While that's certainly good to hear, again, I can only say don't get your hopes up, especially for older games.

Oh definitely. :) With the exception of Postal 2 though as the developer has actually stated they're looking into GOG Galaxy for a possible future patch. :) Not holding my breath for any specific games beyond that though. :)

On the other hand, the major update to the game that hit Steam last year isn't even on GOG yet, so I wouldn't hold my breath even for Postal 2 if I were you ;-)

Running With Scissors has sent the new build to GOG about a week ago, which GOG has confirmed also. It's just a matter of time until GOG packages it up with their special sauce and does QA testing now. No idea how long that process takes but we'll get an idea of it now since we know when RWS sent them the new patch. :) I'm guessing it should be sometime in the next few days/weeks though.

Well, that is good news! Looking forward to it :-)

On the topic of Galaxy multiplayer, I'm actually not sure I like the idea at all. At any rate, it depends on how it is implemented. If, at any step in the process, the multiplayer functionality relies on infrastructure from GOG or CDPR, then it's really just as bad as any other proprietary multiplayer system. We've all seen what happened to GameSpy. If the system means that games will stop working (at least for multiplayer) if GOG should ever go out of business, then it's a bad system.

Disagree. And we already have several FPS.

quake 3 ,unreal tournament goty , ut 2004 would be the best games to test the multiplayer fps waters with gog galaxy, provided if they can get the devs to add galaxy support.

Multiplayer games that use VAC or punkbuster will asap kick people out who are not authenticated via steam or ea's client for battlefield , so would be probably best to avoid those and stick with games that dont use em.

You can't really have a multiplayer matchmaking service that doesn't connect to a centralized server due to the very nature of it from a technical standpoint. The purpose is so that people who want to play a game can auto-locate other people who want to play a game. Now on a LAN that is simply done via UDP broadcast to probe the local network segment to either find a game server that is running, or for the game server to announce itself to any clients to display in a chooser window. It's easy, automatic and works on a LAN segment, but UDP broadcasts do not travel beyond the LAN. The only way for a game to discover other players outside of a LAN is via connecting to a known server at a known domain/address to basically either say "Give me the list of games that are up and running." or to say "Hey, I have a game up and running, let everyone else know about it." That can only happen if the game knows the hostname to connect to, and it can only do that if the game came with the host preconfigured or using some other method of obtaining the information which itself relies on centralized infrastructure (such as TXT records in DNS for example). Without a centralized server you basically do not have any way to have multiplayer matchmaking at all and that is a rather important service that is greatly desired for multiplayer games. I'd go as far as saying more people who play multiplayer demand that feature than do not.

So it really boils down to:

1) Does the audience for the game in question have a high enough interest in multiplayer matchmaking being available?

Answer: This is going to be true in 2014 for just about every game that is made. While some people don't care about multiplayer at all whatsoever, and others only are interested in LAN and/or Direct-IP, there are boatloads of people who want to connect somewhere and find players to play with whom they don't know about at all. This pretty much makes this feature a must-have for any serious game.

2) Does the game publisher want to offer their gamers multiplayer matchmaking?

Answer: Why wouldn't they? It is probably the most common way that people connect together in 2014 and play multiplayer games realistically, again whether some people care about multiplayer or not, and whether or not some people only want or care about LAN or Direct-IP. A publisher would be foolish to not include such features in any games they're developing because there are people who want it and would find it odd for a new game to not have it nowadays. It's a feature that's been around for 15 years or so that gamers are used to and expect. Since it makes it easy for people to play multiplayer and find someone to play with, this encourages people to play that game multiplayer and allows communities of gamers, clans, groups, etc. to come together and make a rich social system for playing that game. It draws more people to buy the game so that they can do this and ultimately makes the game company more money.

3) Does the existence of this feature affect someone who only wants to ever play single player games, LAN multiplayer or Direct-IP multiplayer assuming those features are present in the game by its design?

Answer: No, not at all. If someone does not want to use an optional feature of a game or other software - just don't use it, nobody is forced to use a multiplayer matchmaking service in their games if they only want to play the single player, LAN or Direct-IP mode of the game in question. Just don't use the feature and let people who want to actually use it get what they want too. Both groups of people are happy about what they get, and the game company is happy because people who can find players to play with keep their game alive for many more years than if they did not have this feature.

4) So since a central server is needed in order for the entire concept to even function one way or another no matter how you slice it, whether it is through a custom service, DNS queries or some other centralized discovery mechanism - who should run it?

