That alone doesn't explain why other old games like the Styx games are happily released here while Agony isn't. In fact it seems there is little problem with "AA"-size games coming here, even late, UNLESS they are "controversial" or include dungeon crawling.

The order of priority in releasing seems to be:
-quirky new-ish indie game like this Florence release
-AA game like The Surge (great stuff imo) or Paradox/Slitherine DLC game (ehhh)
-maybe a classic game/but usually another quirky new-ish indie game instead
-maybe a non Paradox/Slitherine wargame that is relatively complete at release
-dead last: high-voted "controversial" or dungeon crawler game.

The setting of Agony interests me way more than that of Florence, and if we're talking about "hide and seek" horror gameplay where the player is defenseless, there are already numerous games like that on GOG. In fact that sort of mechanic seems like a pretty common trend in modern horror games outside of the biggest franchises.

You said it yourself...and to add on similarly there are already some games here that some people would consider "controversial" or "inappropriate" in other ways. The recently-returned Lula game appears to be one of them. I get it...and I don't deny the artsy indie games get great reviews for the most part. Low risk, potentially high reward. But I'd like to interject that a reason why the small scale indie games are relatively bug-free is exactly that: they are small scale. By comparison, Agony is a big enough game that it has legitimate physical releases on consoles. As a bigger example, Bethesda games are notorious for being buggy, but look at the giant amount of content inside them. Is it more important to have expansive content, or to have a small bug-free game?

The bad reviews for games like Agony, Grimoire before it got accepted, etc are instances where I think it's important for GOG to gauge their own audience over reviews because the audiences are not necessarily the same across stores even on the same platform. I maintain that the audience on GOG is not the same as the audience on Scheme, despite many dual-users. For the hardline "old school" users that refuse DRM, there is a much better chance of being able to look past flaws of a cool-looking game, in order to have it DRM-free.

And btw, I really didn't mean for this to turn into a discussion about Agony. Agony Unrated (or hell, even regular censored Agony) is ONE example of a phenomenon that is observable over and over again here. I'll see you all in the next artistic unique indie new release topic I guess.

I find it funny, that you quote the "day one release" part of my comment, but ignore the "bug-ridden" part completely.
You are aware that in case of Agony, the "bug-ridden" part may have been the deciding element for the rejection, and thus lead to the "no-day-one-release" part?
And do we know, if the devs tried it later (after bugs got fixed) again?
I don't, but maybe you know more.

Point is: the game was a technical mess when it got presented to GOG. Also: according to most reviews I have read, the game is objectively bad. Feel free to disagree with that, but that doesn't change the opinion of a lot of others.
Btw - my opinion in that regard is irrelevant - I haven't played Agony (or Florence and I also have no intention to change that - so I have no horse in this race).
Oh, and the Styx games were never bug-ridden, as far as I'm aware, and they are considered good games by most reviews.
I'm not disputing the latter. And if you like the setting of Agony - fine!
But again: the majority of players obviously thinks otherwise.
And again: you are picking the one point out of the whole, which is most supportive for the argument, that you are trying to make ("Agony is controversial! - That's the sole reason why GOG won't release it!") and ignore all other, more decisive factors like: Agony was (still is?) full of bugs, and an objectively bad designed game on top of that.
Well, about that: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/gog_did_not_agree_to_publish_agony_unrated_on_their_platform/page1
If "cool-looking" is your best argument for Agony, you may find yourself standing in a corner.
I'd argue, old school users still prefer "good" games over "cool-looking" games.
Same here. No need to turn this into a fight over personal preferences.
Again: I don't have a horse in this race...I'm neither interested in "artsy indie games" like Florence, nor in games filled with "shocking content only to stir up controversy", like Agony and Hatred.

I just think when it comes to rejected games, we shouldn't leave out the important technical factors completely, only because some people don't like GOG's decision, and automatically assume, it has something to do with "controversial" stuff.
As you said yourself: there are already other controversial games here. So that alone can't be the deciding factor.

- is the developer and/or publisher willing and easy to work with (will they accept DRM-free, of course)?

- will a day-1 release guarantee more sales because people haven't already bought it on Steam?

- if the game has already been on Steam, will a release here still generate a decent profit? (like with an initial deep discount, or the game being really popular on Steam like a "AAA" title)

- has the genre shown to be profitable here on GOG?

- has the developer agreed to implement Galaxy features?

- is the price reasonable?

- if it's an old game, would putting in re-release work actually be worthwhile for a profit?

- does the wishlist show there's a reasonable amount of interest in this game?

- how likely is it Support will have to spend a lot of time helping people because the game is too buggy?

- how much time and money could be lost on providing refunds?

- will a release here be "problematic" from a PR/gaming news angle? (not a fan of investing too much into this, but it sometimes has to be considered)

and there are probably other considerations I'm missing.

Personally I'd like to see GOG find ways to allow many more games here - be less picky, make putting in Galaxy features easier, maybe having to take a step back Support-wise on some titles, etc. I'd be okay with titles like Agony, Underworld Ascendant, Hatred, Consuming Shadow, etc. showing up but GOG may not be in a business position to allow them. *shrug*

Just to clarify, I did address the "bug-ridden" part, but was trying to respond point-by-point so it did not come until later in that post:

Duly noted.

