Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

GOG.com

DalekFlay

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 5, 2010
Messages
14,118
Location
New Vegas
If Amid Evil is half as good as it seems it'll be my first payday purchase tomorrow.
 

KeighnMcDeath

RPG Codex Boomer
Joined
Nov 23, 2016
Messages
12,859
I enjoy metroidvania and beat-em ups.
198X
Bloodstained


And I like weird art games so those on my radar are:
Seasons after the fall
Luna
 

Belegarsson

Think about hairy dwarfs all the time ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Patron
Joined
Oct 20, 2015
Messages
1,261
Location
Uwotopia
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.

DalekFlay

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 5, 2010
Messages
14,118
Location
New Vegas
I'm in it. The new interface is cool. It launches the other client in the background, so it seems pretty seamless which is nice. However I tested a game I know for a fact launches without the Epic Games client running but Galaxy still loaded the EGS client, which seems like something it should be told it doesn't have to do.
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
3,678
Location
Nantucket
I'm in it. The new interface is cool. It launches the other client in the background, so it seems pretty seamless which is nice. However I tested a game I know for a fact launches without the Epic Games client running but Galaxy still loaded the EGS client, which seems like something it should be told it doesn't have to do.

Did you get in today? When did you first apply for the beta? I'm still waiting on mine unfortunately. Also yeah I agree I hope they do the same for Steam's DRM-free games too. Maybe that's something the community would have to manually curate though with DRM-free appids being added to a whitelist manually.
https://pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/The_Big_List_of_DRM-Free_Games_on_Steam
 

DalekFlay

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 5, 2010
Messages
14,118
Location
New Vegas
Did you get in today? When did you first apply for the beta? I'm still waiting on mine unfortunately. Also yeah I agree I hope they do the same for Steam's DRM-free games too. Maybe that's something the community would have to manually curate though with DRM-free appids being added to a whitelist manually.

Yes today. I would guess the client just defaults to loading the other client, yeah, but hopefully they allow a checkbox or something to tell it not to do that.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
The one thing conspicuously missing from GOG Galaxy 2.0 - letting you BUY games from other platforms. I can imagine the other platform holders might not approve of that if it were implemented.
 

Tytus

Arcane
Joined
Jul 9, 2011
Messages
3,596
Location
Mazovia
The one thing conspicuously missing from GOG Galaxy 2.0 - letting you BUY games from other platforms. I can imagine the other platform holders might not approve of that if it were implemented.

Didn't they brokered a deal with Microsoft Store already?
 

Tytus

Arcane
Joined
Jul 9, 2011
Messages
3,596
Location
Mazovia
The one thing conspicuously missing from GOG Galaxy 2.0 - letting you BUY games from other platforms. I can imagine the other platform holders might not approve of that if it were implemented.

According to the German games magazine Gamestar, Microsoft allows an official integration into Galaxy 2.0. This means, that for example PC Game pass games can be installed, started and deleted with the GOG client. And we will probably see coss-platform chat with Xbox.

https://www.gamestar.de/artikel/gog-galaxy-groesste-innovation-der-e3,3345341.html

Edit: There is now an english article from PCGamer.com

https://www.pcgamer.com/gogs-quest-...might-work-and-microsoft-is-already-on-board/

They have official Microsoft support.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I'm talking about buying games from other platforms from the GOG Galaxy Client. Not just installing and playing them.
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
3,678
Location
Nantucket
Honestly it'd be in everyone's interests if the supported platforms had their respective stores integrated into the Galaxy client. Everyone would make a shitload of money off it. I'm basically imagining GOG having a "search engine for games" where you search a game, you're shown a title and given links to whatever platforms it's being sold on.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
Joined
Oct 5, 2012
Messages
13,582
Codex 2014
I guess GOG themselves selling Steam keys are probable under Valve's current policy and would be an interesting development. Especially with that GOG Connect.
 

Rahdulan

Omnibus
Patron
Joined
Oct 26, 2012
Messages
5,104
I'm in it. The new interface is cool. It launches the other client in the background, so it seems pretty seamless which is nice. However I tested a game I know for a fact launches without the Epic Games client running but Galaxy still loaded the EGS client, which seems like something it should be told it doesn't have to do.