Answer: There aren't a lot of viable options really. It really boils down to the game developer, the publisher, the distributor or some centralized third party service (ie: Gamespy).

5) Why don't they make it so the gamers themselves can run their own multiplayer matchmaking service instead?

Answer: They could make it so that gamers could independently run their own service that acts similarly to how a centrally controlled service mentioned above would work but the problem with that is that person 1's game that just got installed has no idea what computer on the Internet to connect to to know that person 4938 is running a multiplayer matchmaking service for the game on their computer. The only way to know that person 4938 is running the service is either for person 1's game to connect somewhere online centrally that can tell them this information or to force every gamer who wants to have this feature to have to punch in the IP address of someone else's server without having a way to know what it is, unless it is a friend of theirs or something. You essentially end up without matchmaking, but with Direct-IP, or a crossbreed between the two which is a whole different thing than any of the other options really. Having this as a feature is possible but it isn't an "instead of" feature, but it would be a possible "in addition to", meaning for example that a game that added this functionality would say have the ability to connect to the game company's dedicated servers for regular matchmaking, or another option that essentially is "Type in the hostname/IP of the matchmaking provider you prefer to use." Even with that option, there are people who want a central "official" game service to use.

I've got some other thoughts I'd like to share in another comment below which I think are important for people to think about also...

As a final point I'd like to say that without this option being available on GOG.com we end up where we have the following:
1) Some games that have no centralized matchmaking service at all and gamers that want this to be available to them as some kind of option who simply do not have any option at all, while the same game might be available on another distribution platform like Steam that does have this feature. Case in point: Full Spectrum Warrior series of games. Steam wins, GOG customers lose.

2) Some games that get pulled from the GOG store completely because the 3rd party service shuts down that handles their matchmaking and GOG has no control over it because it is 3rd party. Case in point: Gamespy and the entire ArmA series of games. Those games all got updated to use Steamworks multiplayer matchmaking and are now available for sale again on Steam with fully functioning multiplayer. Steam wins, GOG customers lose.

3) Some game publishers that consider multiplayer matchmaking a core part of their game's experience but either prefer to use a robust existing service to implement this than to implement it themselves and they're only willing to put their game out there with matchmaking ability and not willing to put it out there on different retailers, some with matchmaking and some without because it can be confusing to customers who aren't aware the game is different if they buy it in different places. Or they buy it on one store and their friends buy it on another and they can't play games together with the optimal experience they are expecting because one version of the game lacks matchmaking support. They're not willing to implement all of the functionality themselves so they use Steam and don't make the game available anywhere else because the other options don't have multiplayer services. People buy the game from Steam because that's the only place it is available. Steam wins, GOG customers lose.

4) There are many games in the GOG catalogue already that have multiplayer matchmaking built into them, some which even require a CDKEY to be registered in order to play online multiplayer. That is nice to have the game here and have it with multiplayer, but as we learned with ArmA series of games if that 3rd party service shuts down, we not only lose the functionality if we own the game, but GOG and GOG customers present and future lose the opportunity to buy that game if it is pulled from the store due to lack of multiplayer. Some people might not like the fact that such games are here now and rely on 3rd party servers/services in order to play those games and that would be understandable. What solutions are technically possible to solve this problem and give a more robust solution that provides the same type of features and gives people more freedom and flexibility? Having GOG run their own multiplayer service for the games they run in their own store and as an optional service is a lot better than not having the functionality available at all in any games, or not having the games available to even buy here at all.

Multiplayer matchmaking is an optional feature, at least in games that exist on GOG.com. Nobody is ever required to use them ever in any game in the catalogue right now unless they want that particular functionality, and that isn't going to change with GOG Galaxy. The only thing that really changes is that games that use it will be more flexible and GOG can manage the service and listen to their own community and make it better for everyone because it's their service. GOG can't change Gamespy or some other 3rd party service or guarantee these 3rd party servers will continue to run forever etc. They can control what their own servers/services do though and that stands to keep games up and running at least for as long as GOG themselves are in business. At the current lifespan of multiplayer services for various games out there being all too often very short, the distributors have a very good value proposition for both the game developers in providing the service, and to the game customers for longevity of their store. More game companies or services like Gamespy shut down their game servers or go out of business than there are major distributors doing the same.

