I'm fine with that, getting something that other people get just sort of ruins it for me. It doesn't bother me when it's given on merit or when it's the result of a contest, but it really rubs me the wrong way when something like this is given to everybody, but some people don't get anything through no fault of their own.

That's sad.

It's not sad at all, it means that I care about the experience of other people on this site. I know that I can be quite harsh at times, but the fact is that I do to help whenever I can, even when it's poorly worded and bordering on abusive.

The actual requests for something are incredibly low, most of the folks wanting something don't seem to even seem to be demanding a game. I can't speak for them, but I think that's the case. We'd presumably all like an alternate pick, but from the posts I've seen just about anything to include us seems to be acceptable.

Lastly, this is December, granted not everybody on the site is Christian, but it seems really to not be in the spirit of the season to not be thinking about those less fortunate. I know that I have it pretty good compared to many in the world at large, but in this case the less fortunate are those that were left out without any particular thought.

Ultimately, if more people were "sad" like me, the world would be a rapidly improving place to live.

Erm ... I don't know what my past experiences could have to do with this, but even without knowing you at all, I can assure you that you've probably rarely been so totally wrong in your life. ;) PM me if you really want the details, I don't think they're appropriate here.

It's really very simple: If someone gets something for free, and you get nothing, then you can either be happy for the other person, or feel envious and/or treated unfairly. And with such small things like cheap GOG games, it would never, ever occur to me to feel anything else but happiness. If other people choose to feel miffed, then that's their prerogative, but I'm absolutely convinced that I'm better off. Who do you think has a better time at a celebration, the person enjoying it (even if others might get some presents he doesn't), or the party pooper sitting in the corner with a sour face while grumbling about things he feels entitled to? :)

I'm sorry, but I don't understand that at all. It seems to me that you'd only be hurting yourself. If you think you enjoy the game, buy it. If you don't think you will, then don't buy it. If you think you'd enjoy the game, but don't buy it for 3$ because there's a tiny, tiny chance that you could save these 3$ but waiting a year and hoping that exactly that game gets chosen as a free gift, then (imho) you're simply too miffed to think things through. Such an approach may have some superficial resemblance to logic, but in the end you're just depriving yourself of your own enjoyment, which is a pretty silly thing to do imho.

Would it be nice if GOG rewarded loyal customers more? Of course. Some bonuses like "You get a free 5.99$ code for each 50th game you buy" would be nice, and if delivered with the charming way GOG often displays things, it would certainly create a warm fuzzy feeling among these customers. Such a bonus could even stimulate a few sales, Gamersgate's blue coin are a more elaborate token economy that works exactly on this principle. So if you say that a nod by GOG towards its long-standing, loyal customers would be nice, I'm in no way against that. However, I do think that complaining about gifts that others get is absolutely the wrong way of going about this, on several levels.
I agree with Taleroth that that's pretty sad. Ever heard of the Grinch? :)

I'm not gonna quote anyone specific here but just say that I totally agree with hedwards and that I find the attitude of people like Taleroth and Psyringe to be very very sad and it is that attitude that is the reason why the world is in such a sorry state right now because people like them are not willing to share and that they apprently don't have a problem with enjoying something even if it comes at the expense of others. And if those "others" point out that it's unfair that someone has everything while others have nothing then they are accused of being selfish and that they want to deprive others of nice things. I don't have much money but I try to donate a little to charity even though I know that means less money for me to buy stuff. Now I could take the attitude of some here and simply say "well why should I deprive myself of more stuff since the poor people in Africa should just be happy on my behalf for the stuff I get". I could also use hedwards sports analogy and say that those of us who weren't good at sports should just be happy for the captain of the football team and then just deal with the fact that we couldn't be a part of the sport even if we wanted to. Or perhaps it could be set up in such a way that ALL could play and not just SOME.

I simply don't understand why some people here are able to enjoy stuff when they know that others for no reason of their own are excluded to participate. Here it is even worse because those of us who are excluded are so because we supported GoG in the past. This is not the same as winners of a competition or people who have earned it through skill - I have no problem with them getting stuff that I don't. Here we are excluded because we were dumb enough to support GoG in the past.

