Abandonia and GOG? Has this been done to death?
 

I don't know how much times have changed, but when I first started visiting GOG about a year ago, there was the occasional reference to how people, like some of those on Abandonia, were frustrated by how GOG was charging money for games that were free here. I don't know if you guys are more tolerant to us guys now, or it was never that bad, or what, but I'm curious.

Personally, I think while what you guys do is rather legally iffy, it's a fantastic service for those who don't want to see neglected games die out entirely. (I've tried a few games from here, and got Jazz Jackrabbit a few months back.) However, I quite like what GOG is doing (aside from some mediocre indie releases), as in my opinion they bring some forgotten classics "back out into the open," usually doing a good job making them compatible with new systems, and adding value to the games by including bonus material (I'm always hounding them for more soundtracks). Adding extra value (bonus stuff and compatibility mainly) to what could easily be pirated or acquired from here is important to me. So, truthfully, I'd like to see some of these games appear on GOG if they have "extra value" to them. (Like the inclusion of the Jazz 2 soundtrack with a Jazz 2 release)

Just my (probably unnecessary) two cents. :) I have no sway on the GOG forums, I'm not a mod or anything, but I do like the site, and figured I'd test the waters to see if amends could be or even needed to be made. ;) Peace.

Hi tytbone :)

Anybody talking in other forums is either speculating or stating their personal opinion. So let me give it to you straight from the horse's mouth:

We are GoG fans :)

When a game goes up on GoG that we have available here, the download here comes down immediately and we link to GoG.

Most of us have active GoG accounts.

I have nothing but respect and admiration for a group that has managed to make these games available to the wider public, legally and simply. I cannot emphasize this point enough.

GoG ensures the continued presence of these games on people's computers legally and is helping introduce these games to a wider audience, our goals are actually very similar. Any rivalry would be internet stupidity and counterproductive for everyone.

I hope that clears things up for you, but most importantly, welcome to the forums! :)

A quick note: keeping track of all the archives we host is a big job, so if you happen to come across a game that is sold on GoG that we haven't removed just let us know and we'll fix it :)

Not only it was never that bad, it was an attitude mostly expressed by newcomers who just wanted to get the games free ("Legality, what's that? Games should be free!!!" kind of people).

Most of the long-timers and all of the staff see it quite a bit differently: it's Abandonia's goal to ensure old games are not forgotten and still available.
If their owners realize old game X is worth repackaging and distributing again, then it's mission accomplished for us.

GOG adds them to their catalogue The truth is that no self-respecting abandonware site would ever knowingly provide downloads of games which are still sold from a legitimate source (unless legal owners released them as freeware, but that's a very different situation).

In fact, I'll go and say something else:
GOG staff once expressed that they believe abandonware websites removing downloads of games available on GOG indicates some sort of change of heart on our side.
The truth is that it's the appearance of GOG and others like them (as well as expansion by other digital stores to cover that niche) that is a victory for us - because someone, somewhere finally got the point we've been ceaselessly hammering in for years.

Beautifully said, I deeply agree :D

The Fifth Horseman got it right. I'm certainly not the oldest member here but I've been around this site for a very long time and I can assure to all of you that Abandonia main goal always been the preservation of the good old games of the past.

I'm one of those who don't like GoG on this site... But even then, the reasons why I don't like GoG has nothing to do with old games and the fact that we don't have the games they host on this site anymore. It has more to do with the fact that I completely disagree with their methods of doing things such as the need of a third party client to be able to play those games or the fact that I would need to pay to have an immaterial copy of something instead of a hard copy like a CD or a DVD, etc.

Like Fifth said, the moment that those games were sold again and that there was a market for them was an incredible victory for the abandonware scene as a whole. Anybody who say otherwise either don't understand in the least what the abandonware movement is about (and this happen way too often) or they are trying to change the mind of people for their own personal gain.

You're talking about Steam there, GOG doesn't have any client, or any kind of DRM for that matter.

What does GoG have to offer then? I might have got mixed up in all this.

Edit: I went on GoG site and I can't even find a note or an explanation on how GoG work. All I can see is a list of games for very low prices... Really help to understand.

All games are totally free of DRM, it's the sites policy: nothing could stop you from uploading what you just bought to any warez server, and everyone would be able to play it just like you. The games for DOS come ready to play in modern OSes if I remember right (that is including DOSBox, like Steam does too, but unlike them without fourth-party launcher client). It's download only, they don't sell disks.

The lack of third party software and DRM is actually one of the huge benefits of their system. You should check them out more closely EoF, they honestly are pretty cool :)

Aside from the old titles they sell, they also do this for all the new titles they have. The lack of DRM restrictions was very impressive to me (and continues to be with the ongoing updates etc.) when I purchased The Witcher 2 from them.

I would if I could, like I already said.

But the lack of hard copy is still going to set me off. By law I'm not authorized to make a hard copy for myself if I purchase online and this simply mean that if I lose my copy I'm done for. That's not an option for me.