I have a seemingly irrelevant question, but it's something that gets on my nerves - do they have their own art asset database or do they draw from other stores' sources? I ask because I saw how new game covers look in Steam's upcoming library if devs don't update them. Valve has apparently been haunting devs to update their assets for months with no success.

ca7fml50tr331.jpg
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
3,678
Location
Nantucket
I'm in it. The new interface is cool. It launches the other client in the background, so it seems pretty seamless which is nice. However I tested a game I know for a fact launches without the Epic Games client running but Galaxy still loaded the EGS client, which seems like something it should be told it doesn't have to do.

I have a seemingly irrelevant question, but it's something that gets on my nerves - do they have their own art asset database or do they draw from other stores' sources? I ask because I saw how new game covers look in Steam's upcoming library if devs don't update them. Valve has apparently been haunting devs to update their assets for months with no success.

Steam's library update is going to be a fucking mess if they don't find another way to generate cover art or force developers to update their listings or get removed from the platform or something that would motivate these fuckers to do thirty seconds of work. Those blank ones aren't even old or abandoned listings. Three of them were released in the last two years.

hugsO4D.jpg
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://www.pcgamer.com/gogs-new-ap...rge-steam-epic-battlenet-and-everything-else/

GOG's new app is the best way to merge Steam, Epic, Battle.net and everything else
Now in closed beta, GOG Galaxy 2.0 is still missing key features, but the library management tools are already excellent.

6Usw7DdkLqUWUyDJHUGc5T-320-80.jpg

GOG Galaxy 2.0's marquee feature is that it gathers all your videogame libraries under one roof: a better launcher. It can't make those other launchers disappear, but tries to make them as invisible as possible, allowing users to install, play, and curate games across most of their digital libraries—Steam, Uplay, Origin, Battle.net, Epic Games, and GOG, of course—entirely from Galaxy 2.0's clean, simple interface.

We're still waiting on proper integration for Xbox Play Anywhere games on PC and the ability to force-close launchers when quitting an associated game isn't in yet, but digging through my library across (almost) all platforms is already a breeze. I'm creeping up on 1,500 games on Steam alone, and with dozens more floating around, tied to other launchers and accounts, I can't keep track of what I own, what I've downloaded, and what I still need to play.

One day into the closed beta and I'm already convinced GOG Galaxy 2.0 will be my new home base for organizing my library and picking what to play next. Here's why.

Launching games tied to separate clients works well
From Galaxy 2.0, I tried installing and launching games from every supported client, and it worked without issue, whether the client was already running or not. Steam is the least intrusive of the bunch, which stayed minimized in the system tray throughout, only popping up the usual 'Preparing to launch' window. Uplay and Origin's client windows tend to pop up, while Battle.net pops up for a minute before minimizing to the system tray.

I'm not sure how consistent these behaviors are between users, but once the ability to close launchers when an associated game is closed is integrated into Galaxy 2.0, it won't matter much either way. Galaxy 2.0 is doing what it can to remove extraneous clicks and window-juggling from the process.

I can see my console libraries
Which shouldn't matter, right? This is PC Gamer dot com, after all. But hey, a guy's gotta play Bloodborne. And Spider-Man. And God of War. And—well, you get the idea. As someone who constantly forgets they own consoles at all, it's nice to be reminded of what I own and can play without booting up a console in a different room.

There's no community or official integration for Nintendo accounts yet, which is a big blindspot right now, but because community integrations are entirely open source, there's no reason we won't see it once more people are able to play around with Galaxy 2.0.

It makes videogame 'playlists' possible
The bookmark feature might be Galaxy 2.0's best asset and what truly separates it from other all-in-one launchers like Playnite. You can bookmark any search results page or individual game page to add it to the sidebar for easy curation and navigation. And because the search function allows you to filter via genre, custom tags, installed vs. uninstalled, personal rating, platform, and operating system, you can essentially make music player style playlists for your games across all libraries.

While it's missing basic functions, like the ability to drag and drop games into playlists or the ability to rearrange them on the sidebar, I've already made playlists for specific people. I made a bookmark for the entire Half-Life series. I made a rainy day videogame mixtape. I tagged a bunch of anime games "Wes" and made a Wes-list. I bookmarked The Witcher 3 on its lonesome like some emergency shutdown button and called it Tub Time, because sometimes it's Tub Time, like, right the hell now.