Like hedwards said it's all about that warm fuzzy feeling in your gut that lets you know that someone cares about you and want to include you into a community - it's not about a free game or stuff but just about that little pat on the shoulder from GoG saying thanks for the support. - and yet their silence is what hurts the most.

Just popping in to say thanks for the free game and the offers. I couldn't get the game because every time I tried to download it or add it to my account, I got the server crash image, but oh well. I'll just take that as proof that you guys are doing great with so many clients you can't keep up, and if that means having GoG around for another couple of years, all to the best.

Best holiday wishes to the whole GoG team! You guys rock!


....Now go and secure me the old Blizzard games, I want to take another crack at Warcraft I and my laptop doesn't have a floppy drive anymore :-P

This is getting riddiculous.

I can't be happy because of free Empire Earth Gold because jepsen1977 and kids in Africa who don't have PC's and internet connection don't.

Tip for you: there's always someone excluded.

And sports team analogy is good. Fat kids are not supposed to be in 100m sprint team. They may still enjoy it by watching it on TV and being happy "their" team wins. It's called olympics as far as I remember.

I'm OK with an idea GOG should support loyal buyers more (like loyalty promos for example) or even give out additional 10% discount for a single game in catalogue for those who have been "good buyers" for the entire year, but it has nothing to do with empire earth.

And at the end, this is YOU who cannot feel joy because somebody received a gift and you didn't. That's sick.

Since forum went berserk when I got the gift; now my better late than never: Thank you GOG :)

Hyperbole much? ;)

You have no idea what or how much I'm doing to fight for a fair society and for a fairer world. I'm pretty confident that it's not less than you do. I do this precisely because those are important problems that need to be addressed. Fairness of money distribution in a society, or fairness of food distribition in the world, are very important things that are worth (and necessary) fighting for.

However, invoking this level of fairness and equality of distribution on a mass gifting of cheap video games is just overblown, and going to this level of morality just to justify one's being miffed is a pretty self-defying way of argumentation. Frankly, if you really care that deeply about not being left out from such a light-spirited giveaway of cheap toys, then I can only assume that you don't actually have many real problems to care about. Which, in a way, is a good thing, so perhaps I should be happy for you that you do have the luxury of getting so worked up over so minor things. :)

Your argument is also factually wrong on several accounts

1. You are not "left out" of the giving. You simply had the game already. Things like this happen. Do you throw a tantrum when a friend gifts you a book that you already had, while he gifts someone else a book that's new to him? I don't - I appreciate the gesture anyway. And that's exactly what I'm doing with GOG's gesture as well. I don't find that difficult. :)

2. You are not deprived of playing Empire Earth. Since you obviously already have, you can play it just as well as everyone else. So why not just play it instead of getting worked up over others getting it for free? To use your own words: Actually ALL can play, not just SOME. :)

3. The gifting did not come "at the expense" of you. You didn't pay anything for the giveaway, and there are no costs associated with it for you. You actually didn't lose a single penny.

4. Your argumentation is very inconsistent. You keep harping about not getting another free game, but then you say that you actually don't care about the game. You say that you just want a pat on the shoulder from GOG, but if that's really what you're after, then why do you keep talking about being miffed when others got a free game? You _could_ get that pat totally independently of any giveaways, you know?

I'm sorry, but the most consistent explanation for your arguments so far seems to be that you just can't get over the fact that this one time someone else got a gift that you already had, and that that's so important to you that you even liken it to worldwide problems. Really, I don't think that this way of thinking is making you happy. Perhaps you want to think about what you really want and whether your current actions are actually helping you getting it? Because I don't think they do. I fear you're currently just making yourself unnecessarily unhappy.

Yes, I'm familiar with the works of Theodor Geisel and if that's what you got out of that particular book then you really need to reread it.

