What a bunch of douchebags

It was in bad taste sure but most sites (this one included) pay very little attention to GoG and what they are releasing. When the hoax began many news sites reported on it and the comments were filled with people who had never heard of it saying they were sad to see it go.

" What a bunch of douchebags "

" It was in bad taste sure but most sites (this one included) pay very little attention to GoG and what they are releasing. When the hoax began many news sites reported on it and the comments were filled with people who had never heard of it saying they were sad to see it go. "

Of course it was a hoax. We've been saying this for days. Well, not a hoax, actually. It was a stunt in the tradition of lame radio and media stunting.
 
And no, it didn't work. They are a beloved site and if they had just announced their changes it would have had a lot of publicity. Instead, they produced this stupid stunt, which probably leaves many unaware of the newest part of it and will be left thinking the site is gone. And even if it got a lot of publicity (doubtful as the major gaming sites already cover the shit out of GOG -- including almost every sale they ever have), also earned a lot of ill-will. I'll be downloading my previously purchased games from their site and then discontinuing my account.
 
There are countless places to get the same games, free, with just as little or even less hassle. I just always paid for them through GOG, because they were awesome and I felt good about supporting their effort to make old games playable and DRM-free.

I just hope they get big enough to get the lucasarts and epic back catalogs. GoG does a better job than publishers who put their back catalogs on steam of configuring dosbox  to play the games well.

It was unfortunately the stupidest possible pr stunt imaginable for a downloadable game service, but it won't stop me from buying their games as long as they're games I want.

A really dumb thing to do. Never have been a customer but that didn't help them win me over. I was wondering when the EBA guys were still giving away a free download from GOG and didn't mention anything about it being discontinued.

That's a pathetic business tactic, but it sure as hell worked. I never used GOG myself, and this experience has somewhat put me off using them. Regardless they do provide a good service, but the method in which they have pushed their service to the masses now is disappointing.

I'm sure there were better ways to generate buzz than perturbing their large group of loyal followers. I know that there were quite a number of core users who bought each and every game, not because they liked each and every game, but because they wanted to support GOG and CD Projekt. However, because of this stunt, I think some of those users will begin to question how much they use the site in the future. But then again, the really loyal members tend to treat GOG as a GOD. So, in that case, they will probably just shrug it all off and justify GOG's stupid marketing stunt :P
 
Imagine what will happen when they really close down :o

Looks like they'll have Baulder's Gate up when they relaunch. Which means they've finally got around all the licenscing problems with tose games, so we'll probably see Torment and other D&D based games.
 
This is pretty huge.

" Looks like they'll have Baulder's Gate up when they relaunch. Which means they've finally got around all the licenscing problems with tose games, so we'll probably see Torment and other D&D based games.  This is pretty huge. "

Wow, this is the most reasonable thread I've ever read on here. 
 
I was sad to hear they were going away, but the idea that it might be a hoax was amusing to me. I love their service and generally keep the installers I get from them on a external drive for safe-keeping.

Wow, what cheap move. They seem to be apologising pretty heavily about what they did but they knew the effect it was going to have when they pulled the stunt in the first place. A small marketing budget is not an excuse for lying to your customers and I seriously hope that their customer relations are hurt by this so that nobody else thinks it's okay to use these kinds of deceptive tactics to make money.

Yeah, when there was speculation that it was all a marketing stunt, I was kind of annoyed. Regardless, I'm happy they'll be back.

This is like that "hoax" with the girl who "quit her job" via whiteboard and photographs. It's not a hoax if you go "haha, jk" a couple days later. 
 
It's getting them attention and they're still open. That's cool and I'm happy for them. And I understand they don't have, like, a serious marketing budget, etc. But they definitely should have thought this through a little bit longer. Hoaxes or jokes are fine, but crying wolf in such a deadpan manner is a bad idea.

" Sounds to me like they're going to announce the new service Wednesday then launch it Thursday. It still doesn't explicitly state that they're shutting down for good. "

I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt. 
 
How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal?
 
I don't see any reason to be so upset.

I'm totally fine with what they did. And i hope they come back bigger, stronger and better than before. They did an amazing job on the old site, so i hope this new venture will kick ass too.

" @JokerSmilez: Technically they took our installer downloads for a few days. "

Define Douchebags

I was working on a Top 5 Dumbest Video Game Decisions of 2010 list for the end of the year. I think it may have to be a Top 10 at this point. >_>

" @JokerSmilez: They away our ability to download our games for a few days. Its not really a big deal. "

" I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt.  How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal? I don't see any reason to be so upset. "

" I'm totally fine with what they did. And i hope they come back bigger, stronger and better than before. They did an amazing job on the old site, so i hope this new venture will kick ass too. "

Bye!Good

Ehhh, no big deal.

