GOG

I think this is missing one other crucial factor in GOG becoming established: they targeted a niche.

Seems like a lot of people don’t really know this any more, but GOG’s ‘thing’ didn’t used to be a focus on being DRM-free, it was a focus on making old games accessible again.

GOG used to stand for Good Old Games.

Until GOG came along, publishers had next to no interest in making their older games available - things like Doom, Monkey Island, System Shock, Star Wars Dark Forces, etc. Hard to believe now, but none of these games used to be available to buy anywhere - if you wanted to play them you had to either own the original discs, find a torrent, or visit a dodgy abandonware site.

It was GOG who identified that gap in the market and established themselves as the store for legally owning digital copies of these old games for the first time. Steam was actually playing catch up on that front for quite a while, and many old games are still better maintained on GOG than on Steam.

yea thats something i can get behind honestly! :D
Like i said i do really love their Installers but i just wish more People would use them over Steam or similiar launchers :(

A while back, Tim Sweeney said the market share of the Epic store was 15%, while GOG's was around 0.5 to 1%, which isn't implausible. The players count of the Epic store has been significantly boosted by Fortnite, exclusives, and high-profile game giveaways.

i can get behind this honestly :P
tho i gotta be honest i reallyo nly buy Games nowadays if theyre on Sale (which is also most often the Case XD) due to mebing not the wealtiest and not liking also to buy 60+ Euro Games :P

**Telling developers that they can't have bigger discounts on other store fronts is an unsubstantiated claim by one developer. The official policy has to do with discounting Steam keys, ie selling a Steam game for less than on the Steam store, while keeping all profits and taking advantage of Steams features.

If general sales were actually being restricted by Steam, it would have been made immediately obvious with sites like isthereanydeal. Such a site would have no reason to exist if the Steam store would always have the best discounts due to forced store policy.

*EDIT: Was gonna strike through this text, can't get formatting to work. See below comment by Rose@lemmy.zip

"Overwhelmingly positive" please spend at least 5 minutes reading the GOG general discussion forums and get back to me. GOG is constantly being criticized by their main user base for how poorly they run their store and their nonsensical business decisions. I don't think this is a bad thing tbh; its a better situation than the Steam fanboys being creepy boot lickers. But I would not describe GOGs most adamant supports being universally "positive" about the state of the store and company.

The general customer base of GOG does not care about the Galaxy 2.0 client, or GOGs collaboration with Amazon Luna for streaming owned titles. I don't know what other "good features" you could be referring to. GOG is barebones, but competent, in the world of digital store fronts/game launchers. But obviously being competent is not enough when dealing with an entrenched monopoly.

Most gamers do not care about DRM. This is the same market that is suffering from enshittification at an abnormal rate. This market has already long normalized things like gambling mechanics advertised towards children, or installing spyware for the sole purpose of stopping cheaters. Outside of the bubble of online discussions, the target audience does not think about these things and will buy whatever slop is put in front of them. Clearly the people who buy Denuvo releases at launch on Steam do not feel any reason to buy games on GOG specifically. And judging by public sales/player data, that's a lot of people.

One thing that would help, I think, is to always mention the DRM free options first, then Steam. The mainstream user gets what he wants, but not before hearing about DRM-free.

For me i never tried Amazon Luna tho i did recieve the Free GOG Games because of my Parents having Amazon Prime :P

That's not correct.

I have totally gifted Games via GOG in the past.
E.g. my nephew got KSP from me last birthday.

On the Game page it prominently shows a "buy as present" button.
Recipient doesn't even need his own GOG account.

Perhaps some regional block?
Where are you from?

"Like the ability to buy and gift games" uh wut? >.>
Now maybe theres a misunderstanding in English but i can gif Games to my Wife and she aslo to me and we never had Issues really even tho were from different Continents :P
But i do agree with the Gift Card Abbility considering that even Steam has such -.-

@Zephorah @RetroHax You just have to buy games and give it to them, what's the problem ?

I defentely would hope os considering that theyre to me seem like the only Real Steam Competition as EGS is i believe without the Free Games nothing really >.>

On a small tangent, might I suggest the Heroic Launcher? It connects GOG, Prime Gaming, EGS and (in beta) Zoom Platform, and makes things rather seamless while keeping things pretty self-contained on Linux.

For me i use mostly itch io for Indie Games rather than Steam actually XD
which is for example also how i bought Celeste :P

Both Steam and GOG requires installing a game to play it.

eh i mean i can defently see that as i also use Steam of course but i do prefer GOG over Steam anyday really! :P
Just the Fact that i can backup my Games easily without having to first use Goldberg on my Steam Games makes it much more Convenient imo to use over Steam :D
But i can obviously see your Arguments with the Amount of Games just basically being non existent especially with the whole JRPG Gaming Category being basically Steam Only :P
Even tho i pray that changes due to the Final Fantasys now being on GOG XD

On Linux versions of games, I remember coming across some news that they're hiring to work on those.

eh? >.>
I am honestly a bit confused as to where your coming from with this >.>
i personally would not say i have noticed some kind of Game Breaking Bug in a lot of Older Games to be honest >.>
Major Factor is maybe no Controller support in some Old Games but i suppose i just let that Fly really since as long as my Game works and i can get it DRM Free i gladly pay the Price honestly :P

But i also wouldnt mind obviously discussing it more with you :P
Especially considering that i dont understand the “neither here nor there.” Thing of yours >.>