GOG is under new leadership, which is its old leadership. CD Projekt Red co-founder Michał Kiciński left the company in 2012, which meant leaving GOG – his creation – behind.
Now, he is back, but users should not expect any drastic changes. In fact, Kiciński seems more determined than ever to stick with GOG's anti-DRM efforts, even though it may cost the business.
GOG won't change its anti-DRM message to protect triple-A releases.
“Since the beginning, we have not seen DRM as a solution to piracy, because games are pirated anyway, almost one day,” Kiciński tells Gamesindustry.biz. “We see DRM as something that can make life more difficult for legal customers. The only reason to keep it alive is to please game owners, because that's often what they need.”
True enough, the gaming community is very much against DRM. Despite pushback from publishers and DRM companies themselves, many link DRM to performance issues in games.
This is something that Kiciński experienced with The Witcher 2, which was published by Bandai Namco. Even after the game was pirated, the publisher insisted on using DRM, which CDPR wasn't happy with – and faced legal action from Bandai Namco to have it removed.
GOG has had to hire private investigators to track down IP rights holders
“Sorry to trouble you, but you own Deus Ex.”
So, it's not surprising to hear that some publishers don't work with GOG, because bringing their games to the platform means releasing them without DRM. That being said, Kiesinski isn't terribly upset about losing these business partners.
“We've lost something, we've gained something,” he says. “There are probably even some developers who actually choose to work with us because of this philosophy.”
In fact, GOG doesn't get anywhere near as many games as Steam, with almost all major publishers skipping it entirely. Still, it's got Skyrim, Fallout: New Vegas, No Man's Sky, and more big PC games on the home page, so it's got a lot of bases covered. It also has some mod support thrown in there, like Steam Workshop, making it a little easier to dip your toe into it.
So, don't expect GOG to become the go-to place for Triple-Age to take on Steam, but expect it to continue to honor its niche. This seems to be the message from the new leadership. We just have to wait and see if this site is big enough to grow.
