I have been thinking for a while now, and perhaps I misunderstand, but what if...

One or more AAA devs / publishers came to GOG and said, "We'd like you to sell our games, but we are concerned about your DRM free position. We could make you megabucks if you only made our games available on your Galaxy client."

So you would have to log in to Galaxy to play the game (ala steam).

Talk about a rock and a hard place.

I don't use Galaxy, I think it is a good idea. Without it, GOG may not still be here, but it is still too broken for me to trust it.

So,
1) What would it take (if anything) for you to switch to Galaxy? Skyrim would pull a few, and other AAA games would too.
2) If you were in GOG's shoes and could see profits go up this way should they?

Personally, if these games aren't here now I don't miss them, so Galaxy only would change nothing in a practical sense. If GOG caved this way it could be seen as the thin end of the wedge. I will start to use Galaxy when I can trust it, not because I "need" a specific game.

I've been thinking this for a while, but didn't want to give the GOG team ideas, but I am sure this has already been discussed at GOG, they are sharper then me as are the the AAA people.

So what are your thoughts?

I believe if GOG makes Galaxy mandatory for a single player games, a huge number of people would be turning against them.

For me personally, now that I'm using Windows 10, I surely will be using Galaxy 2.0 along the time, but now I'm content downloading offline installer. When Galaxy achievements is on par with Steam on all game maybe. GOG should set up a small specialist team to help the devs achieve that.

1) Galaxy being supported on Linux would be essential for me to even consider it, although I'm not particularly interested anyway. I just don't want to install an extra, superfluous piece of software on my PC to play my games, period. The presence of some AAA DRM-laden games available via Galaxy wouldn't change that. I use GOG because I don't want DRM. If I wanted that (hypothetically, because I don't), I would go to Steam.

2) Under no circumstances. The reason GOG exists is in large part because of their firm anti-DRM stance. If they were to lose any sort of differentiation with Steam, then there would be very little reason for anyone to use them. Therefore, I disagree with the premise of your statement - profits wouldn't go up.

1. the reason i came here to begin with is because of the no client thing. now i'm not entirely opposed to a client as long as im able to back my games up and play them without the client installed. currently galaxy openly offers the option to download installer files, which i think is pretty alright. if gog said "the only way you're going to be able to download your games is through galaxy but you can still get the offline backup installers through galaxy as well" i'd be okay with that.
i would not be okay with a galaxy/online requirement however. if i was cool with that i'd probably buy most of my games on steam.

2. maybe, maybe not. they'd likely lose me. but i can't speak for everyone else.

these days, at my age, i really don't care that much about the newest trendy games. in fact i much prefer most indie titles. though getting newer big budget titles here is always welcome.

Don't know. I don't like relying on a client to play a game. I've literally refused to play Skyrim before because it demands you have steam in the background even if it doesn't actually need it. (thus get cracked version instead).

Only if the features were worth it. But i would play more single player stuff, so nothing to log into, don't need to tell anyone 'Hey i got XYZ trophy'. 'I've been playing 10 hours of Paintball stunts eXtreme!' . I don't care for acheivements. I don't care for updates of any kind...

Actually i remember a big dispute regarding ToME and Defense Quest, where it phoned home and in both cases the devs removed the offending feature. Not really. I don't see how it would work. You can make games that plug into galaxy if it's running, but it shouldn't require it. Ditto. I recently had troubles trying to get GoG Linux and other games to work, and got FEZ to work, and VVVVVV, but nothing else due to missing dependencies and a certain lack of knowledge. Having galaxy fix the problems (but not be require to play) would have made me reluctantly use it.

You don't have to be a "non Galaxy user" to object to the premise described in the OP.

I use Galaxy all the time. But I'd still start boycotting GOG if they started selling DRM-infested
products.

In other words, being a Galaxy user does not conflate with the idea that "Galaxy users are fine with DRM-infested games."

If Galaxy were GOG's own general-purpose, security/privacy-oriented Linux distro that was made to work hassle-free with everything sold on GOG, I would consider using it.

In its current incarnation, Galaxy (like all game launchers) is bloatware that offers no valid reason for its existence. It doesn't provide any functionality that can't be handled at the OS, file manager, web browser or game engine level. No. Principles aren't principles if they can be bought.

