There was a time when RPGCodex was a great source for any CRPG fan. It's a shame the place took the way they did. Now the amount of time wadding through junk and bulls**t it takes to get to the valuables, conflicts waaaay too much with the free time left on my hand.

I don't see how this is really an issue. Does it really matter what a bunch of basement dwelling, bottom feeding uber-fanboys want to think?
They are going to hate GOG no matter what, it's best to just ignore them, like I do with NMA trolls.
EDIT: LOL!
I guess that makes me a lazy, moral fag, good to know!
Kinda sad that hes using an avatar from my favorite game too.

hehe. amusing.
the thing is these guys don't have any right to what they did. Gog, developer, publisher can take their work and claim it is their own. simple like that.

It mattered when Ubisoft did it, because at the same time they thundered against the evil pirates and for the necessity of harsh DRM, they used a crack from a pirate group to fix the mess their harsh DRM had made for some of their legitimate paying customers. That is not the case in this situation, however.

Once again RPGCodex is outraged because something was free and now it isn't. The fact it was never free in the first place again escapes them. Nothing to see here people, move along.

...I don't care.

I lol'd at the RPGCodex thread. Talk about angsty, edgy righteousness. I had no idea the site was like that- back in the early 2000's I used the site. Whatever happened to them?
As for the actual topic at hand, my personal feelings are:
1) I wouldn't mind a statement from GoG responding
2) I have no idea if a legitimately cracked .exe would "look" the same as a scene one, so there's that reasonable doubt
3) Many of these games don't even have the source around anymore to compile DRM-free exes from scratch, so if GoG has to resort to this I honestly don't care.
4) I have no idea or proof one way or another if these exes came from the publishers or were provided by GoG.
At the end of the day, it amounts to one huge "I don't really care, as long as the game I paid for is working."

With a 10 year old game, the rights of which may have changed hands a number of times since it was made, those files may no longer exist. In some cases, they may never have existed. And if the source code has disappeared along the way as well, then modifying the released game files somehow is the only way to do it. Whether that is done by the publisher or by GOG with the publisher's blessing, I don't know, and truth be told, don't really care either.

Frankly speaking, I would rather download the game from GOG all the while knowing that I won't have to worry about finding a torrent for the game, virus-scanning it, unraring it, and all the other hassles that are involved with torrents. Another positive is the better download speeds and the slight glimmer of hope that my (and other peoples') purchase sends a message to publishers to let them know that we would like more, instead of less, complex games.

The membership of the Codex, and their ridiculous mewlings and indignation that "I can't get it abandonware anymore!" make me think that abortion should be a requirement in certain cases. What a collective waste of genetic material.

Posting in a soon to be epic thread.

Who gives a shit, i certainly don't.

God will smite them all.

It's not too unreasonable to end up with the exact same machine code in the .exe if they use the exact same technique to strip the disk check as the original crackers.
Also, who gives a flying fuck. The deal with Activision has been made, the game here is obviously completely legit.