I have always defended the DRM-free idea, loved GOG the moment i saw it... But in the end i still use more other venues (like steam) and as things are right now i can't see GOG reaching the popularity it could have.

Why that happens? What could be changed so that GOG becomes bigger and more profittable?

So im making this topic so we(users) can post suggestions and ideas, like a big brainstorm and discussion(haven't found any stickies or foruns for that, if theres one its badly positioned for new users).

I want gog to thrive; Everyone should: DRM hurts only the paying consumers, and if GOG don't get more traction publishers will keep making those abusive irrational practices.



In my particular case, bigger deals elsewhere(and the new steam's cards that can be sold) have a lot to do with it- at least while my income is so low. But even if that wasn't the case(and shouldn't be; these ever bigger deals may hurt developers more then it should) gog would still be smaller then it could be...

Theres a lot i could list as suggestions(and i will after some replies) but the main ones are Marketing and CONVENIENCE/Community.

The Name:
For me and many others the name have its appeal, but gog isn't only about old games and this alone may put many possible customers away. Plus it doesn't sell the drm-free idea as a practice any game should use... Im imagining some publisher meeting where someone brings droping drm to the table, pointing at gog and hearing 'Yeah, it may work with old hard to find in torrent games'.

Convenience+comunity:
Surely a companny should look for ways to be different, but some practices that spread everywhere occur for a reason; Steam, origin, raptr and every modern console works around community, most try to work rewards in many forms and so on- and this does add a lot to the service.

IN NO WAY OR FORM IM SAYING AS SOMETHING 'REQUIRED'- AT ALL. Not something to trown down customers throats as that would be like a form of drm; Keeping downloads and the downloader as it is but offering a launcher that communicates with the portal profiles, with chat and features like counting playtime(just an example) would make a lot of difference- community is the keyword here.

Itunes turned digital music viable for the convenience after all; Downloading my games whenever i want is nice but too little.

Good old games- lets make them better/easier:
Theres some softwares out there to play old games with local co-op online; This is the kind of partnership gog should be looking for(imho), that could work great with the launcher utility mentioned above.

Imagine firing the launcher and seeing upfront a digest of my games(if customizable it would be even better): latest posts on each games forum, a new released mod or unofficial patch for some game... Letting the fans take over each of these sub-communities, voting their own moderators, people who love a game making announcements, linking news, mods, fixes...

Damn, i got carried over and it became too long- so, what you guys think gog should aim for to grown even more?

Sadly i do not think GOG has a very bright future, not unless the world finally wakes up and reigns in the huge yolk of copyright!

On top of that, i have noticed over the years, that game companies seem to be getting more and more tight assed, both with DRM and not sharing their copyright. Meanwhile we are in the middle of this huge mobile phone/pc gaming fad, and only older or simpler games can run on mobile phones, which only serves to put far more greedy ideas in the heads of those whom hold copyright on old games..... not easy for GOG to do deals with those whom have visions of grandeur in the back of their minds!

I concur; Talking about other platforms i think gog could also work with mobile platforms, since so many indies(and old games) are being ported to them. They obvisouly shouldn't aim at that market all in, not until gog grows some more, but definitly start including them with games already on gog that also exists on mobile.

They could work with some of the devs/publishers to deliver cross-platform purchases; An special tag applied to games 'buy once access on all platforms'.

Speaking about that also reminds me of an idea i had for deals:

NEW DEALS HANDLING- Aiming for fidelity and rewarding full-price purchases:

On my view GOG must keeping trying(as long as they can) to not cut prices too much, but an fidelity program could work wonders, plus rewarding full-price purchasers.
Some sort of points, lets call them 'xp' for now, could be amassed from purchases- proportional to price paid (that means full-price awards more points), that could later on be exchanged for a discount ticket.

That way customers can bring in that discount when they really need for something they're dying to get but wouldn't otherwise. Of course those tickets would have a maximum discount value.

I would put something around 70% off as the maximum, but during special sales events the tickets could go higher- not stacking with default discounts; That could work together with other community features, like customer who help others and are active gaining 'levels'(5th being the maximum), your level being added as % discount on every exchange (being inactive would slowly reduces someone 'level').

I can also easily see the 'buy once access on all platforms' feature as exclusive to full-priced purchases; No one can complain and thats in no way unfair- you played the game on the cheap already, having it on multiple platforms is more like a luxury.

CD-Project are a forward-thinking, consumer friendly business. They seem to be going from strength to strength. I'm not sure why you feel that they wont be able adapt to changing markets?

First witcher then gog... im a fan(of the kind 'how can someone not be?! they're awesome!'), i believe in their potential and if i were an big investor i would have betted on them.

Its precisely because i put so much faith on them that im puzzled they didn't went full steam(no pun intended) when gog launched- i still remenber reading the news, checking the site and thinking gog would become a hit once they had everything sorted out.

I see a huge potential on the whole idea, to the point gamers would prefer getting a game drm-free(here) before checking drm filled alternatives, and more publishers entering the drm-free bandwagon.

It is possible; In no way i expected it to reach that level so fast, but while the portal and library improved theres so much room for improvement, features that could add to the service... thus this topic.

In short: you're misinterpreting me; Im not saying they can't or wont adapt, im just voicing what i feel its lacking and that i would like- and asking the same of other users.

Is there anything you would like to see on gog? What?

I think one way GOG could spread awareness is to take advantage of Let's Play and videogame reviewers. Many bigger companies do not want videos derived from their games to be monetized, which means that the people making the videos are going to turn their attention to titles from companies that don't mind the monetization. GOG should endorse games in their catalog being used as material for these efforts, which will draw in more customers as time goes on.

For example, Angry Joe did a review of Dragon Commander, while High Wang creates La-Mulana lore videos. Both of the games featured in these videos are in GOG's catalog.

Dragon Commander - Angry Joe review

La-Mulana Lore: The Gate of Guidance (High Wang)

That would be awesome!!!!

For instance, while i looked up some videos for la-mulana (im tottally addicted to it) i tried to avoid spoilers and tottally missed this lore series (thanks for the link by the way!).

Some partnership or support could do wonders. Talking about the launcher-as-a-hub idea i mentioned earlier, having a video feed for each game you own on gog would be awesome; They can be as simple as links with a description and thumbnail(but embeding youtube is easy)- the content makers get clicks and ads and gog could get some more traction.

Damn, the gog community could make an awesome curation of such videos. Rather then rolling around youtube searching for videos of that game, along side a bunch of bad videos and unrelated ones id rather find then all in the same place, the most endorsed by gog gamers(who own the game) upfront. That would be amazing.