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The galaxy is your oyster.

Smugglers V, a turn-based Sci-Fi epic where you fight, trade, and pirate your way to the top of galactic elite, is available on GOG.com, for only $9.99.

There is a whole genre of games dedicated to a single idea: you're a spacecraft pilot climbing the ladder of power and fame through trading, combat, prospecting, freighting, and possibly piracy. The unsurpassed freedom and feeling that your destiny is your own to shape, made this single idea one of the most prolific motifs in PC gaming. Many of space-sims enjoy cult following and games of this genre developed nowadays sometimes reach incredible scale and complexity. Most of them, though, involve a lot of action and put reflexes before tactics and planning. This one is different. It's played in turns.

Smugglers V is what you get when a dedicated creator polishes and improves every aspect of his game for years. Smugglers is not a series in the common understanding of the word. You don't need to play Smugglers 1-4 to enjoy the fifth one to full extent. It's still pretty much the same game, that evolves with each installment, gaining more and more gameplay depth, enriching the dynamic universe presented, and offering new options. In the latest version we offer you here, the phenomenal turn-based space-sim offers 30+ different spacecrafts, 100+ pilot skills and traits, 6 different career choices, and 4 factions to pledge allegiance to at your whim. The turn-based mechanics make this title extremely addictive, as the "one more turn" syndrome can hold you at the helm to the wee hours of the morning.

Pilot, forge your fortune and make your own destiny in a galaxy full of war, unrest, villany, and opportunity in Smugglers V, for only $9.99 on GOG.com.
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JMich: Ah, fun math again.

So, in the last quarter, we had less classic releases than the average (or is it median) for this year. Which also means that for another quarter, we have more than the average/median of the year. Can you run the numbers for those? Or would that show that GOG is releasing more than previous years, thus prevent the gloom and doom predictions?
Businesses operate with quarterly reports, as that is more useful than year on year reports. Here are GOG's for 2013:

1st quarter (jan-march): 10+ year old games represent 58% of the total releases (25 out of 43)
2nd quarter (apr-jun) : 10+ year old games represent 27% of the total releases (11 out of 41)
3rd quarter (jul-sep): 10+ year old games represent 24% of the total releases (11 out of 45)

I'm pointing out a trend. It's very simple: GOG are releasing fewer classics now than they did earlier this year. Way fewer. The percentage of classics out of the total releases is also lower. Your data shows both these points to be true.

GOG have also, in the last few months, been releasing way fewer classics than they have in the same months of the past few years. Your data shows this too.

This is a trend, it is not a prediction. I have never attempted to predict anything. There is also no fun with numbers involved.
Post edited October 04, 2013 by Zeewolf
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JMich: Math is fun! :)
NERDS!!!
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Zeewolf: I'm pointing out a trend. It's very simple: GOG are releasing fewer classics now than they did earlier this year. Way fewer. The percentage of classics out of the total releases is also significantly lower. Your data shows both these points to be true.

GOG have also, in the last few months, been releasing way fewer classics than they have in the same months of the past few years. Your data shows this too.

This is a trend, it is not a prediction. I have never attempted to predict anything. There is also no fun with numbers involved.
There is also a trend that GOG releases more classics as years increase. 36 in 2010, 57 in 2011, 62 in 2012, 48 in 75% of 2013 (which means at least 60, possibly more). So Classic releases are on the rise, according to this trend.
There is also a trend that GOG releases fewer classics as years increase. 67% in 2011, 39% in 2012, 36% in 75% of 2013. So Classic releases are on the decline, according to this trend.
Both these trends are true (according to math). Both these trends can't be true according to logic.
Another example.
According to you, 50% of 10 is more than 25% of 30, because it's a higher percentage. 36% of 132 (classics so far in 2013) is more than 46% of 79 (classics in 2010) but less than 67% of 85 (classics in 2011). However, assuming classic percentages remain the same for 2013, and release rate also remains constant, that means we'll have 176 releases in 2013, and 36% of 176 (projected classics in 2013) is more than 67% of 85.

Math, trends, and analyses is one of the most fun you can have, especially since math is one of the most versatile tools to use. See the first 2 trends for examples that are math supported (if not math proved), yet logically can't both be true.
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JMich: Math is fun! :)
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mistermumbles: NERDS!!!
But being able to prove what you like using math is fun. Including (but not limited) to the famous 0.9999.... = 1 equation.
Post edited October 04, 2013 by JMich
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Zeewolf: I'm pointing out a trend. It's very simple: GOG are releasing fewer classics now than they did earlier this year. Way fewer. The percentage of classics out of the total releases is also significantly lower. Your data shows both these points to be true.

GOG have also, in the last few months, been releasing way fewer classics than they have in the same months of the past few years. Your data shows this too.

