The title says it all. AKIBA'S TRIP: Undead And Undressed on GOG is nothing more than the so-called "Steam-rip".

The game has Steam files in its installation folder ("steam_app.dll" and "steam_appid.txt") and it interacts with Steam!

Luckily, I also have this game on Steam, but I think users who don't have this game on Steam might have problems as Steam starts tracking stats for this game. It can be perceived as an attempt to launch a pirated game and lead to the banning of your Steam account.

Maybe you should remove this game from sale until you fix this issue?

It's far from being alone either. Literally dozens if not hundreds of games on GOG are the same. If you have all your games installed at once (on a large HDD / SSD), all under the same sub-folder (eg, "GOG Games") it's surprising what shows up searching for steam_api.dll in all sub-folders. Most of these games are indeed "Steam games" just with a GOG wrapper around them. See attached pic of what happens when you delete / rename steam_api.dll for Unmechanical. Don't worry, it's a "feature" not a bug. Apparently...

But it's the first time a game purchased on GOG has interacted with Steam. I mean, my Steam profile now says that I played this game yesterday. There was also a Steam overlay (that's how I found out that something went wrong).

I don't know about other games that do that as 1. I run my Firewall in "Whitelist mode" (absolutely everything gets blocked from talking out unless I create a manual 'allow' rule) and 2. I don't have Steam installed. Perhaps someone else here with that game could test it? Given that AKIBA'S TRIP Undead and Undressed appears to run without the Steam client, it's pretty lame if they just took the Steam version and dumped it here "raw" with full Steam integration intact, though to be honest nothing surprises me with this stuff anymore...

Correction: someone who has this game on both Steam and GOG. Otherwise, the Steam account may be compromised and that's not good.

Really, Steam bans for launching pirated games?

Has that happened before?

If so, seems like all the more reason never to buy anything from Steam, ever.

Steam bans for running pirated games? Well, maybe.
Steam bans for running a purchased game from GOG? A bit far fetched. Moreover what's the point to link statistics to current Steam account? I could have dozen Steam accounts, how would Steam know which account to ban?

The only possible way to test it is to create a fresh Steam account with 0 games, log in and run GOG's game. If Steam ban the account it will count as truth. For now it's just a *wishful thinking* of how bad everything is.

I find this sad. There seem to be no limits to the depths of developer laziness ... :-(

Anyway official GOG response is a MUST for this particular situation. Will GOG mods ignore it or not, that is a question.

Yes. Some games on GOG work like you just described. For example, A New Beginning: Final Cut (from Daedalic Entertainment) won't work without those Steam libraries, as AB2012 has already mentioned. I think GOG stuff is powerless in this field, and you can only blame developers who provide their games on GOG as "Steam-rips" for lazy work and treating GOG customers as second class citizens. It's a very old problem on GOG and yet it wasn't resolved, as you can see.

You made some wrong conclusion from the situation.

It's okay if you get banned for trying to run a pirated version of a game (with Steam files left in the game folder) that you don't own on Steam, since it's a violation of the user agreement.

What's definitely not okay is a situation like this. My Steam account was at risk "thanks" to the unprofessionalism of the GOG staff (those who put the game on sale in this state), and I'm pretty sure there won't be any compensation, not even an apology.

It's different, having some Steam files as a requirement to run the GOG game is just a lazy workaround to sell it. Having a DRM-free GOG game which goes to your Steam account *just because* is borderline criminal and I believe it's a breach of GOG customer agreement as well.

Yes, I absolutely agree. And I think, I already stated so (maybe in a different manner). In fact, this situation is one of the major reasons why I almost stop buying games on GOG these days. Well unless they way more cheaper than on Steam.

How does it even work? How steam can link this game to your account?

It's okay if the GOG version of the game uses some of the Steam files / libraries WHEN it doesn't affect anything.

The situation with AKIBA'S TRIP is different: the game purchased on GOG interacts with the Steam client and my Steam account.