Like others I've seen post, downloading (new) games takes forever where I live. I was very impressed with Witcher being totally on disc, and I didn't mind later updates being downloaded. I was hoping, that since this is the same company Cyberpunk would also be on disc. Seeing the posts here, though, it looks like I'll be days and over data-limit when I buy this game.

I honestly would be willilng to pay more for a physical copy, even if it needed updating later. As long as I could get the bulk of the game on disc, downloading later on wouldn't be such a problem. All the new games are coming this way now. There has to be a breaking point somewhere. We're getting slapped with over-data fees and throttled down connections, so games are taking longer and costing us more all the time. I'd rather pay that extra fee to the game company than the phone company.

This a a multi-page rant of mine. I won't start again, but just wanted to say how disappointed I am. I'll go eat dirt now.

Nowadays, when I buy a game it is after the game has been released years before, the "final patch" often is out for it, I can buy the GOTY edition, and the price is reduced from the current trend of $60 for full price, to a reduced price. I simply do not trust game developers anymore since they have traded in their love of art and story telling for security, money, or whatever.
Owning a physical copy ensures that I almost always do not have the same problems that digital game owners have. Those who own own a digital copy have to sometimes hope servers are still online to activate their games. Also updates that are forced through digital downloads can break mods, community patches, even workarounds to microtransactions. I do not have this problem in almost every case. For instance games that you own where you download a patch. If for instance a certain patch undoes something and you want your game to keep that feature you can simply skip that patch version or not patch it (which you CAN almsot always do with physical copies, but not always with digital copies).
I also would be perfectly willing to pay more for a physical copy, but let's be honest... we are paying $60 for most big title game releases right now. The discs when mass produced do not cost the companies that much money. I would also be OK if we were able to buy the games digitally, but download them (something GOG has offered me in some but I am not sure in all of my games). Then I can back them up and install them when I want to play them, and no DRM or activation required. I can also choose if I want to patch them or mod them or whatever. Having a physical disc is really nice though, because the discs used to hold our games in my experience seem to be of a high quality. higher than the discs that people burn for themselves which often start peeling or having difficulty after just 4-5 years.

^These^ are exactly my thoughts, too.

What exactly is the difference (apart from the requirement of a good internet connection) between a physical copy and storing the gog offline installation of the game on an external SSD? You do not have to use Gog galaxy. After the one-time download, you will no longer need an internet connection. No forced patches, no in-game purchases and no potential spyware (useless without internet connection). I would agree with other digital game platforms like Epic, Steam, Origin, ... but not with gog.

For every game you buy from gog, you can download the offline backup installer. If you want to avoid the disadvantages of a digital version, this is the right version for you.

Just realized there was activity in here. First couple weeks after my initial post, there wasn't. Sorry. As to the difference in digital vs physical, I don't know about the others but for me it's not having to wait days to play after I buy. I live in an area that does no have fiber optics nor cable and satellite is just too "iffy."

For instance: I tried to buy Syberia 3 from GoG and wound up asking for a refund because the download was going to take, literally days. Now that's only Syberia 3. When I bought Doom (box) and still had to download it from "that other company" it took several days to download because I had to keep pausing it and only letting it run overnight. It might have been less *IF* I could have dedicated our bandwidtth to nothing but that download, but that's just not possible. In this house we have 2 desktop computers, 2 laptops, 4 kindles, and a Roku. Often several running at the same time, and we're only two older people. I can't imagine what people with families must go through.

I love the fact that Gog lets us buy and store offline. I must prefer Gog to Steam and would prefer to buy all my games here. But for an initial purchase, would I pay more for a disk? Oh yeah. Definitely.