But the kidney part was a great running gag during our visit :D

What?
http://falseknees.com/273.html

Like Wishbone already said, it wouldn't have been the same when you would have done the same thing via Skype. Besides the Q&A, meeting face to face and getting to know each other was an impotant part of this meeting (at least for me). And there was also a lot of informal talk in the evenings that gave some more insight into GOG's business. Hard to create that kind of experience using Skype.

It all depends on the fact how important devs/publishers think it is to be on GOG. So the bigger/more important GOG is the more developers/publishers are trying to keep their version up to date to assure GOG and their customers are happy. Of course GOG is asking for new updates whenever they are aware of them (I was told about this tiny fact directly in chat long before signing anything so no NDA problem here) but in the end it will always be up to the devs/publishers if or when they send the update to GOG and there is not much GOG could do about that without damaging their image for future devs/publishers.

The reason for devs not updating GOG for several games imo has nothing to do with actual "refusal" but more of lazyness (as stated that's my opinion only because we did not talk with any external dev and of course GOG also could not say WHY devs would not update any game ... the sentence is pure me). Often the Steam patch and the GOG patch are quite different and you'll have to do another DRM-free build which needs to be tested as well and so on. In example I recently read about the DRM-free build of Journey Down 3 after release: the game crashes on some systems. This problem however does not occur on Steam. In a reddit the devs said that they have to redo the DRM-free build to make the crashes disappear (and I guess meanwhile they already did that in case anybody now should have doubts about buying the game here ;)). So it's obviously not just taking a file from one platform and add it to the own version. Don't know of course if they ever did that but I highly doubt it. The normal way pobably would be that the devs upload a new version/patch and tells them about it so GOG can build the installer.

The sound at the beginning of the old batman

Would semantic details that mean literally nothing really reassure you? "Yeah, we'll keep it optional... until we don't"
Email and fax. They email it to you and you sign and scan or fax it back. You have 1 week to comply, or you don't get the skype invite... Seriously, have none of you ever businessed over the inerwebs before?

Yes I have, and habitually do. And you simply can't beat being face to face with people. Skype really isn't the same, it just isn't. It's also very difficult to go out to dinner together over Skype.

I get that. I'm just calling bullshit on the "we had to sign a NDA, and you can't do that over Skype" argument. I think it's great, if only a little dodgy that they secretly invited a few people. It's awesome that you guys got to go have a great time and see things and do things and report a little of it back to us.

Yeah. GOG is great and all that. :P

They actually asked each one if we do this (and I do) so they are aware. We also repeatedly told them that Galaxy in itself is not a problem neither for us not for anybody else as long as you can simply set a switch to use GOG the way you did before (meaning default setting for non Galaxy installers). They are very well aware about this fact as well.

See what I wrote above. If they have the needed files and don't update it's their fault but as long as they don't have the files it's up to the devs and while of course you are allowed to ask (which GOG does) for updates, everything more than that would be a problem. You can however try to speed up that process by yourself by contacting devs and publishers ... I did this a few times and got some pretty good results. It's no guarantee of course but I can push as much as I want since I am just a customer who paid money for a game I want to have updated :D

This is more or less answered in the OP. they still are trying to get classic games but it sometimes takes time.

I do remember a Q&A video a few years ago but unfortunately don't remember the campfire songs you were mentioning. Well, I cannot be here every day then ;) But yeah, personality is a big thing and a reason to buy here - we told them as well.

Of course that's totally o.k. but don't forget that GOG gets more important to devs the bigger they are and the more customers they have ... meaning more devs will try to update GOG recently and offer them their games. It's a bad situation because in the end all I as a customer want is a game that is kept up to date. And for now this is more often the case on Steam than on GOG but to make sure that this changes I'll have to buy on GOG .... not ideal. Its like this thing with DVD series. publishers release just one season and wait how it sells. Customers are afraid that the publishers won't release the rest of the series and don't want to have half of a series in the shelf so they don't buy. The publishers see that the sellings were not good so they don't reelase the rest of the series (I experienced this behaviour multiple times in my dvd forum). How could you break this circle of expectations?

Maybe a bit of clarification here: the "it takes long" was not said by GOG directly that is more us saying that switching a forum mess to a good forum (one that is really good and has everything in it people want without the usual "GOG has switched and nothing is working anymore") takes time. They simply don't have estimates yet.

We sure had and I for one am happy about your quiet "yay" as well :)

That and a hot dog == 7-course meal.

Galaxy is never going to be an issue because the portion of their userbase using it will outgrow the portion that doesn't, if it hasn't already.

What's interesting is that this is so Willy Wonkaesque, but didn't have anyone clamoring for golden tickets. It seemed from the original post that there were more people invited, but only those six chose to visit --good on them for keeping an open mind and doing so.

However, we all love a mystery and now the chose six are shrouded in it. Who knows what super powers they bring back with them. :)

Lights on but no one home, eh?

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