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Pull out disc with a game from 10 years ago
Installs just fine and launches
“Connecting to online services…”
“Timeout: Retry? Quit?”
Huh?
This is the message we need to hear. The bread and butter. I get so tired of people nitpicking GOG and Mozilla over every relatively minor thing when they are some of the only people trying to hold back the deluge of bullshit.
Agreed. Someone complained Firefox moved to updates every few days or something.
They had no clue Firefox updates like all the time.
I’m done with GOG after the NeoNazi shit.
What’s this now?
I have bought many games from GOG, but I think there’s a flaw in this argument.
If a publisher decides to revoke GOG’s license to sell a game, wouldn’t they require GOG to remove the game files from their servers? As in, wouldn’t the installer break?
The offline installers aren’t fully complete, are they?
They work offline. If you’re on Linux you can automate the archiving with https://github.com/Sude-/lgogdownloader
If only they would post more stuff on Bluesky or even use Mastodon instead of TwitterX
(Yes, i am aware they have a bluesky profile but they post less stuff on there, it seems)
I absolutely adore GOG for being like this, and for consistently applying pressure to publishers and other marketplace vendors alike.
I just also have A Steam Library with like 1200+ titles, and it’s measured in Terabytes. And butrot in my physical media ingratitude will be non zero, in long enough timescale.
I consider my continued patronage of buying games to be my subscription costs to the platform vendors. 🤣
Bit rot is already happening to my PS2 games. MGS2 is completely dead for me now. Its a copy I’ve had since I was a kid when it came out.
Archive multiple copies with something that has error-correcting codes. Use btrfs, zfs, par2, rar, raid-5, DVDs etc
The only way to be sure is to save it on a quartz matrix. Only issue is it’s read-only. Not rewritable ever. Once you etch your data into quartz that’s it.
Storage is amazing, though. All of human knowledge (so far) has already been etched into such a storage medium by the UN a few years ago. It fits in the palm of your hand.
Or… you could just follow the 3-2-1 strategy with normal drives and regular scrubs. For most purposes (including a game library) that’s way better.
But I want my game library to survive the sun’s expansion!
GOG trying to drum up positive pr after that Nazi symbol newsletter.
Didn’t they instantly flag that? It was for some slavic game thing and all of those symbols are rooted in cultures long gone that nazis appropriated.
Hey, watch you don’t criticize gamers’ favourite Nazi bar.
You could do this before that incident as well.
No shit, you somehow didn’t understand their comment.
Yeah, that was a major WTF moment
You guys really trying to make an elephant out of a gnat.
sorry I like to remind people not to get cozy rooting for for-profit corporations that’ve shown some ick recently. took as much effort to remind as it did for the post, but whatever constitutes “elephant” in your book.
Just a quick reminder that discs that you burn yourself at home do degrade pretty quickly, much faster than pressed discs. I personally have had burned discs that failed after approx. 6 years. It can happen even faster if you use low-quality discs. Even pressed discs can fail after 20 years if you are unlucky.
Using 2 big HDDs (2 for redundancy) full of your installers might be safer in the long run and also easier to manage and backup.
Try M-Disc, it’s supposed to be as good as microfilm for archival.
Big Disc propaganda
Big Disc Energy
It can happen even faster if you use low-quality discs.
Yep. I got some no-name DVDs at Kaufland as they were just EUR 1 for a 10-pack. They started having read issues after just 4 years.
Also, they easily peel apart with just fingers and no effort.Edit:
Packaging:
Media ID: MBI 01RG40The worst case I experienced was a disc that disintegrated after a couple years. It got an actual extra hole in it, in a way that looked like somebody spilled acid on it and the acid burned right through the disc. In reality it just lay in my drawer.
In your acid draw?
That’s why I print out all my downloaded games
Print them on clay tablets. Those will stand the test of time, especially with the right level of error correction. (Sorry for the ad cancer - I didn’t want to promote a specific brand or spend forever finding a good review site.)
Unfortunately I’m allergic to clay
I hope you also laminate them for longevity.
I laminate my punch cards for longevity. Wouldn’t want them breaking down.