At it's heart it's about the Christmas spirit and including people even if one wouldn't otherwise include them. The presents themselves were just a way of expressing the warm fuzzies and ultimately they were willing and able to include the Grinch even when common sense would dictate otherwise. The view that the holidays are more than just the gifts, but the community and including people that might not have anybody else to celebrate with.

Personally, I don't like receiving gifts in such a fashion where other people are being left out through no fault of their own. I'm really not comfortable with it, and I personally wouldn't get the right feel if I were included when others weren't.

If you're OK with that, that's your right, but the I've got mine and that's that mentality that I'm seeing all over the thread is not really what I would consider to be the spirit of the season.

As I've suggested before, if GOG can't even come up with a card, avatar or something else that's non-monetary for those that didn't receive anything, it kind of spoils the spirit of things and I for one wouldn't be any happier had I received the gift. Personally, I'm glad that I'm excluded as I don't have the money to make this right and I'd feel like a dick if I received a gift that others in the community didn't get.

Ultimately, I don't even know why I'm bothering some of the posts I've seen by others reflect a real deficit in humanity. Especially that post suggesting suicide as the remedy, I realize that wasn't serious, but it's completely inappropriate to joke about that kind of thing IMHO. I do think it's worth recognizing that it would be a lot more meaningful for everybody to just get a custom avatar or card from GOG than for a section of the customer base to be left out for daring to buy from them previously.

I think there#s more than one facet to it. It's also a book about a person who's grown so bitter that he'd rather prevent Christmas than seeing people making gifts. Obviously, since not giving away any GOG games was a solution you felt okay with, this was the aspect I'm getting at, and I still think the parallel is there. However, I do agree that the facet you mentioned is also present. I might point out though that the solution in the book was not abolishing Christmas. :)

I simply don't feel left out and I don't think that anyone really got left out. A game was made available for free, no one was excluded. Some people have no practical use for the gift since they own the game already. But this happens - not every gift is a useful one, it's the spirit that counts. And the spirit of giving was right there, as no one was excluded. People are excluded from giveaways when there's a reputation requirement to even enter, or when they need to fulfill any other requirement. This was not the case here.

While I don't think that such an alternative would be required, I agree that it would have been a nice touch.

Well, as has been said, that inevitably would mean that no gifts could ever been given. Even if GOG had gifted a "choose a game of your liking" voucher, there still would be people who didn't get it in time. Even if the gift would be extended indefinitely (which would be economic idiocy under these conditions), there would still be people who would be less happy with it than others. Some people might find their all-time favourite game on GOG. Others are "excluded" from this experience because their all-time favourite game isn't available on GOG, or they are only interested in newer games and joined GOG only for buying TW2. The equality you require is impossible to achieve unless gifting ceases totally.

Furthermore, to achieve the equality you're after, all promotions need to stop too. With each promotion, GOG gifts the purchaser about half a game, but the promos have a narrow time limit. Hence they aren't fair - the people who can't access the site during the promo are "excluded" from receiving this bonus. So this practice needs to stop too.

Also, forum giveaways need of course to stop as well, as (again) someone would be "excluded", because he might have the game already, or he might not be online in time, or he might simply not be the one who wins it in the end.

That is exactly the "solution" the Grinch had in mind: Stop the giving altogether. I don't think it's a good one.

I haven't read the whole thread, but I agree that such jokes are inappropriate.

While a card would certainly be nice, you're again (imho) exaggerating the affect of not being able to use a gift because one has it already. Again, by your logic, all promos should stop immediately, as every promo "punishes" the people who bought the game at its "full" price. Again, I don't think that's a good solution. I think it's much better to just join the celebration, be happy for the people who got a game they like, and appreciate the gesture of the giving even if the gift isn't useful for oneself.

When someone gives you a present you already own, you smile, say something polite, and move on with your life. I didn't benefit from the big six million downloads thing because I already had Broken Sword. Oh well.

Screw you, Grandma! I already got socks.

I just want to thank GOG for being without a doubt the best game download service out there.
Happy Holidays.