I just tried that and it works, no problem. I can extract it straight from the KDE file browser (on OpenSUSE).

Okay, so it is possible to just dump the contents of the .deb file without "installing" it with the package manager.

Thanks for reporting your work!

I've been hesitating buying the LA adventure games, but now my concerns have been dispelled.

I'm happy that everyone is being able to run it on Arch.. but still, it would be very nice to have an official word from gog on the subject.


Now that you guys mentioned it, I agree that it's probably because of having to accept license terms, but there are better ways to do that. I wonder if gog considered using MojoSetup when they were planning linux support. It would be a good choice for them as far as I'm aware, and would allow them to show license terms to the user before installing.

I'd like some sort of response from GOG, too. Even if it's "Our hands are tied, we're sorry", I'd accept it.

I submitted a support ticket ysterday asking about the lack of tarballs for these new releases.

Even if it is because of the EULA I still don't see why they couldn't just put it into the start script - they've already got a script for that in the .deb, making it part of the start script is little more than a copy+paste job with only a few small modifications.

Edit: A quick copy+paste and then a few small changes/additions, it's a crude way of doing it but:

Excuse my ignorance ... I can't see how this would really make any difference. If you can unpack a deb archive (please people: stop calling it an installer) you can also run (sort of) the game. It is run by ScummVM. I have installed ScummVM on my system from the repositories. Therefore I extracted the files from the deb package, moved the folder with the files for the game to my ScummVM folder and added the game to it. The rest can be thrown away. The game runs just fine. (In case you're wondering which folder that might be ... it's the one containing monster.sog) If done that way, it will not run a start script and will not show any EULA for that matter. If you want to make sure that an EULA is shown you need to make an executable installer, like with Windows.

Aside from adamhm's post:
Sorry, I don't get the moaning in this thread. It is easy to extract a deb package, as people pointed out before. Inside there is the software, because that's what a deb package is: an archive. It is very similar to a zip file or indeed a tarball. So just extract it, run the game and be done with it. Use the tools you have inside of your Linux distribution and get things working for you. Well, sorry for the rant. No offence.

I think I have to add someting to it: As a Linux user for many years, I am aware that if someone switches from another operating system to Linux there might be things unknown. For that reason I am very happy to help anyone who comes to me with a question about how to do things. I feel that part of the appeal of using Linux is choice and also the possibility to make things work for you. The only requirement is the willingness to learn on the part of the user. Getting software from a deb file working under a distro that's not Debian-based is really not difficult. I agree that GoG originally promised we'd get tarballs with each Linux game and the have sort of let us down with this release. But even if I had for example Fedora (which I don't) I would not have any problems getting this deb extracted and run the software inside.

I, too, will file a support ticket, because I feel GoG should make good on their promise, but I will not sit there and sulk. The deb file is perfectly usable on any distro. So, please: where's the problem? ;)

Of course it can be worked around, just as it can for the Windows version using tools like innoextract. The point is it shouldn't be a reason for not providing a tarball.

I extracted the game from the .deb package (BTW I don't see anyone here calling them ".deb installers" except GOG) manually too rather than go through the package manager.

You're right, of course. I'm sorry I got a bit worked up.

It's true: only GoG insists on calling them deb installers. I really dislike that. A deb file is a file ... not a msi package or an exe or whatever. It's really not much more than a tarball with a few scripts inside it. In fact I told GoG in my support ticket that it would be better to change that. That way a Linux newbie would not learn strange terminology. ;)

wow i did not know Ubuntu and mint are that fragmented from Linux, back in the college they were using Ubuntu as the default for teaching Linux i guess i need to test out the other distros and catch up with times

One month late, but I still hope some of GOG.com team members are going to read my response.

Basically what you're saying is:
A publisher, who doesn't understand the first thing about how Linux distributions work, made the requirement to display a license agreement and you caved in. So, I guess we're lucky you still provided a deb package instead of making a binary installer. :) By the way, as I pointed out in Post 21 it is a non-issue to extract the contents of a deb package in such a way that your license agreement will not be displayed.

The other thing you're saying: Your promise to provide tarballs with every game for Linux stands and is to be trusted ... except if the publisher or developer tells you otherwise. Great, that puts my mind at ease!

By the way, have a look at slide 35 of this presentation of Ryan C. Gordon of icculus.org: https://icculus.org/SteamDevDays/SteamDevDays2014-LinuxPorting.pdf He says: avoid distro packages -- Don't ever ship .deb or .rpm packages. It's not worth the trouble. You know what: he's right. I can tell you, two years down the line (when Ubuntu 16.04 LTS is out for example) you will run into trouble with your current deb packages. I promise you. tarballs are much more stable for long term usage.

Very well put, Jim.

Let's also not forget that it probably would have been possible to display a EULA via the start.sh in a tarball. Sure, it doesn't display it "before installation", but since tarballs aren't installed per se (they're extracted), GOG would have totally gotten away on a technicality while still showing a good-faith display of effort.

I get the feeling no one from GOG is listening to this anymore. Oh well. They've got bigger PR holes to dig themselves out of now, what with the encrypted installers and such. Just one thing after another lately, isn't it?

So what's the difference for you between extracting a deb file and a tar file?

Absolutely not, I extracted everything from the deb, and then just copied the file games to another folder, and then deleted everything (including the unnecessary ScummVM, that comes with every game)