When GOG first appeared I was against it, because it didn't feel fair to sell something that is free (at AB) and nicely working like Cannon Fodder for instance.
But then they started giving some stuff for free and when I checked their site I kind of understood what it was all about from the good point of view.
I still didn't buy anything there and probably won't in near future, but it was nice to replace my old pirated copy (that was bought when there were no way to buy legitimate games in my country) of Empire Earth with legitimate one (which is of course improved with expansion and bonus content).
Like EoF, I too like hard copies but there are numerous advantages of digital download, GOG tought me that if nothing else. But I still had to burn EE to CD and put it in old box, so that the replacement could be complete. :smile2:
Abandonware titles aside, GOG is selling Seven Kingdoms AA, and that is a freeware title, so that is not very nice of them. :suspicious:

So is it some kind of impossibility for you to lose a hard copy?

In fact, If my house would burn down right now, I'd lose all my hard copies. The only games I'd have left would be those in my Steam and GOG accounts.

You should blame the developer, rather than GOG. Its him that has made the game available there in the first place. I was bit mad too when they put up Red Baron which has been freeware for long time. Apparently it was back on sale again because the old developer bought back rights to it and decided to squeeze a few more bucks out of it.

I doubt your house burn as often as hard disks die.

Exactly.

Plus, I've never had my house burn in my entire life. Even if it would happen, I would also lose my PC along with my hard drive... Meaning exactly the same thing for me as far as I am concerned.

Anyways, this thread is not about me not liking GoG. It is about people who post on GoG and bash down abandonware. Or at least that's what I understand from the first post. :p

You can always re-download the game from GOG in case of a HDD failure.
Only if GOG gets shut down or removes the game, you can't get a backup copy from them.

Can they remove games, so you can download them any longer even though you bought them? Have they actually ever done this?

... Apparently they could, and more:

http://www.gog.com/en/support/policies/terms_of_useI'm going to download my GOG games to some external storage now, thanks for raising this. I've always felt reassured that GOG or Steam stores my games so I don't have to, I thought they committed themselves formally to some guarantee. But I guess in practice they kind of do...

In practice, companies are always entitled to what they say... Until they don't. :p

Short explanation of the GoG service then:

1. You start an account with them.
2. You buy a game.
3. The game is added to your virtual shelf, with all extras tied in to the title.
4. You download the installer for the game and save it on your harddrive.
5. You run the installer, and install the game.
6. You back up the installer on an external drive/DVD
7. Your harddrive crashes and the dog eats your DVD backup.
8. You log in, download the installer again, and this time you back it up on one more drive.
9. You play the game, and realize it works under 64-bit Windows 7 without any thirdparty emulationsoftware that you need to worry about, you just run the shiny icon on the startmenu.

I have some 40 titles or so on my GoG account. They are one of the best things that happend to the old-games scene in many years. The prices are realistic, and not 30$ for Monkey Island 1-style.
We made a policy MANY years ago, that IF we found a serious retailer of a game, first hand copies, we would remove OUR download, and point it to the sales site.
It has NEVER been Abandonias idea to profit on ANY game, since we do NOT hold the rights to them. We've had software developers and companies tell us that they do support what we're doings, since we aren't doing any intentional harm to sales of any games directly.

It has always been the policy of Abandonia to provide a free experience, when a payed, legal option is NOT present.

They have done this when some of the IPs changed hands and the new owners were not interested in a new business contract with GOG.

For the record now i only buy games in digital format, is much more convenient and inexpensive.

I also prefer soft copies, I have enough junk at home, specially in case I move again, which is likely.

Done backing up my GOG games and the Steam ones for DOS. :)

I don't know why you guys don't like hard copies. It is always so much nicer to be able to read a real manual when you need to. Plus, you don't actually have to keep the boxes around if you don't want.

I have a full bookcase of games of all origin in my living room. Those games cover only a very small fraction of the games I ever owned in my life... And even then, it is always funny to see the look of those who ask me if I ever played all those games in my life. Then I answer 'Of course!'. :p

Gog and Steam have their own libraries, virtual but they look good.

I travel very frequently so sadly hard copies have become impractical for me, GoG and Steam have been a godsend for me in that regard :)

I do agree though that a good manual is awesome, I really miss the old manuals that in many cases were little books because of all the work that went into them. Ah well.

Eagle of Fire, I dunno how it's treated in Canada, but here, in Russia, you have full rights to make yourself hard copy of any game you are own legitimately.

So nothing can prevent me from downloading game from GoG and burn it on CD/DVD for my leisure. :)

I'm not sure where the commentary regarding Hard Copies is coming from - I just checked the terms of service, and I'm seeing nothing about this? Under U.S. law it's pretty explicit fair use.

That said, I have a bad habit of buying GOG stuff I <coff><coff> er, already own, specifically because the DRM has been removed and I have a soft spot in my head for game soundtracks (though I generally wait for a sale). There's something really sad about the fact that I have a google music account entirely devoted to game soundtracks I've either uploaded from GOG extras or exported from games myself.

Jonnan

Post-Script: I note for the record -- going through the site and seeing the 'Sold' and 'Protected' tags for various items was one of the things that made me willing to donate and become a member here.