Let's not beat around the bush with the reason these kinda garbage games get released and praised while games like Agony are rejected or even Hatred for that matter, GOG is a woke SJW company that loves to throw games with no actual gameplay on here as long as it falls under the SJW ''WOKE'' mantra and any actual games get rejected cause they actually revile actual gamers.

GOG has just rereleased Lula and brought Biing!, come on!

They released 2 old classics that are barely controversial. yet they have rejected Shoot em ups and other games for whats seems to be nothing more than they are Niche games yet have more votes than this game. Please stop white knighting GOG simply cause you like DRM free games and look at what they release in general not the small print which those 2 games are.

Seeing as both hatred and Agony had more votes and got rejected no to mention many of their other rejected games I'd say they are just going the route of the SJW and are releasing indie games with barely or no gameplay at all. SJW love progressive games that have zero gameplay since they aren't actual gamers.

I don't know how the conversation went from Florence to Agony. It reminds me that I couldn't go to Florence last December because I was in actual agony, with a broken ankle. Anyway, I wrote a little comment about the game in its reviews section. I have no pretense to call it a review.

Nice short story with casual mini games
This is a mobile game port. I have only played this title on my Android smartphone. Its base price on the Play Store is 3 € against the 5 € asked here, that feels overpriced for a 30 minute mobile experience. Touch interaction is part of how the story is told and I feel that the pc port will lose immediacy because of this.
The developer is known for their previous mobile hit Monument Valley. There is nothing in common between the two, other than being carefully crafted. Music and visuals are on pitch, and the "slice of life" story is well written - though there's no words for you to read. Other than the love story, it deals with personal realization, and acceptance of our own past failures as a step to it . I think that this version would be acceptable for at least less than the mobile price. It's nice to see something different in the store, that you can entertain yourself with in company of someone who is not an abitual gamer, for example. I have played this with my partner and it's been a nice, relaxed experience that gave us a chance to share our views about the story, and I think this can be a good way of enjoying Florence.
I'd like to add that the title doesn't offer any difficulty, it's like reading an enhanced comic book.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

Did I trigger you again so soon? Couldn't cope with the notion that people here would like to see games like Hatred or Agony? Or did the notion of graphical difference suddenly don't matter so you can feel you made a point? Gotta love you white knighting like so many other GOG fanatic SJW types.

Gog release 2 old classics with barely any graphical fidelity and you'd most likely claim they are on par with games like Hatred or Agony which are both Taboo themes subjects which resemble reality a lot more than 2D art which barely any interaction.

While I don't necessarily disagree based on what I've seen, a lot of it seems to come down to certain types of genre too, not just what is or isn't "controversial." We can't leave that out, though I know it doesn't really apply to Agony. Most dungeon-crawlers/blobber RPGs (not named Grimoire which btw sold great upon finally arriving here despite being "old" and "poorly programmed" and even having a truly DRM-free release on itch months earlier, but I digress) lack controversy, yet have consistently gotten rejected. One can say that it would be repetitive to have a lot of them, but that doesn't stop GOG from getting more games of other genres like point-and-click or FPS. For that matter, I am not clear why the new Din's game was rejected at first though thankfully it did release here and thankfully the developers had made an option to buy DRM-free direct from their own site, for those who didn't want to wait or want to use Scheme. I guess you can say the Din's games are dungeoncrawlers, so maybe that was why.

Don't forget the common refrains of "GOG accepts controversial games, it has Postal and Saints Row". Great, I love those games!! But now, how about bringing more that push boundaries like that? Postal 4 was a welcome step imo, though it is a little unclear whether that would be accepted "on its own" if there weren't already other games in the series here. What continues to confuse me is why we can "cap out" at a low number of controversial games, while there is no such limit for indie games, even ones not as unique as Florence (like some of the platformer/rogue-like titles, for example). And it has to come down to preferences of the curators, regardless of the motivation, no?

Edited to clear up wording in the last part.

Like you said if you look at their release pattern itself is a double standard rejecting Dungeon crawlers or anything real gamer like yet constantly releasing the same copy-pasted like games over and over again and they wonder why they barely making a profit. I'll be leaving it at this seeing as the GOG white knight will most likely drag this on for being offended by being critical.

*Moded, disputing moderation decisions publicly on the forum is not allowed.

The fact is that it doesn't really matter how new/old, AAA/indie, bad/good the game is, if it's not in demand by the customer base of the store, it will not sell well. Prove me wrong, but it seems to me that illiquid products are not a good thing for any store.

Let's face it: while Florence is trending on Steam (it's on the main store page and already has 300+ reviews), on GOG it has only one of four reviews from a real customer and even less than 10 owners among the ardent defenders of the game in this topic (which is very hypocritical). Sounds like a success that Agony, Hatred and many other rejected games will never be able repeat, no doubt.

Now you can compare it with Grimoire, "Biing!" or any other recent releases that were really desired by the community (actual and potential buyers) to see the difference.

Yet we get told by apologists that the Scheme and GOG audiences are the same, so we must all bow down to the almighty Scheme review as a source on what games should come here.