The most important thing to note though is that the existence of these features either as they are right now without Galaxy multiplayer, or after when some games do support Galaxy multiplayer, is that nobody has to use or care about these features at all if they're simply not interested in them at all. Why would it even matter at all to someone if these features are present if they're simply not going to ever use them and have no interest in them? Why do people think that their own personal preferences and usage case is how it should be for everyone? Without these services only one group of people get what they want (except if a game doesn't come to GOG at all because of the lack of this service being here). With these services those same people are essentially completely unaffected by simply having a coke and a smile and not using those features or needing to concern themselves with them, and everyone who does want to use the feature actually has an opportunity to even get a chance to. Both groups of people can get what they want out of the game.

The only people that don't really get what they want is people whose wants and desires are simply to have things so that they get what they want and others do not get to have what they want also even though it wouldn't affect anyone negatively in the first group for both to get what they want.

What if GOG goes out of business? We can't know for sure but we can speculate that game companies would do what they do now which varies from game to game. Some games lose their multiplayer functionality, some get it patched to some other platform like Steam or elsewhere. I'm not sure it is a terribly important thing to be worried about though if the only options available without it are:
1) The game never gets sold on GOG.com ever anyway.
2) The game comes with multiplayer ripped out in which case your experience the entire time GOG was in business is the same as if it had multiplayer and they went out of busness. With multiplayer working while they are in business you at least get a chance to use it, and not have to worry about if Gamespy and its friends are still up and running. 1 point of failure is better than 2 points of failure in this case.

People are free to have their opinions either way, and to figure out what works best for them. I highly doubt there are any more than a small handful of (possibly highly vocal) people who would feel so strongly about it to leave GOG and go on their way because a feature they don't care about and wont use is now an optional feature that other people can use. Any of our lost comrades after the fact will be more than made up for IMHO by the massive number of people that are happy about all of the new stuff along with the huge wave of people that will be coming here in the near future because they now feel GOG is another option that can provide them with what they want and in a way that is arguably superior to what others are offering out there (after it has time to get the kinks worked out and mature of course).

What I just don't understand is that some people are more vocal about something like this becoming available which is potentially more flexible and less restrictive than options that exist here right now that are far less convenient and far more restrictive which they don't make barely a peep over.

I'm just glad that GOG has the balls to move forward on a project like this to modernize their service in a flexible way that respects the customer's freedom and tries to give customers more options with less reliance on 3rd party services or competitors to get what they want, and that they can do this without being paralyzed by business fear over a small vocal minority. That takes guts in this business.

I'm sure glad they have balls of stelel. :)

Anyhow, everyone will be expressing their personal views (no right or wrong really, just opinions) over time on this and it'll die down after a while once it's out there and people get used to the new stuff and realize their experience is either for the better or at least not any worse minus some possible short term growing pains as new services/website/etc. become available. This time next year we'll have calm waters and hopefully half of GOG gamers will be socializing even more closely in brotherly battles using Galaxy multiplayer to find each other. ;o) Making GOG clans to go battle it out with Steam clans.... Tell me that isn't compelling... :)

The Witcher Adventure Beta kept me up half the night I must admit, but now the rooster crows which tells me it's far past time for bed. ;) Got a few more things to do then I'm down for the count. ;oP

Have a good night all.

Dude, seriously. I thought I was long-winded, but even I give up once you let it rip. You probably had some points in there somewhere, but halfway through the first post I'd already forgotten the beginning of it.

Let me just say that you could both have the ability to host your own master server, and still have the game config be pre-configured with the official master server. Then the game would not be a hostage to the whims of economy and/or single parties. If it can be manually configured to use a different server, and the means to host such a server are available, then the game is free (not in an economic sense, you understand). "But how will your game know which server to connect to?", I hear you ask (or saw you ask something similar). Well, you tell it. There's this thing called the internet, which is a great way for people to share information with one another. If the official master server ever goes permanently offline for whatever reason, then I guarantee you that someone else will gladly host another one, and will happily give out the address of it in relevant locations such as fansites, Wikipedia, Mobygames, etc.

Thank you for posting this link. I'm happy now. :)

Why are you hating on liquid fps?

While I probably wouldn't play MP it should be a feature of the new client. A lot of people only like playing MP.
The only games I may consider is Rainbow Six. I played that MP like crazy back in the day, both co-op and PvP. Once people started getting crazy with the clan this or that I stopped playing. But the clans did help me weed out the people I didn't want to play with.

I would play the hell out of coop games, especially Trine 1 when it's finally out.