As the next step, I'd love the ability to share bookmarks, either via a custom URL or through official social media integrations. I've always loved assembling music playlists for specific people or to fit a particular mood. It's not just a great method for personal library curation, but could be an excellent engine for discoverability. GOG Galaxy 2.0 could be the Spotify of games, sans the streaming of course.

The open source community integrations could be bonkers
Except the community could technically integrate streaming into GOG Galaxy 2.0 via the open source plug-in feature. There's little to show for community-made plug-ins beyond launcher integrations right now, but some pretty wild stuff is possible.

A GOG rep tells me that some people have already made plug-ins that allow users to launch and stream Xbox games to PC (or Mac), a plug-in that pulls in your entire iTunes library, and a Discord plug-in that integrates your Discord friends and conversations into GOG Galaxy 2.0.

Some ideas off the top of my head: someone could make a plug-in that lets you install and launch PS4 games in GOG Galaxy 2.0 via PlayStation Now. Maybe Twitch and YouTube plug-ins allow for easy streaming or clip-sharing. A plug-in that connects to your Stadia library and launches it via a Chrome plug-in from within the Galaxy client. A plug-in that makes a fart noise every time you launch a game. The possibilities are beyond anything on offer from any launcher right now.

The 'Recent' page is fascinating and helpful look at my habits
Data, baby. From the Recent page, I can see everything I've played across every platform up top, which skips the step of opening the right launcher to get moving. I need to play a lot of Fortnite for the job (and fun), but I'm also playing through Pathologic 2 right now. Seeing them side by side as soon as I open GOG saves me a couple seconds of clicking and scrolling in their respective launchers to boot them up.

I'm especially into the bar graphs showing games added, my recent achievement history, and hours played. You can sort to show that data split up by platform or as a whole, monthly, weekly, or daily. It's imperfect data, pulling only from games and launchers that track time-played in a manner accessible by GOG, but it's fascinating nonetheless. I tend to play more when the sun comes out in summer, it seems. Backwards! Note to self: go outside.

The Recently Added section especially appeals to a digital neat freak like myself. I'm one of those old metadata obsessed MP3 collectors. My music library is massive, but more importantly, it's tagged and rated. Any new game that comes into Galaxy 2.0 will show up here, its blank rating and tag fields as blatant signals to fill those fields in before they're moved through the queue. I have a lot of tagging ahead of me with a library of 1,600 games, so hopefully plug-ins or official updates make mass-tagging less formidable.

I don't have to find art for 90% of my games
GOG Galaxy 2.0 pulled most of that in without issue. It's not just box art either. Each game page features background art, too. I'll still have to find bespoke art for some of the more obscure entries or the occasional game with a garish thumbnail, but I'd also be content leaving what GOG pulled in for me as is. And if you don't like what GOG pulled in, you can change the thumbnail, background, and icons to any image of your choosing. We expect you to do the right thing with The Witcher 3.

GOG Galaxy 2.0 still has a long way to go. Unified friend and chat features aren't in yet, you can't edit metadata for most imported games, and there aren't any experimental community-made plug-ins to play around with yet. All that and more is on the way in the coming weeks and months, almost certainly before a final public release.

With dozens of the biggest games departing Steam for other platforms in the last six months, GOG's new approach is arriving at just the right moment in the Store Wars.
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
3,678
Location
Nantucket
I wish they'd just open source the whole damn client. It's good for peer review, security auditing and it'd result in a solid Linux client that's maintained by the community. There's so much money on the table, I don't know why they're only making the plugin module open source.
 

ADL

Prophet
Joined
Oct 23, 2017
Messages
3,678
Location
Nantucket
Is there a source on that? I really hope it's true but I've seen nothing that indicates it. The open source community integration stuff is certainly a step in the right direction but it's only a half-measure.
 

Perkel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 28, 2014
Messages
15,804
Is there a source on that? I really hope it's true but I've seen nothing that indicates it. The open source community integration stuff is certainly a step in the right direction but it's only a half-measure.

"Open source integrations" from official gog page. So not exactly open source.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom