signed: +1

Here's something I just read that I found interesting here:

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/cd-projekt-red-boss-likes-tweets-criticising-sony-for-removing-cyberpunk-2077/

“It’s very likely that the day CD Projekt started telling people to go ask for refunds, Sony were immediately in touch with them saying ‘we need to take your game off the store if you’re telling people to get refunds’, and CDPR have then slowly, reluctantly, agreed,” wrote No More Robots founder Mike Rose.

“I don’t know this for certain, of course, but it’s the likely turn of events. The big no-no here is CDPR telling players to a. Go against PS policy, and b. Overwhelming PS Support, without talking to PlayStation first.”

What Sony has done with CD Projekt could be what they did to Red Candle Games, except that Sony didn't begin to claim that "many gamers" had asked them to and allowed GOG to spin the PR to their favor. There's no doubt that many PS4 owners have asked for refunds, just like there's no doubt that many gamers actually want Devotion on GOG. If this is what happened, there's definitely some hypocrisy there.

To be fair, those games were really wanted by many people(especially those who won't ever touch steam or etc), so I can see why some would buy them.

As for low rating the critical comments: if they are on the devotion topic I can somewhat get why they might get downrated.
(some probably wanting most such talk to stay in the various threads on the topic)

That said, I don't think people should low rate people needlessly & also feel that people should try not buying too much from GOG to maybe "coax" them into changing their minds re: Devotion. I also think what GOG did was a big mistake, and am hoping they change their minds before they burn through all the goodwill they have left.

(probably GOG will remain silent as always, but I will hold out some hope)

I have wanted Hexen and Heretic for YEARS, probably just as much as a lot of the instabuyers in the thread, but GOG have crossed a line, and I would have hoped that more people would have the fortitude to protest GOG's disgusting behaviour at least as long as a single sales event. Messages need to be sent or things will only get worse.

I want these games, a lot, but shiny thing doesn't make me discard my morals, I'm not a GOG employee.

The release seems deliberately timed as a distraction as well, and I'm not about to let GOG sweep what they've done under a rug.

The devotion incident is one reason why I myself am not buying the game(Heretic/etc)...at least for the time being....I can wait.

That said, if a few people(relatively speaking) buy the games I don't think it'll help GOG much profit wise(I mean considering the loss of income due to people not buying much if at all due to the CyPnk2077 incident and now this new incident). That and other reasons are why I would like others to join with us and not buy much or at all from GOG, but I am ok if some don't want to join in.

I'm not either....I will complain about this for a good while myself....if only to raise awareness of the issue to others, to raise morale among those also doing so, and to vent a bit.

You're probably right, but GOG needs to hurt financially, and every blind happy sale still worries me a bit, after all, impatience and apathy is what led Steam to become the monopoy it is. Lord knows GOG isn't going to listen to it's fanbase unless they somehow affect the bottom line.

It's really quite the depressing situation to be in isn't it? On top of actually wanting Devotion itself after a twitch streamer I follow thoroughly sang its praises right before the official GOG reveal, I actually had a whole stack of games I wanted go on sale this time and was ready to buy a lot, but I just... can't.

Steam became a monopoly by way of strong-arming physical discs --- which all games were on prior to Steam - out of business, in collusion with other institutions in the the industry who helped them do it.

Consumers didn't 'choose' Steam in the early days, but rather they were forced either to buy Steam client-DRM-infested games, or else not buy any games at all, since there were no longer any Steam-free games being offered in the stores. Even games that had physical discs in their boxes were still tied to the Steam DRM client.

As for the Devotion debacle: it seems like GOG's strategy to completely ignore it until it blows over might work, sadly. There are lot of happy campers about some new releases who don't seem to care too much about GOG lying to their customers and bending the knee and censoring to appease the CCP.

And that's happened very recently after the debacle started. In a few weeks or months, how many more people will jump back on the happy GOG camper bandwagon?

The difference between GOG and Steam being, of course, that GOG operates on much thinner margins.....and with CDPR stock down quite a bit(between 25 and 35 percent), I would say the chances their bottom line will be affected by the recent events is likely good.

Sometimes, it is a bit disheartening. That said, hopefully we will see some good come of this in time(like a reversal of the gog decision, or at least a new site to take it's place over time if need be).

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Or some might see such(boycotts) as not accomplishing much, so they're just grabbing what they can while they can in case the store goes kaput.

As for GOG ignoring it: That'll be hard to do with their parent company's stock down so much, and then having to issue refunds left and right.

Half-Life 2 was the real trojan horse that gave Steam their leverage, I remember how many people were up in arms screaming bloody murder about the mandatory online requirements... but they all just gave in and bought it any way because protesting with any real conviction would have meant not getting the shiny thing right now, and they knew that convenience and apathy would win out over conviction.

Hell people are already starting to forget and go back to happy GOG time. I feel so hopeless and dejected about the situation, I still haven't been able to fully come to terms with the fact that GOG lied, bold faced and guilt free, right to our faces. I hate to get all blackpilled, but I also cannot see anyone being capable of taking up the mantle if GOG fails either, if this alleged DRM free juggernaut goes under the whole DRM free movement is likely going to be demoralized in perpetuity.

That though is all on CDPR, all eyes are on their failure, not on GOG's ethics violations, so I could see them bouncing back, taking responsibility for the game's mistakes whilst still sweeping the rest of the issues under the rug and ignoring them.

Welcome to the Republican Party, USA, post 2020 election cycle. I can't say why, because I'm aware the mods are back out of hiding, but I think Veritas would be able to explain a little better.

I would've bought Heretic, and many games in the sale (as usual), but I'm so disappointed in GOG for being disingenuous about the removal of Devotion, as well as the actual decision, that I haven't bought anything, and won't ever again unless GOG resolves this mess and responds honestly to the many tens of thousands of comments about it on Twitter, fora etc. I also did my first ever GOG refund of my last order (four games). To be honest, not buying games is going to save me a fortune, maybe GOG did me a favour, and I can work through my game backlog which might take years. I often bought games on GOG to show support, but the Devotion thing, with its blatant lie about the reasons and then complete silence, has pulled all that away. If I do want any other games I guess it's going to be via Itch, which also doesn't require a launcher and has many DRM-free games.

You could take a look at Zoom after the redesign.
They have a ton of old games that never reached GOG and sometimes even exclusive ports (Trickstyle for Linux).

I've done just that the other day, grabbed some freebies and had a look around. I'm still not convinced but I've been told there is a massive redesign happening now, so we will see.

Edit: Well I went and bought Street Racing Syndicate on Zoom, at least they have some racing games there, a genre GOG's glorious curation team has almost never tried to support.

Other than it being a total pain to navigate, what's the problem with itch?

The problem with itch beyond the atrocious website design is that is primarily a dumping ground for indie projects with no quality control at all, as it stands it's not much better than an app store, with only a handful of actually worthwhile games and absolutely no support from any major players. That's also the reputation it has earned, so it's unlikely to ever really change.