" Looks like they'll have Baulder's Gate up when they relaunch. Which means they've finally got around all the licenscing problems with tose games, so we'll probably see Torment and other D&D based games.  This is pretty huge. "

" @august said:

" Looks like they'll have Baulder's Gate up when they relaunch. Which means they've finally got around all the licenscing problems with tose games, so we'll probably see Torment and other D&D based games.  This is pretty huge. "

What‽ Dude! I am so excited for this now! I lost my disc for Baldur's Gate some time ago, and I haven't bothered to torrent it. I would gladly repurchase it. "

Crappy childish marketing, I agree. But at least it's a whole load of exposure for a very good service - if they can attract more customers and profit from DRM free games, then it's a win for all of us.

" @JokerSmilez said:

" I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt.  How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal? I don't see any reason to be so upset. "

Imagine if you went to Giantbomb.com and without any warning whatsoever there was just a message that said "Unfortunately this site has been closed now! Thank you everyone for supporting us over the years. Oh by the way, all the video content will be available somewhere in the future". Then a few days later there was an announcement that said "We just did this for some publicity; we apologise from the bottom of our hearts lolz" "

People should stop complaining. It was a bit of a silly stunt I agree, but like JokerSmilez said, apart from a few days of being unable to download your games, they haven't exactly harmed you in any way. If anything, the publicity generated by this stunt will ensure more business for CD Projekt, and therefore more support for games in the future.  
 
@BeachThunder said:

" @JokerSmilez said:

" I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt.  How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal? I don't see any reason to be so upset. "

Imagine if you went to Giantbomb.com and without any warning whatsoever there was just a message that said "Unfortunately this site has been closed now! Thank you everyone for supporting us over the years. Oh by the way, all the video content will be available somewhere in the future". Then a few days later there was an announcement that said "We just did this for some publicity; we apologise from the bottom of our hearts lolz" "

Being able to re-download previous purchases from GOG is a privilege, not a right. You don't pay ANYTHING for them to do this for you. Its pretty shitty of them to give no warning of a closure, but you can avoid losing your games by doing what you're supposed to do with them and keep them yourself. 
 
Further, at least we had the option to own the games in the first place. If people are really this upset about GOG, you guys are going to shit your pants when On-Live vanishes in about a year.

" I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt.  How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal? I don't see any reason to be so upset. "

You know, there's a reason we're taught the story of the "Boy Who Cried Wolf" as kids. 

" Being able to re-download previous purchases from GOG is a privilege, not a right. You don't pay ANYTHING for them to do this for you. Its pretty shitty of them to give no warning of a closure, but you can avoid losing your games by doing what you're supposed to do with them and keep them yourself. 
 
Further, at least we had the option to own the games in the first place. If people are really this upset about GOG, you guys are going to shit your pants when On-Live vanishes in about a year. "

A thing many with your viewpoint (which I do agree with in many cases) seem to miss is that GOG had a sale up until the last minute before they shut down, and when they shut down they didn't just close the web site - all current downloads also were dropped - meaning a lot of people who bought games on the sale (where several games were made in the last decade, and therefore generally were above 1GB each) in the last hour or so before the shutdown had no chance of actually downloading and backing up the games they bought. I wouldn't have had as big an issue if they had just shut down the function that accepts new connections for download, allowing all current downloads to finish - but they cut everything. The store portal, the customer support, all downloads - and never sent a single e-mail to any of the customers to explain why they were doing it.

Yes, sure, the page returns tomorrow - so it wasn't actually like you wouldn't be able to download your games or just have a limited time to download them before they shut down GOG entirely (as was the impressions many got from the first notice GOG posted), but it took nearly 2 days before they said anything at all, and when they did they only posted it on their site - no e-mails were sent.

" I'm kind of curious as to why people are so pissed off and say they feel "betrayed" by the stunt.  How did this negatively effect you in anyway? Did they take something from you? At worst, you thought the service was ending but they made it clear that all your purchased games would still be available for re-download. So, what's the big deal? I don't see any reason to be so upset. "
 
 

Does anyone here really care? I mean really? It was a marketing stunt. Yes it was sleazy but meh. 

You'd have to be stupid to buy from a company that will take away your purchases, albeit temporarily, for the sake of advertising.  All you are is fodder to create a scandal with to them.  If you still look upon their service in a positive light, then you'd be a hypocrite to criticize virtually any other videogames business practice in the future.  MS, Sony, and Valve would never be idiotic enough to pull a hoax like this.

Heh, never read anything about it closing, but I recently tried to go there to see if there was a way I could play Duke Nukem 3D and saw the thing about them shutting down. The whole thing went over my head, since I didn't really use the site anyway. I just thought "oh well" and moved on.
 
But that's not important right now. What is important is me asking if anyone knows if Duke Nukem 3D being sold on GoG will run on Windows 7 even though it was absent from the list of compatible OS's.

They said they got Baulder's Gate that's cool

This stupid PR stunt has forever lost me as one of their customers.