I prefer to cut archival cards from 0.7mm 316 stainless steel sheet 👍
Clay tablets have been demonstrated to last much longer than paper or metal
Nonsense. I got some high quality copper from a merchant I fully trust and I bet this will last forever.
Was his name Ea? His name isn’t known today for being engraved in copper…
I suspect corrosion-resistant steel alloys haven’t been around long enough to prove themselves in that regard XD
Corrosion-resistent is not the same as non-corrosive.
I suppose gold as a noble metal would be stable over a long period, as it’s non-reactive. But certain kinds of acids can still dissolve it, unlike ceramic
The special ones, yes
I eat those to gain their power.
You should really move to microfilm. It saves so much space!
It just doesn’t smell the same
And reminder that solid state drives (including thumb drives) can lose data after a couple years if they are not plugged in from time to time
Use M-Disc media. It’s said to last 1000 years. It’s expensive and very slow to rip at the suggested 4x speed.
I’ve been very satisfied with them, and you just need a regular Blu-Ray drive.
Verbatim Datalife HTL BD-R discs are supposedly made in a similar technology (some folk on r/datahoarder reddit think they’re exactly the same but idk) and they actually work out cheaper than good quality HDDs. I can get 25GBx50 cake for £30. They’re not making crazy statements about their longetivity, but they at the very least won’t have the same problem as DVDs because they use inorganic dye. I’ve only started burning them a year or two ago so time will tell.
Cheapest solution is an HDD + one more for backups. M-Discs for 15-17€ per 100GB are for the games you wanna take to your grave.
I mean they are games that i no longer have to worry about data corruption or loss. Like ever. And i can Will these to family & friends. The cost is easily worth that!
Yeah, normal burners are more like printers, where the write laser activates or deactivates a pigment which then either reflects or absorbs the read laser to represent 0/1. But that pigment can degrade over time, turning 1s into 0s.
M-discs are instead etched and iirc use constructive and destructive interference so the reader (which is the same reader as normal discs, just the writer needs to specifically support M-disc) reads the 0/1. It will also degrade over time, but since it’s a thicker layer of difference, it will last significantly longer than a thin layer of pigment. And I bet that special m-disc specific readers could be made to read it again after it degrades to the point where the interference technique stops working, since an image could still show where the high and low points are, even if the waves don’t align perfectly anymore.
In practice, I’ve found that the drive was way easier to find than the media for m-disc. Like most optical disc writers these days seem to support it but the discs are expensive af compared to non m-disc.
Though when I was going through my old burnt CDs and DVDs, I was surprised at how well they were holding up. I was expecting at least some read errors by now but everything has been fine so far.
Well, other than the data quality lol. Not like the readability of the file but stuff that took days to download back then would download today in seconds and a good monitor I got well after my early files was only 720p for its resolution. The data I prized as a youth is kinda sad today.
What about Verbatim AZO? I’ve heard good stuff about those, and they’re not expensive.
Also, as far as CDs go, I’ve found that an old degraded player which doesn’t read burned discs anymore but plays pressed discs will still play burned AZO discs just fine.
blu ray in this economy?
Are tape drives still a thing?
Yup
If I were more serous I would probably get a couple of those. I remember it being part of our procedures at a gov office.
yup. God knows how many Dreamcast games I’ve had to toss and reburn over the years.
Going forward any gaming purchase I make will be from GOG.
Or itch.io!
Does GOG support Linux?
GOG does not have a Linux launcher. There were some rumblings about focusing on Linux development when there was a change of hands, but we still have to see anything coming from that.
However, GOG does host Linux builds of games where available.
4 replies and all of them “yes but actually no”.
I’ve been waiting for GOG Galaxy to be Linux compatible for over a decade. When they start supporting my OS I’ll start supporting their store.
But why do you need a launcher though? Is it to play games socially or something?
I just launch from the start menu. My issue is that there aren’t enough Linux titles, but at least GOG is very good about marking Linux titles and making them searchable.
So I can keep my library of games I own in one place, install it on my OS and (ideally) maintain them (patches, mods, scripts etc).
If they really wanted to be a source of competition maybe even something like the community hub of sorts where you could download the aforementioned patches or fixes for your games but primarily for centralisation of my library in app form.
Use heroic? It allows GOG login (amongst others), and does all that.
