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Legends of Amberland no longer rejected by GOG

Chris Koźmik

Silver Lemur Games
Developer
Joined
Nov 26, 2012
Messages
414
EDIT:

The game has been released on GOG. Details below.


Legends of Amberland approved by GOG!

All right, here goes the story. A while ago, I got a surprise email from GOG and it said they do want to have LoA on their store after all. Why the sudden change of heart is a speculation but I think the wishlist link ( https://af.gog.com/wishlist/games/legends_of_amberland_the_forgotten_crown?as=1649904300 ) you posted months ago might have been an important factor in change of the decision. It gathered quite a lot of comments saying, well, paraphrasing it and to put it kindly "we want the game on GOG, pretty please?" (OK, they used a different wording in those comments with a bit more of emotions). It seems GOG staff do read those whishlists, as they claimed previously :)

GOG agreed to all the things I said in the past I will try to get for you if it ever is released on GOG (so you don't need to pay for LoA twice):
1) All people who bought the pricer "Support The Developer" Edition via my official website got a free GOG key (if you have not received it, please email me using the same email you used when you bought the game). It applies to people who bought the game before GOG release.
2) There is GOG Connect enabled for one week (so hurry up!) for all people who bought it via Steam and want the game transfered to GOG.

It was released on GOG 24.02.2020.

I do hope it means the future sequel will be available on GOG from the start :) Thanks all of you who endorsed the game and made it happen! Many thanks!!!



======

This is a topic I tried to avoid for a while but, well, after talking with GOG representatives a few times I can say now that Legends of Amberland: The Forgotten Crown will not be published by GOG. At least not in the near future, probably never.

I know a lot of you asked for GOG availabilty of the game, so I tried my best to push it but at this moment I gave up.

What I can say now is buy it on Steam. There is no DRM protection of any kind integrated in the game (there never was and never will, it applies to all my games by the way), so you can just launch the game without launching Steam client anytime you wish after downloading.

You can try wishlisting it on GOG (but I highly doubt they ever take a notice of this wishlist):
https://af.gog.com/wishlist/games/legends_of_amberland_the_forgotten_crown?as=1649904300

Also, there is something called "GOG Connect" which they introduced recently which allows you to transfer your game from Steam to GOG libray. If the game ever go on GOG and they enable Connect and the rules of this connect thing are sane and it's free then I vow to put the game as elligible for GOG Connect (I will do my best to not make you pay twice for the game).



The story behind GOG submission:

First, don't get me wrong, there is a lot of nice people at GOG. They played the game, they gave a nice feedback and so on.

But the thing is it's the third game I sent to them. Not a single one passed for numerous reasons that, well, do not make sense to me (it's a good game but it's already released so we will skip). As for Legends of Amberland it passed the first look and it went into internal testing. They provided me the feedback/results of the internal testing (which is super nice of them, it was not "thank but we are not interested" thing but actually something useful which I salute GOG for).

The problem is the reasons they listed. They have not objections to disclosing it so I will write in more detail. In addition to some subjective things (like story and combat) which I supposed is subjective and fair enough, and some objective things (like a single bug they encountered) there were some quite disturbing reasons like "poor animation" and "lack of shadowns"... Which made me totally puzzled. There is no way I'm adding shadows, this would totally destroy the oldschool feel of the game, same for excessive animation.

It simply felt to me the people who evaluated it did not even acknowledged the fact the game was somehow related to the games from the 90s. I'm not sure they even noticed... And if they did they did not care, or even worse, they considered it being a retro game a bad thing.

The biggest advantage of GOGs is they have this huge library of old RPGs from the 90s. It is perfect, I mean PERFECT, shop for a game like Legends of Amberland. All gamers who strive for the feel and look of the old games have a account on GOG because it's the only place they can buy those. It would be a perfect fit...

Let's face it, it's not the first story you heard here. If you count the recent RPGs theat were rejected by GOG you definitely should see the pattern.

It seems GOG has abandoned the Good Old Games legacy and want to distant themselves from their retro past. Which is also compatible with their recent moves to enter the digital stores war alongside Epic and emerge as a traditional digital shop rivaling Steam. Somehow they seem to decided that being connected to a retro image would undermine that strategy. That's why I highly doubt that Legends of Amberland will ever be accepted to their store.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Infinitron

I post news
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This is hardly surprising, I'm afraid. Games that are less obviously retro-looking than yours have also been rejected by GOG.
 

V_K

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What I can say now is buy it on Steam. There is no DRM protection of any kind integrated in the game (there never was and never will, it applies to all my games by the way), so you can just launch the game without launching Steam client anytime you wish after downloading.
You can also use itch.io for the DRM-free option.
 

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
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Was the turndown message per chance this:

Hello,

I'm sorry for late reply.

Thanks a lot for your submission and your interest in GOG.

We’ve taken a look at Legends of Amberland, it looks like a rich RPG game, with complex combat, deep lore, fun mechanics and simple, yet eye-catching retro graphics.

