+1.

Consolization is VERY dangerous, for future reference. Especially if they both defend and struggle to justify it. Downgrade was only one aftereffect of this hideous influence. Season pass didn't sound HALF better, either. And extras that in the past were provided in GoG shelf for free, like strategy guides, now they have to be purchased extra; like season passes.

I am awfully close to suffocate from the stench of fish. But before i abandon ship, suspicious signs have to get worse than that.

Let's hope it won't come down to this.

I didn't see this back in the day. I completely disagree.

Every change GOG has made has been bumpy. From the beginning, there were bumps. But usually they smooth out. And things progress.

Galaxy is optional. If you don't like it or if it's not working for you, I'd say get over it. It's a beta. And it just recently launched as beta. So if you want to help out by trying it out, please do; otherwise, use the downloader or website (remember when those were wonky?).

There are changes like the grays and the avatars and the gameshelf and friends and whatnot. And for a huge amount of people, those things are important. And for some folks, not so important. GOG is trying to accomodate more people, not fewer. But sometimes there is give and take.

I personally hope that many folks get a better-working shelf. But it works well enough. Tags are great. It would also be nice to add just a few features: 1) Sorting, 2) 1 page.

I would not put any hope in things reverting. And I wouldn't want it. Change is good. Let's keep moving forward. For everyone, not just the oldies.

In a few years, we'll be complaining about another change and Galaxy will probably be on all of our hard drives, working well. And we'll be sorting through our libraries and chatting with friends and holding achievement-earning competitions. And some folks will be silent, like always, and enjoying their games just as they always have.

I started as a fan of Galaxy, but it has worn on me the three weeks or so I have used it. It just doesn't serve any purpose for me other than get in the way. Friends, Chat, Achievements are all bogus for me, even though I know they mean something for others. I realize it's beta, but it really was forced on the clientele and took over immediately as the primary way to download an install games despite being unfinished and buggy. I know we still have the GOG Downloader, but that is destined for the scrap heap. I have been using a download manager and that works okay, but some of the games are multiple parts and not the single installer that GOG used to provide. The GOG Downloader links are buried pretty deep for any new customers to this site, and downloading the files outside of Galaxy with or without the Downloader has become cumbersome at best. I still have Galaxy installed on my PC only because it appears the direction GOG is going, but it serves no purpose other than a front end for my installed games. I could just as easily add them to my Steam client and have the same thing.

I find it hard to defend the shelf change as well, since it was a step backward with multiple pages, lack of manual sort, and reduced quality box art. Not a deal breaker for me, but a step back nonetheless. It had a much more "My Collection" feel to it before, now it just looks like a list of games like any other site I purchase from.

In addition, this has been a strange week for non Witcher 3 customers. I fully understand the need to promote a CDPR game heavily on their own site, but between the flood of W3 threads clogging up the forums and the lack of new or discounted games on the main site it has just sent me wandering elsewhere for my gaming fix.

And I will mention the usual GOG traits such as the folder naming debacles and disappearing games that immediately preceded all of this other chaos. Those used to be cute, but combined with the other changes have been amplified as additional problems that have gone unresolved.

Combine all of this, and I find myself wondering about the direction GOG is about to take. I understand the need for growth, but hope that this will not just become another "gaming site" like Gamersgate, Indie Gala, DotEMU, etc. They serve their purpose, but the old GOG felt like a little internet gaming home where my private collection of classic games sat, instead of the "in your face" and "mass market" feel of Steam or "sell, sell, sell" at other sites. Now it feels like just another outlet to buy a few games.

I'm not done with this site as some others have claimed to be, but I hope this week has been an anomaly and not a vision of the future for those that came here not interested in Witcher (an other mass market games) or a client like Galaxy. Maybe it was just too much change in a short span of time, but I hope to see some of the old GOG pop back up once this flurry of activity settles down. I would rather see this site do less things really well, than introduce a whole bunch of "features" that are half baked and make it just like all the other gaming sites throughout the internet.

Rant over....

Literally everything you're exasperated about right now, was announced almost a year ago when they first started talking about Galaxy. If you don't like it, don't use it. It's pretty simple. Just like with Steam you can add games that weren't installed via Galaxy. Also something they talked about nearly a year ago when they first announced Galaxy. Anyone, and I mean ANYONE who says a game like Witcher 3 could survive on PC sales alone, is a flat out fool. That's the reality of the market right now. You can't spend the kind of money it takes to make a game like Witcher 3 and NOT cater to the console market, if you want to stay in business for long.