Ethics matters (However disappointed I might have been that Loom and Maniac Mansion weren't options - <G>.)

Welcome to the forums Jonnan :D

Glad to be here -- my post count probably won't go up too much from here, but Abandonia has a great site.

Jonnan

No worries, enjoy your stay, poke around and don't feel shy to speak up if you want to :)

The thing with soft copies versus hard copies is that when you purchase a soft copy you purchase the liscence to have that copy only. When you purchase a hard copy, your liscence cover the media as well.

I don't know if GoG cover this term explicitely (the liscence would allow you to make as many soft copies as you want, or one single additional copy) but the way I understand it GoG is supposed to be the legal way to go around and I don't really recognize this under this specific circumstance.

Not that I would complain if it would lead people to change their mind about people making personal copies of their hard copies for backup. Right now it is pretty hush hush, you're pretty much seen with a very bad eye when you do that since the term hacker seem to still be anchored very far in the public eye. But if it do happen then the industry would have no ground for making anti-piracy campaings.

What I don't understand is why everybody seem to aknowledge the fact that it must be legal if a company like GoG do it. For me, the whole terminology is extremely arkward at best.

because it is GOG.com operated by GOG Ltd that's run by CD Projekt Red?

People and taxes are paid, therefore it can be used as step#2 in this equation:

1. get on internet
2. ???
3. profit

Everyone accepts this as the universal law for profiting on the internet. Only step two is unknown, so people must come up with stuff like GOG and ask people like Ubisoft if they can sell their old games.

It is ok because people get paid for stuff that people who have already been paid - and then some other people got paid as well - get paid.

Basically.

Here in Sweden at least, we have separate laws.
Companies can write w/e they like in their license-agreement, but you are still allowed to make a few hard copies, and even share them with your friends, for them to install and use.
I have a good example myself:
I bought Civilization 4 expansion "Warlords".
It was DRM protected.
Titan calls Atari Sweden, and ask how I'm supposed to make my legal backup of it.
The tech-support told me to make a clone with *Software X* and use *Software Y* with this and that setting to emulate it.
This, is my LEGAL right to do here, if i own a copy of a piece of software, game or OS, doesn't matter.
If they are obstucting me from making my legal backup copy, I'm allowed to bypass it to ensure i can use the software that i hold license to, even if the original medium fails.
Option two is to return the scratched/damaged disc, and get a new, but we all know how long softwares are being stockpiled...

This is why Good Old Games got it just right.
There is no DRM or other copy-protection to bypass once you've bought the software, nor any third party verification-software that needs to run.

GOG is essentially giving a taste of Sweden to everyone.

This is Lay knowledge, but I'm reasonably confident of my understanding of it.

Under U.S. law fair use (and my understanding is the 'fair dealing' provisions in the commonwealth countries are basically equivalent), in *theory*, is not a right per se, but an affirmative defense - the intellectual property equivalent of saying "Yes I killed the man, but I can prove it was self-defense".

However, while there are fair use defenses that can be fought in court by rightholders, personal backup is actually writ into the wording of the law. For that purpose "Legal Right" versus "Affirmative Defense" is a distinction without a difference.

Accordingly you don't need to get a specific license to save a copy; in fact a company cannot actually prevent you to do so with a licensing agreement because you never actually needed a license for *that* purpose in the first place.

Jonnan

5

And that does demonstrate the difference between a "right" and an "Affirmative Defense"; The "Affirmative Defense" of Fair Use/Dealing says they can't do a thing to me for saving a copy if I manage to bypass their copy protection. The "Right" to save a copy means they actually have to assist in my doing so.

I would prefer it be a "Right" obviously, but I find it satisfactory as is.

Jonnan

http://www.gog.com/en/support/websit...oads_and_games

"2. Can I re-download my purchased games? Is there a limit to the number of re-downloads?
You can always re-download games bought at GOG.com via the “My account” page. Also, there is no limit to the number of redownloads, but please remember that you're not allowed to share your GOG.com account with other users as only you are entitled to download games from your account."

"4. Can I make backups of games downloaded from GOG.com?
Yes you can, and as a matter of fact we strongly recommend you do so – backing up your stuff is a very good habit, you know? Because our games are DRM-free, as soon as you download the setup file, you can back it up on a DVD or your external hard drive without hassle. Plus, as our installers are wrapped in nice .exe files, you can save them all in one folder and create a nice local backup of your games library! And if you forgot to backup your purchased games, fear not. You can always redownload them from our website for free – see below for more info. Sure, downloading will take a little bit longer than launching an installer from your backup disc, but that's no big deal."

Thank you Rabadi. This is actually what I was looking for earlier. I don't know how you got there. It is possible I simply could not because I have JavaScript off by default.

Anyways, to reply to the others, like I said I'd be very happy if this kind of industry actually make people change their mind on things. However, even though I know it is stupid to actually think that it is impossible to back up things the main problem is not there. The main problem is that other people, the vast majority of people, think so.

I don't know if you guys understand what I mean but this can lead to some dangerous stuff when you're not careful. And this is stronger than what the law actually say.