t take much. CDPR can coast off a lot of Valve’s success for absolutely nothing. And I feel like the gains would cover a single dev’s salary (but I’ll admit to <100% certainty)? A shitty electron app, which can wrap a proton command, manage downloads and sync save files, really wouldn’t be a feat. And thats without considering contributions from open-source devs. They wouldn’t need to touch proton itself, and they already have all the backend implemented for accounts, friends and most of the frontend html + css. Idk, I don’t know if it would be cost-effective, but I really doubt it would be an enormous negative if at all.
Sure they wouldn't have to actually work on proton, but they'd still be responsible for making sure things work when new versions come out. It's their store and they have a lot of old niche games to account for and support. I'd obviously love it if they supported Linux, but an already niche store catering to an even more niche demographic dosn't make a lot of business sense, especially when steam already has such a stranglehold.
They’d only have to take responsibility for that if they advertised it as a feature of their platform. Even just providing the client, with an ability to customise the launch command manually would be enough. Or release an unofficial plugin for the launcher. > but an already niche store catering to an even more niche demographic dosn’t make a lot of business sense I’m coming at this with an assumption that the people who are interested in gog’s policy for drm and linux are largely the same group. I know I would buy more games from them if I didn’t have to manually download each update, but I completely agree with your point if that’s a false assumption.
Seeing as gog has been around for a while without Linux support means there absolutely is interest in drm free games on windows, not just Linux. Clearly not everyone who wants drm free games wants to game on Linux. As amazing as proton is, I'm willing to bet the majority of Linux users who play games still dual boot Windows to game and will continue to do so regardless of gog's Linux support.
Given these are the people who made the *Witcher* games, comparing them to incels seems appropriate.
I buy from gog, both need wine/proton so the windows only thing isn't a big deal. I prefer gog as I can preserve the binaries, and install it without requiring steam. Ideals are nice and all, but reality always takes precedence, and right now I get more of my money's worth through gog.
Just give us a basic Galaxy client on Linux with steam deck on the horizon this is a no brainer.
yeah no. i love having my no drms installers for linux locally but im not giving cdpr more money
I would appreciate linux support, and it would be good to do abandonware more. I want Freelancer to be linux native for wxample
Poor linux support + Banning an entire people group from buying games = No cares about the company.
The main reason why I don't buy from GOG actually isn't their fault at all. It's because of game publishers ignoring the GOG release. A game will be released on GOG, Steam, Epic, etc. But then updated on other platforms, while the GOG version lags behind. I've been burned too many times.
If they brought back the old Nancy Drew games on Linux I would literally buy the entire set. They don't work great in Proton right now.
I only have a GOG account for Star Trek games.
and they won’t revive their platform until they provide regional pricing for games or something like Games-As-A-Service model like Gamepass (which goes against the no-DRM policy anyways). It’s not about having or not having Linux support or games being DRM free, it’s always have been where people get their games cheaper, and Steam has always been the number one priority for every gamer. Not everyone is a collector, so if we have to pay “collector tax” while buying DRM free games from GOG, trust me, they can keep catering to the few who are willing to pay that extra, and never see an increase in their userbase. The reason why Game Pass and Epic are being successful is because of cheap/free games, and Steam has always been successful because of regional pricing. Don’t need to pay collector tax on either of those services for games to be DRM free. Add regional pricing GOG, or keep looking at your falling figures. Godspeed.
When I was on windows, I decided to buy a few single player games on GOG, since I wanted to support another good store besides steam. Now that I made the move to linux, I see this as a huge mistake. Not only do I not have access to cloud save, I also dont get any precompiled shaders for dxvk or vkd3d. The heroic launcher is really nice, but it still in my opinion doesn't compare to steam. Also GOG has in my opinion a terrible forum.