Unfortunately, however, we feel that the game would not be a good fit for GOG, as we think that it appears to be too niche and a bit too small in scale in terms of production value for our users, which means that we aren’t confident in its release potential on our site.

For these reasons I’m afraid we will have to pass on Legends of Amberland.

If you have any other games in the future that might be a better fit for GOG, please let us know, and hopefully we’ll be able to work together.
 

RaptorRex888

Learned
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259
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Vatican City
GoG seems to be doing the exact of Steam, instead of letting clear pieces of shit that have no right to even be labelled videogames be sold on their platform with no scrutiny they are rejecting games based on purely arbitrary and subjective 'reasons'.
 

Jarpie

Arcane
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Joined
Oct 30, 2009
Messages
6,603
Codex 2012 MCA
GoG seems to be doing the exact of Steam, instead of letting clear pieces of shit that have no right to even be labelled videogames be sold on their platform with no scrutiny they are rejecting games based on purely arbitrary and subjective 'reasons'.

Is Steam rejecting games? I thought they'll let anything in as long as game doesn't have illegal stuff in them or are scams etc.
 

getter77

Augur
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Oct 12, 2008
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GA, USA
There's always itch.io---and at this rate, that may well come to occupy that part of GoG's old niche entirely alongside tilting at traction on Steam.
 

newtmonkey

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There's basically no point to GOG anymore. So much garbage gets released on the platform that it might as well not be curated. On top of that, they continue to turn down actually great games developed in the spirit of the games on which they built their reputation long ago. Again, why do I need to go to Steam to get absolute treasures like Grimoire and Sword & Sorcery Underworld or Dominions, or itch.io to get the Lurking series? Why is it that when I go to GOG and check out the new releases, it's all hipster indie trash and fucking visual novels and even actual RPGMAKER bullshit.

How on earth is every single Wadjet Eye game on GOG (no offense) but they turn down Legends of Amberland for "no shadows." WTF

Sure, you can can get MARY SKELTER lolwhut on GOG, but not GRIMOIRE? Is it because 3d graphics? Well, then, why's Elminage Gothic on there (don't get me wrong, that's an awesome game).

Though actually, if you look at the GOG reviews for Elminage Gothic, maybe things make a little more sense in terms of GOG's customer base and the kind of game they want...
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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What I can say now is buy it on Steam. There is no DRM protection of any kind integrated in the game (there never was and never will, it applies to all my games by the way), so you can just launch the game without launching Steam client anytime you wish after downloading.
You can also use itch.io for the DRM-free option.

Seconding this, use itch.io. It allows people to download installers like on GoG, but it doesn't have any retarded curation, anyone can put their games on there just like with Steam.

It's utterly fucking retarded of GoG to reject games for being too retro when the store's entire point was to port retro games to modern PCs.
New game comes out, looks exactly like those games from 1989 GoG sells on its store, is rejected for not looking good enough
????????????????????????????????????

I used to be very supportive of GoG - and I still support their anti-DRM stance - but the curation has become absolutely fucking retarded.
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
There's basically no point to GOG anymore. So much garbage gets released on the platform that it might as well not be curated. On top of that, they continue to turn down actually great games developed in the spirit of the games on which they built their reputation long ago. Again, why do I need to go to Steam to get absolute treasures like Grimoire and Sword & Sorcery Underworld or Dominions, or itch.io to get the Lurking series? Why is it that when I go to GOG and check out the new releases, it's all hipster indie trash and fucking visual novels and even actual RPGMAKER bullshit.

How on earth is every single Wadjet Eye game on GOG (no offense) but they turn down Legends of Amberland for "no shadows." WTF

Sure, you can can get MARY SKELTER lolwhut on GOG, but not GRIMOIRE? Is it because 3d graphics? Well, then, why's Elminage Gothic on there (don't get me wrong, that's an awesome game).

Though actually, if you look at the GOG reviews for Elminage Gothic, maybe things make a little more sense in terms of GOG's customer base and the kind of game they want...

This makes the whole situation even more absurd. Games that look and play exactly like the games GoG was built upon - old 1980s to early 2000s classics - are rejected, while hipster indie titles are accepted.

The people in charge of the curation need to be fired. They're doing an absolutely terrible job. itch.io was supposed to be the platform for hipster indie shit, yet now that one is turning into the actual place for oldschool indie titles because there's no curation. Meanwhile GoG's curators turn down all those games that would be guaranteed hits with the GoG userbase.

And then they're wondering why they're not turning enough profits.
 

Bad Sector

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There's basically no point to GOG anymore.

I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater, for the games that GOG offer they offer the most polished service and featureset (assuming the devs do not cockblock them - see missing modding support or multiplayer compatibility in some games) - especially when you consider other DRM-free stores.

The problem here is only with getting games through their overzealous and inconsistent curation, but once games get in they do a good job.
 
Self-Ejected

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