Yeah, patches and updates is probably a good use case. GOG should probably just make a command line tool for Linux modeled after something like apt, with the difference that you need to log in to access your purchases. I think many users would also appreciate a curated directory of mods.
More like, Linux supports GOG and they don’t try to stop it.
The thing you want is the Heroic Games Launcher, you can login to your GOG/Epic/Amazon and install/launch games (using WINE/Proton) pretty much like using Steam.
It’s even available as a Flatpak so you can use it on the Steam Deck.
Yes and no.
GOG games run just fine on Linux, some native and some under Wine\Proton (almost entirely on the game’s devs, but GOG does have their support program to get Wine working on older unsupported games).
GOG Galaxy, their launcher app, does not have a Linux version. You have to download games off their website directly or use Lutris, Heroic, or some other third party management platform to manage them. The advantage of using a game manager–aside from easier monitored game downloads, automatic updates, and community features–is that they’re usually set up Wine for you as well, which can be annoying to set up and use correctly.
GOG is just a storefront. The specific titles you purchase on that storefront may or may not offer Linux files.
But gog makes a launcher and library tool. But not for Linux.
Kind of. You can install stuff like lutris or steamdeck plugins that connect to gog and download games for you
The cover question is: do the games support Linux? And with proton, a lot of them do
I’d recommend Bottles over Lutris due to the latter’s unfortunate use of LLMs/AI.
What does the “Linux” filter refer to then?
https://www.gog.com/en/games/new?systems=linuxEdit: I tried with a random free game. Provided was a shell script with binary data appended to it.
Native supported Linux games. Why?
So Linux users can install the game without having to use some translation software like Proton.
Depends on the game. A giant part of their library is, well, good old games, that only run on Windows natively
Yeah, I thought that was the question. I never considered downloader/launcher, or whatever their software does.
Sadly, based on market share, people seem to be picking Steam over GoG.
They almost always pick what’s most convenient/familiar over what’s principled and better in the long term.
I pick whichever is cheaper with a heavy preference towards GOG. I am also a patient gamer, so I’ll watch and wait for deals so I can get it on GOG but that doesn’t always happen. Also Steam bundles can skew price deals for me making it more attractive.
I’m doing my part. With exception of portal 1 and 2 GOG is the only store I am purchasing games from.
I buy on steam mostly cos it has a Linux client and Proton is built in. I still go to gog for some 90s stuff cos they fix them up a bit.
When gog release a Linux client, it’ll get the same consideration as steam, that’s all they’ve gotta do, I’m not even asking for any packaged compatibility like proton
Until gog finally gets a good first(!) party linux client buying games there is not really worth it yet.
Yeah.
I know it must seem like a small market to them, but Linux should really be higher on their priority list. As it’s growing at Windows’ expense.
Are they competitors even? I thought GoG whole schtick was selling retro games, hence their name.
I know they sell some newer games, but not really sure how it compares to a platform like Steam.
Nah, they sell tons of big budget and new indie games.
But this is their biggest problem. Most don’t even know they exist, and sell modern games.
They don’t have regional pricing, so games there are typically a lot more expensive.
Can I play my gog games on my Steam Deck?
Heroic is so awesome
I’m in the opposite team ! I always buy in gog store first then steam. But yeah, steam is here.
I don’t even buy on Steam anymore. I’m tired of my shit being stored on other people’s computers. If I won’t own the game I buy, then I don’t buy the game.
Same.
So many games aren’t there, though. And Steams pricing policy means they can’t be cheaper on GoG, anyway, otherwise Valve would delist them.
GoG is doing well in the convenience category too though. Their GoG launcher is amazing and syncs with all your online libraries (steam, ea, epic, etc).
But yeah, I think until Steam screws up or goes public or something, and gives people a reason to switch, there’s not gonna be a ton of people jumping ship.
I should get more things on gog.
Steam just makes things work on linux without issue so thats why we still get steam games.
Heroic launcher pretty much does the same for GOG games. Sad that it needs a third-party launcher, but it works quite well.
I guess I have to give Heroic a try. I’ve been using lutris but the auto-generated install scripts are kind of a hit and miss due to gog changing their naming convention on some games.