Does it suck that there seems to have been a slight downgrade graphically? Sure. It's still a gorgeous freaking game, and I have no doubt that we'll be gifted the Enhanced Edition just like they did for W1 and W2, sporting better textures, better lighting and new features like DX12 or Vulcan so they can get those fancy fire effects that they wanted without absolutely crippling the majority of their PC players' systems.

Hell, I have no doubt that modders will have at least the textures and lighting handled long before then. I bet they'll even have UI and control issues fixed in short order. THIS is why we play on PC. Who cares that in order to be able to afford to make this game, they had to focus development on a lowest common denominator? We get mods.

And the expansion packs? I don't know how long you've been gaming but we've gotten expansion packs for ages. Expansion packs are true expansions to the game. More content, more quests, more stories, side stories, new lands, etc. What CDPR is offering is expansion packs, not horse armor. Or, more accurately, the horse armor they're offering, we're getting for free where someone like EA would shamelessly charge $1 for each piece and $3-$5 for for small bundles. If they really are producing another ~30 hours of gameplay with these two expansions, then I'm absolutely on board with it. I haven't bought the pack yet because I don't pre-order anything anymore. But I might pick it up when I'm getting toward the end of the main quest. I play slow so by then at least one will be out and we'll actually have some idea of the quality on offer and if it's going to be worth picking up.

Not to push buttons here, but I have installed several games with the EXE files only to have Galaxy not find them when pointed directly at the folders. My only option was to uninstall through the Control Panel (or GOG unistaller) and reinstall through Galaxy.

You do know that the whole achievements, friends, game time tracking and such are going to be completely optional right? Well as soon as they finish the disable features for those. So if you don't care for those you can just turn them off, if you don't want auto updating that can be turned off either on a game by game basis or for all games(again disabling auto updates for all games is still being implemented) .

If you want to still just download the installers, you can just like you do with the downloader, use Galaxy to download the installers and then ignore it till you want to download something else. Hence the selling point of Galaxy being a "Optional" client it's got stuff for the newer crowd that want it and can be used like a basic downloader for the those who prefer the old method. Yes it's still "a client" but in all reality it's just a downloader with a new UI and soon to be optional client features. Since you can just downloader your stuff and never touch the thing.

So I don't get why so many people are getting worked up about it outside of that it's still in development and has quite it's share of kinks to work out, but so did the downloader for the longest time if memory served. I really think alot of people need to get the whole all Clients must be used like Steam, Origin, Uplay,ect. Where you must use them as a front end, must use them for everything and have to live with features you don't want or care about out of their heads and see it for what it will be in the end and what it's basically is now and that as I said just a fancier downloader with optional client features.

And yes they have buried the downloader links and while I can see why since the downloader is no longer supported and probably will break and be useless. Should they have done it(burying the links) now, probably not but again since they were rolling out the new account it would be pointless to have the downloader links front and center only to have to go back and put them out of sight when the downloader ceases to work.

About Galaxy beta, it's BETA wait for final release, as for now it's very basic client with some bugs.
About Witcher 3, Xbox promotions show everything we need to know about 2013 --> 2015. It's all about money and if you don't have at least $10m lying around, then it isn't worth even talking. :)

I partly disagree with your disagreement.

When did the regional banning smooth out? Or the regional pricing? You might not be troubled by it, but it didn't smooth out one bit. It only got worse.

Sure I do, it feels like yesterday. Hey, come to think of it, it was yesterday. And today, too.

I agree.

You assume everybody is here for the same reasons and has the same motivations and habits. I disagree.

For all these years, I have not usef the GOG downloader because it was too intrusive. Do you really think I will use an even more intrusive client?

My point was not really fixated on the optional features that I won't ever use, as much as it was about the massive shift in too many strategies at one time. Galaxy is not a simple as the old Downloader, but I can live with it. It just complicates things more. I got my Alpha invite, and I believe it was the next week it was up for Beta download and pretty much being pushed out to everyone. It may not be the case, but this looks like they were shoving it out the door unfinished so the new customers coming in for the Witcher 3 release would see a shiny new client like other sites offer.

