It's also not really feasible, since even their offline installer build system is now tied to Galaxy's content management system.

As long as it's truly optional (for single player, and even multi-player where possible), I don't mind its existence and I don't see why someone should. There will always be people who like clients and they're actually in the majority with younger generations.

Neither does Breja live under a bridge last I checked, although he can come off a bit eccentric at times. Try to be reasonably nice to people, even to those who don't share your opinion. I believe that's a better way to be respected, or at least civilized. It's also a good idea to take a break from a community if it starts getting on your nerves, just my 2 (unsolicited) cents.

Not really a relevant example unless we're talking about some company that's deliberately keeping profit low and instead trying to capture markets. Like a startup that burns a ton of cash, offers something for peanuts (or even free) and then start milking customers once they've grown enough. (I expect e.g. Discord to start the milking eventually)

GOG is not at all in that position. They are not capturing markets, they are not pulling off the bait and switch move offering something too good for too low a price. GOG is just fighting to stay relevant in a market that is competitive enough as it is and difficult to operate in due to platform lock in, network effects, and licensing bullshit.

For one thing, and I know I said this before, beause it facilitates the DRM creep by providing the necessary framework for it. "My rewards" or the (fortunately rolled back) Hitman fiasco simply could not be a thing in the pre-Galaxy GOG.

Ok, now I'm worried, because if I come off a bit eccentric around here, I must sound f**** insane to the real world :D

Despite what I may have implied with my first comment (which was meant as a joke) I do not actually think we're in danger of GOG shutting down anytime soon. But I do think it is worrisome, or at least a bit sad, that after all this time GOG is still seesawing between profit and loss. But I'm also not exactly surprised, since I myself so far bought a grand total of one game here so far this year.

I just want GOG to do better. Not just financially, I want them to be better.

Agreed and also, even if GOG incurs a small loss that they can't quite shake off, the parent company may still want to continue operating the store for the strategic leverage it gives them as a platform to promote their games more directly.

One thing I'll keep saying is that they really should open up their platform more and leverage external contributions as a way to increase the value for their end-users at a lower cost.

For example, a lot of us are really interested in creating a great efficient experience for backing up our games, but the poorly crafted, unofficially documented clunky api with an obtrusive login mechanism certainly gets in the way of that.

Anyways, no matter what happens, hopefully people are backing up their installers just in case. That you can do that is in a relatively straightforward manner is the main differentiator of this store right?

Ah, had not read that post yet, so ninjaed ;).

Apart from the neglected forum software and some technical difficulties, I personally have no complaints. I get DRM-free games and the catalog keeps growing. I would also like to see a lot more game titles and some more up-to-date patches, but that's not just down to GOG. With Sega, another interesting publisher has joined and Bethesda is also continuously expanding its range (albeit very slowly). So I'm quite satisfied and will continue to buy only here.

Of course I also wish that GOG is doing better. Personally, I can only contribute to this by recommending GOG and buying games. Fine by me.
In the shadows and between the lines ;-D

A problem that all clients share. And don't get me started on the telemetry. But my presumption was that is would be "truly optional". GOG seems to have deviated a bit from this creed at times.

I'm more worried about the people who sounds normal in this insane world that we live in, to be honest :P.

They could do better, but them being thrown the dead cat called Gwent certainly hasn't helped things. All in all the frequency of releases has constantly increased, but a plethora of indies certainly won't bring in as much cash as some heavy hitters. I hope SEGA can be convinced to bring their entire otherwise unavailable or hard to procure oldies catalogue here, which should help mend the gap.

P.S. Attached a nice GOG release date by actual game release date chart.

But GOG consistently has losses over the course of many years. It's not like this time is the first time it's ever happened.

GOG also sometimes has profitable quarters too, but even then, they are always only marginal amounts of profit.

So even if "the sky is not falling," then this latest financial result nevertheless proves that GOG is still on very shaky ground, and that GOG's long-term future existence is by no means guaranteed, and that GOG going out of business remains a quite plausible potential outcome in the coming months and years.

I'm not saying that will happen for sure, but it wouldn't come as any kind of a surprise if it did, with losses like this still being a regular thing.

GOG isn't like EGS where EGS has a strategy to lose money on purpose. If GOG continues to lose money consistently, then it's probably only a matter of time until they close.

And even if GOG goes back to making only marginal amounts of profits, then that too would also be enough to make their closure always remain a very plausible outcome.

Yeah, largely because of the porn shovelware flood. I'm making a note here: huge success.

This a very good idea, mostly.

They couldn't discontinue all support for Galaxy, in that they would at least need to support it in "maintenance mode" in order to make sure that its basic functions continue to work over time, namely: downloading offline installers through Galaxy, Cloud Saves, Achievements, and gameplay time tracking.

If they didn't do at least that much then they would alienate massive amounts of GOG customers who use & expect those features, and thus GOG's income would lower even further.

But in terms of stopping costs for new development of Galaxy that goes beyond just maintaining its basic functions, then GOG should absolutely do that. And while they are at it, they should also officially revert Galaxy back to version 1.2.67, and only officially support that specific version, which was the last version that isn't terrible.

Certainly doing that would help to improve GOG's bottom line.

Galaxy isn't going away and I doubt gog are even spending many resources developing it currently, unless maybe they want to release a major update around Phantom Liberty release.

Fair point I hadn't thought of.

I have been all along, and yes, I'd say so, but I'd be in the minority. The above suggestion to save money by dropping Galaxy development is unrealistic because most people want and use clients, unfortunately.

Not really. Epic store exists so they can sell Fortnite without giving Steam a cut. CD Projekt can sell their games on GOG without giving anyone a cut. They sell elsewhere but the amount sold on GOG would more than make up for any minimal losses GOG incurs. It's not like GOG is an independent company where their viability depends entirely on their own fortunes.

I don't go for fearmongering but I do agree that this is a concerning development. As some have mentioned, it's not a bad idea to download backups of your games (or at least the ones you value the most) but you should have been doing that to begin with. You probably don't have to worry about any CDPR games you own, as they're undoubtedly going to continue offering their games independent of other platforms, but it wouldn't hurt to back them up too if you have the space.

That said, I sincerely doubt CDP is gonna let GOG just lay down and die. They're just gonna have to go into the improvements with much more fervor. There have been many instances, especially over the past few years (but even before that) where it seemed like GOG was headed into dangerous waters but they're still here, still adding plenty of newer games and so forth.

Best thing I think we can do is to offer constructive criticism (and not the cynical, toxic nonsense we sometimes see in this forum), keep pressing GOG for those improvements and continue to buy from GOG as much as possible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cELD5Bi28JM

The Witcher, The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt & Cyberpunk 2077 have now sold a combined 100 million copies.

Cyberpunk 2077 has sold 25 million copies.

Phantom Liberty, in its first week of launch, has sold 3 million copies, of which 14% of the PC sales and 10% of the general sales were made on GoG.

Some screengrabs:

General sales? So about 300,000 or about 42,000 sold on GOG? Thanks for the info.