Why do people pay for GOG games?

I'm trying out GOG galaxy and I saw Tomb Raider 1,2 & 3 for £1.99

Apart from the fact I'm pretty sure Core Design/Square Enix were giving away these legacy games for free on their website some years ago...

Why would anyone buy games off GOG? They are DRM free and there's lots of websites called things like "Free DRM free GOG games" where people have just uploaded them.

So why would people pay £1.99 for games that used to be free/are free on other websites/are by big companies who don't need the money.

I wonder if it's different for countries who have a "tipping culture" compared to countries where you pay the price only. Like if your used to giving away money like in USA maybe you're more likely to buy this.

With Steam I can sort of understand people want all their games in one place and have things like achievements all linked together. And maybe it's slightly easier to launch games from a game launcher.

Also, on Steam Tomb Raider 1+2+3 would cost £15. So why would it be £8 usual price on GOG? I don't understand.

 

So we can play Cyberpunk 2077 sooner XD

 

Although I don't use Galaxy, but I bought things on GOG and it's not mine or your job to decide if someone "need" the money. Am I paying for my things? Absolutely.

Also GOG actually works with these games, they are running tests if a game is stable to release and runs on current platforms. They may make patches to make it work. So they also deserve their cut because they worked on things and they deserve the money because they're promoting DRM-free and oldschool gaming as well.

 

Well, do they now? If not, that was a limited offer. Sucks to be you, having to shell out this godawful amount of money to get them!

 

Three immediate theories come to mind. One, they're trying to funnel people to one store but they know some people will never buy from said store. Two, they made a special deal with Steam. Three, they're under an assumption of some kind regarding DRM (eg maybe they feel people will let their friends play it and are charging accordingly).

 

Why wouldn't they buy the games from GOG instead of Steam? From what I can see Steam is selling the older tomb raider games for $6.99 and up. So getting the games legally while saving money would be a big reason. And a lot of people like GOG anyway probably due to it being quite thoroughly curated.

As far as why would people buy them instead of illegally downloading them. I mean you can probably find any game or any other software online some place but I've never looked for them for free to begin with if I know they are a commercial product being sold. If the creator of the product wants to release it for free that is entirely their choice but nobody else can rightly decide that for them.

 

@yoonitee - you make it sound like GOG was only some pay for abandon-ware site, but actually they are just another digital game store.

Also, instead of selling Steam keys, they have their own business... and own platform with optional client for launching games.

They sell also brand new games at least from smaller publishers (like Devolver) and they do sell games like Hollow Knight, Stardew Valley, Cuphead, Darkest Dungeon and Witcher 3 (being part of same company), which you of course find also in Steam.

Steam might have the largest game selection (15k or something like that last year), but GOG is just another option, if one doesn't like monopolies.

 

• GoG routinely gives older games several passes to ensure compatibility and performance on modern operating systems
• GoG is DRM free, which means that as long as you have a backup somewhere or access to your account, the thing you bought is yours forever
• GoG has built up a decade of goodwill as a classic PC games distribution service
• GoG is also one of the few sites that was actually distributing games that were in the Dungeons & Dragons copyright hell zone
• It's just a well run, well populated service. Not everyone wants to just take things

 

This one's pretty important. I've got quite a few old games that simply don't work nicely or at all on new hardware or versions of Windows.

 

I ended up having to buy some games I already owned on Steam on GoG because Valve was selling them despite the fact that they only worked on Windows XP. There was no indication they only worked on Windows XP.

 

GOG.

 

Don't care.

 

Do Not*
XD

 

Well, if they are testing all the games for compatibility and viruses I guess that's worth paying for. I'm just trying to get into the mind of consumers in case I open my own store one day!

TO tell the truth I'm probably going to buy that £1.99 Tomb raider set. So I answered my own question!

My opinion of GoG was it was like IndieDB where people just upload their games without much curation or testing. Guess that's wrong then! Still I don't think they'll get many new AAA games on there without DRM so I think it'll stay mainly old games or indie games.

BTW it's the "GoG winter sale" for a few more hours if anyone wants some cheap deals.
Secondly I recommend getting the free Subnautica game from Epic game store. I've been playing for about 8 hours.
I'm liking all this competition.

 

It sure does. :'(

 

I know people who have games on Steam, Xbox One, PS4, and Switch and they're still trying to get through GoG's approval process.

 

BTW what is the "Dungeons & Dragons copyright hell hole"?

 

Use google.

 

The short version is that the rights to games based off D&D were divided up between Atari, Hasbro, and the million companies that grabbed rights when Interplay went under. So, for the longest time it was just straight up impossible to buy any of Black Isle's games like Planescape Torment or Icewind Dale. GoG managed to do something to get distribution rights a long while back and for a while they were the only place to sell them.

 

Well, and this is just an idea, but the convenience of purchasing off of GoG significantly trumps hunting down their releases by more illicit means. Finding a copy of their games that someone else is distributing requires you to scour the internet, and possibly sample a questionable torrent. Are there viruses, malware, or adware lurking in the copy you download? Hope you really trust the site you're getting it from.

When you purchase games directly from GoG, you then gain access to the game from a website with a slick presentation, the latest version of the game, and any associated patches you might need. Since it's a corporately sponsored site, you have far better guarantees that there won't be any viruses or malware lurking. If you prefer not doing manual installing, GoG now has the Galaxy launcher to automate the downloading and installation process, as well as provide automatic updates. For several of their older games that use emulation for support, they automatically update and optimize the configurations for those emulators, to insure that they run at their best on modern systems. The advantage of buying directly from GoG is convenience and ease-of-use.

I would never download a GoG release from a website. Since they are DRM-free, I would perhaps consider installing a game from a friends GoG account, but only if I got it directly from that friend.

 

It worth the time to watch this.

 

Ah now it makes sense. Doesn't make Poland look too nice though.

 

None of the Central European ex-socialist countries looked nice in the Socialism or right after that. Including my home country: Hungray. And they certainly worse right now, but I don't want to go into that because of politics.

 

Hell yeah, thanks for the heads-up on that. Been thinking of getting that game for a while now.

 

Coolio

 

I've been to Krakow which seemed quite nice, although late at night it did seem a bit ominous with what I presume to be the Russian mafia controlled ladies with umbrellas touting for the gentlemen's establishments. And they do overcharge the tourists about 5 times in some of the bars.
But I must say the Polish people who come to the UK and work in the fast food restaurants are usually very cheerful and make a nice change from the sulky teenagers who usually work there. But then if you're getting paid 5 times what you would in Poland no doubt you'd be cheerful too.
I've also been to Warsaw and Gdansk which has an interesting club in a disused bunker.
Never been to Hungary.

 

Lets take McDonnald in Poland which pay ~2000 PLN (~450 Euro) minimum, In UK McDonnald 1100 Pounds (~1200 euro), so not even 3 times more, cost to live in UK way higher than in Poland, dont know why they live there...

Sorry for offtop

 

Sometimes it's superior? GOG will frequently have it's own "GOG version" of a game, especially older games without current support, that will have tweaks/updates/yadayada. GOG also comes with full instruction booklets, and usually art and extras that you can download as a side file. If there's a GOG version of a game it's usually a good bet, however I still prefer the set it and forget it convenience of Steam.