That said, I am reasonably happy with the way standard installers are handled right now and I am glad that GOG backed away from the ridiculous Galaxy-encumbered installers that they once tried to foist upon everyone.

CD Projekt are not hurting for cash. They sell enough of their games to not require help from big publishers. GOG makes a profit, the game development side make a killing. It's unlikely that they would make a u-turn, for a quick buck, and potentially alienate the healthy following they have, especially when Steam will still have the considerably larger market share. It's not a risk worth taking.

Oh, and most of the large publishers require you to install their DRM filled launchers anyway, even if you launch it through Steam. 1) I already use Galaxy, it's handy from time to time.
2) No, as I said before, they don't need the cash, GOG doesn't have the market share to make the 'big bucks', and they have a strong no DRM stance for a good reason. They have already said that DRM is pretty useless anyway. Games using launcher DRM are mostly cracked on day 1.

The only time I use Galaxy is to update my games to keep them up to date because it is very convenient just like what Steam does in terms of updates.
I don't see GOG making Galaxy mandatory any time soon.This is what makes GOG good is that Galaxy is optional and the only time that it is used for multiplayer games. If i had to use Galaxy to play my games then I would do it.

:D
what's the point, why not just buy it on steam then?

I trashed my Steam account and couldn't be happier and Gog doesn't have enough money to pay me to use Galaxy,as for a game AAA being only for Galaxy. Pfff, I'd just pirate it and wouldn't be worried at all.

The reason we have "published by Bethesda" Dishonored (2012), Dishonored 2 (2016), Prey (2017), etc, and Elder Scrolls 1-4 but but not ES5: Skyrim (2011) isn't Bethesda's opposition to selling games here DRM-Free or without a client, it's Bethesda's sh*tty over-monetization of Skyrim resulting in things like Steam Workshop lock-in, Creation Club, etc. Likewise, we don't have most Ubisoft games here because as is seen on Steam, they continue to require uPlay in addition to whatever client the store that sells them uses. And that's in addition to the other 2x layers of DRM (usually Denuvo + VMProtect) for a total of 4x layers of DRM. And anyone who's happy with 4x layers of DRM for Ubisoft games would have already bought them on Steam / uPlay...

But if you mean actually add DRM to Galaxy, all that would happen is GOG would lose it's Unique Selling Point, a lot of us who are here because of DRM-Free would instantly leave and GOG still wouldn't really attract that many more sales from others to compensate for other reasons (eg, the "No Steam No Buy" crowd would carry on with their "all my games in one place - on Steam" brand-addiction thing).

Personally I view offline installers as The Great Bullshit Gatekeeper. Eg, DRM-aside, clients also handle real-time in-game micro-transaction purchases. So client-less requirement = it rejects always-online, lootbox saturated, "time saver" pay2win crap from coming here, and those are exactly the kind of "games" I'm more than happy to "miss out" on. So the single-player client-less offline requirement actually does double duty - it's not just about DRM, it also acts like a filter against all the "paid for desktop PC games with "freemium" mobile phone monetization" wall of garbage out there.

My thoughts are that your post is a veiled plea for DRM games on GOG. We've had these pleas from time to time, both from users and from spammers. And the answer, as before, is a resounding NO.

1 - nothing. Galaxy adds nothing. TBH if you want cloud saves, multiplayer, achievements, go and use steam. Really do not understand why anyone would want a steam experience and then wants to shop here, other than to be the hipster li use steam but it’s not called steam”. Sure there might be one or two who still back up their games, however the vast majority use it as SaaS and have no clue about what DRM (or in fact control free) gaming is.

2 - that’s really up to them, they are a business after all. Simple really, if they did I would stop buying, so would others. Would they get new players in, maybe. Would they make more money who knows. They would be competing in a different market then though, and wouldn’t have the (what little is left) goodwill of long term buyers.

Nothing. I just don't use clients, which is why I never got into Steam, even if they do have some DRM-free games over there. It's hard to say, since we don't have the numbers they do. If alienating most of its original user base is of no concern and doesn't severely impact them financially, sure, I'd see them going down that road - it's a business and businesses ultimately exist to make money. Not that I personally think that is a good system, but it's how it works.

All that "concerned consumers" can ever do to prevent or discourage it is to not spend their money on stores that don't provide an offline, client-free, DRM-free alternative to the games they want to play. Which is why I'm here... and occasionally on itch.io.