Heroic lets you log in on your GOG, Epic, and Amazon accounts and then can install your games directly from your library and sets up Proton like on Steam. It’s not 100% as user-friendly, but it’s pretty effective.
Lutris does the same. I don’t know if it has Amazon integration but it has itch integration which is more relevant to me. It also used to have pretty good gog integration where you just log in with your gog account, pick a game, click install and play. It would even find all the DLCs you have for the game and offer easy installation of those as well.
But recently gog has started changing the names of their install executables so the installation scripts lutris autogenerates fail due to not finding the correct installer. It’s not every game as some games still use the old naming convention but some games require manual installation and if those games have DLCs then those become an extra annoyance due to how gog handles the installation of DLC.
That’s why I’m interested in Heroic because if it’s still as convenient as Lutris used to be then I’m willing to sacrifice itch for better integration with gog because my gog library is much bigger than my itch library. But if it’s having the same issues as Lutris I don’t see a reason to pick Heroic over Lutris because Lutris has more relevant (to me) integrations and I’m pretty familiar with how to use it as a tool to get troublesome games running. I just don’t the benefit of learning a different software if it’s not going to give me any benefits over what I already use.
You can add any gog game to steam and run it through whatever proton compatibility layer you would like. The Heroic launcher and Lutris both also allow this.
To preserve “pagan” games or are we talking about another GOG?
Yeah I’m still pretty concerned about that whole event but it seems like everyone has just forgotten about it.
I could have forgiven the initial email as a rogue nazi intern but their official response being “we made sure not to send it to Germans and its on you all for seeing nazi symbols as nazi symbols” is pretty fucking problematic. Also before anyone defends them as just being pagan symbols, the ones they chose to use were both modern creations by nazi germany
For anyone who’s not up to date: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/gog-apologizes-for-emailing-nazi-runes-to-its-followers/
I definitely agree that using those innocuous Unicode characters in the way they did was someone’s subtle attempt at evoking Nazi imagery, but the whole Germany part of this story is meaningless. Germany is known for having excessive language restrictions, to the point where every marketing department has their standard library of phrases and whatnot to not use in Germany. They are used to making substitutions for the German market to swap out genuinely innocuous phrases simply because they have a different connotation in Germany or whatever. As far as we can tell, that was just yet another piece of marketing material that went through some automated regex filter for German subscribers and no one thought twice about it after seeing that fact.
From their reddit post in trying to cover up:
… I also recognize that placing two such runes next to each other could create an unfortunate association with symbols used by the Nazi regime. This was noticed before distribution, and out of respect for local sensitivities, the material was not sent to the German community.
They knew and actively chose to not send it to the country that criminalizes Nazi imagery. To me the Germany stuff is the most damning part.
Yeah 100%. Their response to the event is pretty much where all of my feelings come from on the subject. They explicitly state they knew they were releasing literal nazi iconography and then explicitly chose to put it out where it wouldn’t get them in legal trouble.
Not only that but IIRC they actually changed the original game dev’s marketing material to use the symbols without the devs even knowing.
It’s all pretty fucking damning and it makes me incredibly sad
It always amazes me when people from anarchist servers bend over backwards to make excuses for for-profit private companies.
That was about their German language newsletter though. They have separate, localised newsletters for several markets, which I’d assume are manually translated. Also, as a native German speaker, I really don’t think it’s all that different than other European language regions regarding sensitivities.
Their marketing team was warned that there was some offense images and it would stir trouble in Germany.
Rather than say, “Oh shit this will look bad.” They said, “Oh let’s just change it for Germany.”
Do you not understand the root issue?
this won’t buy anyone a yacht, though
What if I build my own yacht out of the CDs I burned my GOG installers to?
Sounds holey
Lean into it. Hovercraft yacht
Somehow they’ll get sued over this for making the other companies look like crooks and thieves
I’m already designing covers and checking what disc type is needed for some of my favourite games
Optical media will eventually suffer bit rot and be useless. Save them to an old HDD, SD card, or USB drive, they’ll last longer.
I’ve been wondering if my 3.25" floppies copy of Doom from the 90s still works but I haven’t gotten around to buying a usb adapter drive to try them.
I already have the installers on an HDD, I just like keeping games on my shelf