This is a trend, it is not a prediction. I have never attempted to predict anything. There is also no fun with numbers involved.
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JMich: There is also a trend that GOG releases more classics as years increase. 36 in 2010, 57 in 2011, 62 in 2012, 48 in 75% of 2013 (which means at least 60, possibly more). So Classic releases are on the rise, according to this trend.
There is also a trend that GOG releases fewer classics as years increase. 67% in 2011, 39% in 2012, 36% in 75% of 2013. So Classic releases are on the decline, according to this trend.
Both these trends are true (according to math). Both these trends can't be true according to logic.
You are too hung up on the year on year analysis to see the full picture. It is not all that useful to compare 2013 to 2010, because GOG is in a different situation now than they were then. There is a reason why all businesses have quarterly reports, if they just look at the annual numbers they do not get a complete picture and they may be too slow to react to trends. And for users, what matters isn't years, it is weeks. It is of no concern to me how many classics they released two years ago when I notice that a decline has happened during this year.

A simple fact: During the first three months of this year we got more classics than during the next six months combined. This is not about percentages, it is raw numbers. 25 classics in the first three months, 22 in the next six.

When you call this a good year, and predict 60+ releases, you are basing it in large part on that first quarter. On stuff that happened more than half a year ago. Do not expect me to judge the GOG of today by the (high) standards set by the GOG of last winter.

Also, please don't put words in my mouth ("According to you, 50% of 10 is more than 25% of 30, because it's a higher percentage").
Sorry people but how are your statistical posts about GoG's quantitative and qualitative releases from past years relevant to Smugglers V? Is the game any good? Has anyone played it? Sounds interesting.

Oh and yeah, Good Old Games is about (good or bad) dusty classic games but the best has already been published and it's probably not that easy to get the rights to add more. Adding Indie Games and such is a clever move and a key to GoG's long term survival... It also helps young gamers getting to know the website and the older games it promotes...
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massplus: ...Is the game any good? Has anyone played it? Sounds interesting.
You can see for yourself and grab the demo from the dev's site. ;) Still have to give it a go myself.
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Zeewolf: Also, please don't put words in my mouth ("According to you, 50% of 10 is more than 25% of 30, because it's a higher percentage").
Allow me first to apologize for this. I was basing it on this part
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Zeewolf: Interesting data. From there we can see a clear trend: classics represent a rapidly decreasing percentage of GOG's releases.
since I assumed you were talking about yearly classic releases (of which the percentage is lower, but number is higher). So again, I apologize.


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Zeewolf: You are too hung up on the year on year analysis to see the full picture. It is not all that useful to compare 2013 to 2010, because GOG is in a different situation now than they were then. There is a reason why all businesses have quarterly reports, if they just look at the annual numbers they do not get a complete picture and they may be too slow to react to trends. And for users, what matters isn't years, it is weeks. It is of no concern to me how many classics they released two years ago when I notice that a decline has happened during this year.
My year by year analysis is being made for myself, since I don't care about a week by week analysis. During the first 3 months of 2012 (Team17 and Square Enix signed), the only game that I was semi-interested in was Syndicate. Does that mean that each week GOG was releasing stuff that didn't interest me? Yes. Does that mean that 2012 had only things I wasn't interested in? No. It had Assassin's Creed, Quest for Glory, Colonization, Silent Storm, Worlds of Ultima, Chronicles of Riddick, Torchlight, FTL, Etherlords, Hotline Miami, Stacking, Eador: Genesis and quite a few more. So for me, even though Q1 of 2012 was not very interesting, 2012 was a successful year. There will always be good weeks, bad weeks, excellent weeks, and sucky weeks. Thus why it's much better to see the yearly instead of weekly. If you wish for weekly results, you will be dissapointed.


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Zeewolf: A simple fact: During the first three months of this year we got more classics than during the next six months combined. This is not about percentages, it is raw numbers. 25 classics in the first three months, 22 in the next six.
Yes. And as I said before, there are high release periods and low release periods. You assume it's linear, I assume they fluctuate. If they are linear, you should be able to continue this trend with last year's releases as well. Do they follow the same trend?

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Zeewolf: When you call this a good year, and predict 60+ releases, you are basing it in large part on that first quarter. On stuff that happened more than half a year ago. Do not expect me to judge the GOG of today by the (high) standards set by the GOG of last winter.
I predict 60+ releases based on the previous years. I assume a constant classic release rate of 36%, and a constant game release rate. The classic release rate seems to be on par with last year's percentage (and numbers), so I do feel confident to adopt that number.

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massplus: Sorry people but how are your statistical posts about GoG's quantitative and qualitative releases from past years relevant to Smugglers V?
They are not, and I do apologize for my posts. I do how ever get extremely worked up whenever someone claims "GOG is releasing fewer classics" without the numbers to support it. While Zeewolf does show numbers that seem to support it, I do think that it is too small a sample to make a trend prediction.
As for Smuggers V, haven't played it (yet), so can't tell. SCPM though did link to a demo in post 6.
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JMich: Yes. And as I said before, there are high release periods and low release periods. You assume it's linear, I assume they fluctuate. If they are linear, you should be able to continue this trend with last year's releases as well. Do they follow the same trend?
I don't assume it's linear, but on the other hand, I don't assume that it fluctuates randomly either. For fun:

1st quarter 2012: 55% (16 out of 29)
2nd quarter 2012: 43% (19 out of 44)
3rd quarter 2012: 34% (17 out of 49)
4th quarter 2012: 28% (11 out of 38) * with the release date of bioforge corrected from 2005 to 1995.
1st quarter 2013: 58% (25 out of 43)
2nd quarter 2013: 27% (11 out of 41)
3rd quarter 2013: 24% (11 out of 45)

So we see that 1st quarter 2013 is an especially good period. This has implications for both sides in the argument; it is only natural that there is some kind of a decline after such a good month (for my side) and it skews the overall results of this year (for your side). Looking at only the percentages, it is the only quarter that has a higher percentage than the one preceding it. Looking at the numbers only, it is one of two quarters where the amount of classic releases go up instead of down or staying still.

If we, as an experiment, remove that quarter from the equation then the overall trend becomes a lot clearer, but it is not entirely fair to do that. If we look at six months' periods, which is maybe more useful in your eyes, then we get the following: 22 in the past six months, and 36 in each of the preceding six month periods. With this representing 1.5 years, I think (again) this shows a decline has been happening during this year.

If we are to predict, I am not expecting that the decline continues. I am not expecting a marked improvement either, though there will no doubt be some good periods. But judging by the past six months, I desperately WANT an improvement, and hope it will happen.

I will leave it at that. I'll also apologize for my part in this derailment of the thread, but like JMitch I get kind of worked up when the argument that GOG releases fewer classics is dismissed based on what _I_ perceive to be numbers that in fact support the argument. Numbers don't lie, but there are some that are more useful than others and I happen to believe that in this case, the yearly numbers aren't giving an accurate representation of the current situation.
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Zeewolf: with the release date of bioforge corrected from 2005 to 1995.
Thank you for this correction, fixed it.
And that is why I say that math is fun, because the same set of numbers can produce quite a lot of different results, as evidenced by this discussion.

No matter, I hope I'll remember at the end of the year to make a thread about the releases, so we could continue the discussion there. Would be interesting to see what the rest of the community think of the releases. Feel free to prod me about the thread should you see me forgetting it :)
No problem guys... It's actually an interesting discussion... I was just surprised to see so many figures and was wondering if at some point Smugglers V was the culprit! Thanks for posting a link to a demo of the game. Going to try it soon!
Well, I finally gave the demo a proper go, and while it's certainly not the most complex game ever I really liked what I've seen. Sure, I may have to manually lower my desktop resolution to enjoy this game - fullscreen mode is kinda borked, and I can't recall the last new-ish game I played that still used 800x600 (though 1366x768 seems to work best for me) - but that's the only niggle I have, which really is a non-issue.

It's very obvious that it was done by a very small indie dev, but that's okay. I don't think I'd have been interested in it at its original $30 price point as that does seem awfully high for a game of its caliber, but for a tenner I am very tempted. So much so that I think I won't wait for a sale on this one and I'll actually be snapping it up this weekend. :)

So, thanks GOG for convincing the developer to lower his price - Smugglers V probably wouldn't be here if that hadn't happened - and maybe he'll be willing to sell his other games at a similar price point? TV Manager 2 and Empires & Dungeon 2 also look like they might be up my alley.

Did I ever mention how glad I am in GOG's decision to sell indie games? :)
Post edited October 04, 2013 by mistermumbles
For the ratio old games / new and indie games: It's not only the numbers that matter. You could also look at average rating or position in bestseller list or play duration or amount of extras...

But anyway, who cares. If GOG started selling carrots I might order a few. Only I don't want to be bothered by things not interesting to me. So the only thing I needed would be a better personalized filter. Here is the design proposal for such a filter:

- Each news on GOG has a thumbs up/down button meaning that news of this kind should be shown more/less prominently for this user.
- The system then somehow smartly learns by the user feedback what kind of news (game genre, game age, game price, discount height, ...) this user prefers and displays these news for this user larger while displaying the other news much smaller.
- There is an additional option in the user preference to clear/reset the like/dislike history.

With this powerful and at the same time easy to use filter, everybody can see GOG from its own perspective. How cool would that be!
Post edited October 04, 2013 by Trilarion
I didn't read every one of the posts in this discussion so sorry if someone already pointed this out, but of course the amount of old games released is going to decline over time, because there are only so many old games worth releasing! Most of the classics still worth playing/buying are already here!

Regarding this game, might try it when I get some time, it sounds interesting.
One of the few games I bought on release here.
It kept me busy this weekend, so it's already worth its money.

This game is excellent when you have a small monitor and enjoy an easier FTL without crew micromanagement and more storyline and career options in Space.

I mean SPaaaaaaaaceeeee!11!!11!!!!!1
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WoodMan: I didn't read every one of the posts in this discussion so sorry if someone already pointed this out, but of course the amount of old games released is going to decline over time, because there are only so many old games worth releasing! Most of the classics still worth playing/buying are already here!
Yeah, right. Keep telling yourself that. Won't make it true though.
Post edited October 08, 2013 by Erich_Zann