I would very much like this feature too, in fact I'm not sure why GOG hasn't implemented it yet. Sometimes my downloads get corrupted especially with games such as Witcher 2 and Wasteland 2 for Linux where the download is over 10GB, a simple MD5 would be much appreciated.

No, it's just to say that you cannot call everything under the sun "DRM". The installer was and still is DRM-free, the games, once installed, were and still are DRM-free.

The only thing that changed is that it is slightly harder to use a third party tools to bypass the installer and extract the files directly; it's still possible to install the game on Windows and then copy the files, it's still possible to install the game on a VM and copy the files and it's still possible to install the game using Wine and copy the files, etc...

If tomorrow somebody release a patch for game that used to work with WINE and that this patch has the side effect of making the game incompatible with WINE; are you going to call that a DRM ? after all the game used to work with WINE and not it no longer does therefor preventing the user from doing what they want, definitely a DRM right ?

No. The new installers do not work well with Wine. It has been mentioned in this thread and also on other threads. At the moment there is no way to extract them properly in Linux.

A VM running Windows just for unpacking the installers? Sounds a bit overkill.

It's not really DRM, IMO, but it is completely unnecessary to make things harder for us Linux users.

You are right pirates (i.e. groups that crack games) don't do it usually.... but peoples who upload/post/share the ISO(or crack) do it very often.

Not everything, just something that's intended to hinder your usage of what you bought. I.e. "Digitial Restrictions Management".
And why should it be GOG's concern? GOG doesn't support Linux users who buy games and what to unpack them manually, but suddenly wants to support pirates who download mangled copies just so they shouldn't install some malware? Think about it, it's nonsense.

What about the people who don't use Windows? I for one have Linux on all my machines and I'm not going to pirate Windows or waste hard disk space and partitions to install games.

Again, I'm not going to pirate / over pay for Windows and set up all that to be able to install my games.

If it was possible then people wouldn't go through installer hacks and all this trouble to play their games, wouldn't they? You're wrong, the installers crash, it's the reason why people extract them manually in the first place,


How about GOG removes the stupid password and we're all happy? It has already been mentioned, if pirates want to download torrented copies and end up with malware included, it's their fault, not GOG's. Only a fool would steal something without expecting any kind of consequences.


Exactly, and if you think about it even more. Pirates can simply install the game on Windows and repack it with Malware, what good is the password for?

It's complete nonsense. The ones suffering from the password lock it's us and no one else.

That made me laugh :) This password is indeed double nonsense :)

So if a game is compiled for x86 CPUs and that as a result it prevents me from playing it on my ARM Android table.. it's definitely DRM. Not to mention that the game is closed source... double DRM.

More seriously, yes it does "hinder" a very specific/limited possible usage of the installer (and only of the installer), but not all "restriction" become DRM, the EULA is full of restriction, the copyright laws are full of restriction too, that doesn't make them DRMs.

We are in 2014...the Internet exists...

...what will happen, some dude download a GoG game from a torrent site... he will end up with some random Bitcoin miner installed, he will post in Redit/Twitter : "#@# I just installed a #@# GoG and those #@# installed a malware and destroyed my computers! "... five minutes later Kotaku will post an "article" : "GOG gone bad; now they install malware with all their games!" and ten minutes later similar headlines on most gaming sites... yes that's silly but that's the world we live in.

I would reply: Why did you download the game from a torrent site in the first place, and not from the official site?

A bad example if you ask me and wouldn't make any headlines, especially when said by a pirate downloading torrents. Now if someone downloaded a gog game from gog.com and it contained malware, that would make headlines yes, but not your example.


EDIT:

I just want to mention that if I own a game that is DRM-Free both on GOG and Steam and I want to play it with Wine on Linux:

1. Steam requires you to login once to download the files and then you can forget about the client and Steam/Valve entirely cause your game works just perfectly on Wine.

2. GOG requires you to login once through the site to download the files and then you can forget about the Site entirely and you know your game works fine in Wine just as the Steam version does.

However you find out that you can't install the GOG version because there's a password in your way.


Then ask yourself which of the 2 services gave you a working game.

You can download Windows for free and legally from Microsoft. Granted it will only work for 30 days (unless it's a beta/ public RC which usually last for a lot longer) but it's fast to install and more than enough to extract games, and if you use Virtual Box snapshot feature you can even manage to not have to reinstall Windows every month.

But then it won't be signed with GoG certificate, or any certificate for that matter. And if you try to install an unsigned program then Windows will scream unless you have manually disabled the securities (or you are still running XP)

And how would you know they download it from a torrent site and not from GoG ? Peoples would complain that a GoG games polluted their PC, not that a GoG game downloaded from a torrent site did.

Look what happened recently with Farcry 4 with peoples complaining on the official forum and on Twitter about a missing feature... features that was actually only missing on the pirated version because it was added in the release patch.

Good, it shows that people liked the game. If EA wouldn't be so stupid, they wouldn't have used any DRM to begin with and more people would have bought the game rather than pirating it.

Why should I care about the certificate if I'm downloading the games from my personal account on gog.com?

Give me one valid reason.

Yes I know what happened, this: http://kotaku.com/far-cry-4-tricks-people-into-revealing-theyd-pirated-th-1660853492

Well apparently it was dictated by a technical necessity : to prevent some "too intelligent for their own good" browser from thinking those were RAR files and offering to open them. You could even say that it was also dictated by a "practical" reason : to prevent from accidentally opening and extracting the archive and ending up with an non-installed partially working game.
What ? we were talking about pirates tampering the installer, what I said (actually what GoG said not me), is that if a pirate extract and repack the installer then the new installer won't be signed, which is something Windows don't like.