A proper release schedule, with a still supported Downloader and Galaxy co-existing while bugs were worked out would have been a better approach IMO. But for anyone just visiting the site today, the Downloader is not easy to find, but Galaxy is front and center in all it's broken glory.

I have focused on Galaxy in this response, but again my post was about too much, too quick and that GOG basically made changes that affected it's base clientele without really gaining change readiness feedback in advance. An understandable business move, but the site has lost some of it's luster because of it.

It isn't?
Well, ok. I'll give credit where credit is due. It is not spam. It's just one of the many opinion pieces that are kinda constantly being submitted recently. At least it is worded in a civilized way, however I can still sense the bias in it. Not to even mention the OP overlooks the fact The Witcher 3 had such a massive budget because of its consolization, which statistically improved the potential revenue more than enough times to warrant such a move. People forget this is a business. Difference of opinions, I guess, but some facts don't change.

A good read for all those people who are mindlessly yelling "consolization", "downgrade", "CDPR is selling out".

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-05-19-cd-projekt-red-tackles-the-witcher-3-graphics-downgrade-issue-head-on

So they are basically right.

Well as I said the downloader is dead, it still functions but is no longer supported. Well technically it hasn't really been supported since the last update but was kept around till Galaxy was in what they felt would be a more accessible state. So it makes sense that they wouldn't make it available or easy to find since it's no longer supported and once something happens intentionally or not that causes it to no longer work as intended with GOG then that's it. So had Galaxy been what seems to have been in a better state when going into public beta, which I am sure was the original intentions there wouldn't of been a reason to make the downloader easy to find since it would of been obsolete and unsuppourted outside of keeping it for a few minority sticklers.

As for gaging change readiness, how would they go about that? if you think that they should of used the forums for that, nah. In the 5 or so years I been using this site I can tell you that you can never gauge change readiness based on the forums, the forums represent a small fraction of the GOG customer base and out of that your average active poster represent a even smaller fraction. A minority of a minority. In other words all you would get is the feedback of a vocal minority and history has shown that this vocal minority always reacts negatively to any change GOG does be it moving to allow for selling newer titles to unbundling software, not saying all the complaints are unfounded like complaints about things being broken and never fixed but it seems for every one legitiment complaint you see tons of overreactions to the stupidist shit like as I said the introduction of new games for one.. oh the bitching that went on when that was announced, my head hurts just thinking back to it.

Seriously though you can't base desgin decisions and prepardness on these or any other boards when your a medium to big company since say there are 1.5 million customers on GOG out of that I would say less then 10% of that total uses these forums. That's really not a lot. So it's in those cases you take the chance and roll the dice and see how the customer base on a whole acts, if your losing business and traffic then you have to rethink things but never on how the forums think about it. Now if there is a bug or site problem like people randomly being logged out, things not appearing in their carts and such that you pay attention to but never when it comes to site redesigns and the like.

In another thread about a week or two back I pointed out to someone who couldn't fathom that those who were complaining about the changes to the account system and all that were the minority. To which I brought up a few examples one of which was a man named Bryan Aleverez who co-runs this site I am a subscriber on and has ran it for many years and one day on the site's podcast he addressed the complaints from the sites forums and how people were saying he didn't listen to them or never asked them how they felt about the changes they made. To which he said "If I was to just listen to those use the forums and base every decision this site makes based soley on them, the site would look a lot different and I would have a lot less money. Why? because our forum users make up roughly about less then 5% of our total subscribers. Less then 5%. We make changes and decisions based on metrics and site data, if we keep or increasse traffic and subscribers we know we are on to something, if not then we go back and rethink things."

So in the long run you got to just do things and then you adjust based on how well you are doing based on overall data and you can't really gauge how it's going to work or not work till you do it.

Galaxy not finding them is not surprising, it doesn't scan your computer looking for installed games. Are you hitting the + and choosing "Scan and Import Folders" option?

I don't think you read, or read properly for that matter. The build of the game was changed. That's not a downgrade if other stuff is improved. And please, people who bitch about The Witcher 3 should not play it then. According to CDPR it's either a game on everything or no game. Selling out? Well, excuse me, but a business is a business, and I don't think any sane person who understands economics would be stupid to remain exclusive to an unprofitable or at least too risky of a market if they were in charge of CDPR.