“Okay guys we’ve purchased GOG, the internet’s darling for DRM-free gaming. If we play our cards right we could take an even larger share of steams sales. Our first order of business: pivot our focus onto the one thing that DRM-conscious gamers would hate more than DRM!”
this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2026
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Steam do nothing: wins
Steam’s business model of “do nothing and watch every single competitor repeatedly shoot their own feet” seems to work really well.
True
Caving in to the anti-NSFW demands is "doing nothing"? Paid mods? Not offering refunds for more than a decade? Being one of the first to popularize loot boxes and with it "marketplaces" of items that don't exist, where you aren't even guaranteed the horse armor you want to buy? Literally destroying physical media, used games, and game ownership in one fell swoop so we have to rely on GOG to get the latter back in some form? Damn, their logo must really have the same memetic effects the Apple one has.
I agree with a lot of this except for destroying physical media. Even consoles went digital, music and movies are digital, I don’t think steam is responsible here
They are responsible. They planted the seeds with HL2 as early as 2004. Then they essentially made it not only feasible but also popular to make the physical games of even third parties be just glorified one use digital codes, and all of this waaaaay before 2013's Xbox One attempted to do similar things and got booed very hard.
PC games were always weird with physical media though, shareware and piracy were prevalent since the 80s. And the physical games were even worse than digital in some regards, with Starforce and Securom rootkit-like drm that crashes modern PCs or Games for Windows Live locking save files (and not even cloud saves, normal local save files) behind online service that is now dead. I resisted making a steam account for as long as I could, but today no one even owns a disc drive, steam just won on convenience
but today no one even owns a disc drive, steam just won on convenience
Few people own disc drives because of the constant attacks on physical media and ability to own things, especially games. It's not that they "won on convenience," but rather they "won" by making it so physical games slowly become just a more expensive one time redeem key for digital copies... which you can spend money on right now with Humble and the likes without moving an inch or waiting for the order to arrive. If it wasn't for them, we would own more of our games.
Alright here is my response(am not defending Valve or calling them Saints bere)
Caving in to the anti-NSFW demands is “doing nothing”?
IIRC Didnt Visa and Mastercard pressure them
Paid mods?
thats a thing?
Not offering refunds for more than a decade?
i heard a government pressured them to doing this,yeah that sucks though
Being one of the first to popularize loot boxes and with it “marketplaces” of items that don’t exist, where you aren’t even guaranteed the horse armor you want to buy?
Yeah that sucks to,but for me its fine for F2P Video games and if its not P2W
Donationware would be cool too 👍
literally destroying physical media, used games, and game ownership in one fell swoop so we have to rely on GOG to get the latter back in some form?
Didnt everything move digital?
but
for the most part Steam/Valve did kinda destroy physical Medium,there are sometimes video games that are sold on DVDS/CDS(Video games,Music)
i think for non-DRM Games you can Still own it on Steam???
and used games well i think the digital switch killed it, but if the franchise still has physical Medium it is still possible.
IIRC Didnt Visa and Mastercard pressure them
If they did, then they caved to them despite their wealth and resources. Meanwhile GOG gave away a bundle full of NSFW games and they're also served by Visa and MC. AFAIK only they and itch.io publicly shot themselves here.
Paid mods?
A long while ago, they thought it was an okay idea and they actually sold mods for a short while before taking it out due to backlash. Skyrim was one of the games to have paid mods. I heard a year or two ago they were reconsidering the idea but I don't remember the details. On that note, their mod store is locked to their own versions of most games, meaning that if Skyrim still had workshop mods (free or paid), you likely wouldn't be able to download them for the GOG version of the game. I'm sure if Epic did this, I'll be hearing all sorts of bloody murder all day.
i heard a government pressured them to doing this,yeah that sucks though
IIRC that was Australia. But even their refund policy now is shit. Two hours after you click launch on a game? GOG back then had a 14 day money back guarantee, now extended to a full 30 days refund policy.
Yeah that sucks to,but for me its fine for F2P Video games and if its not P2W
Worth noting P2W is a direct result of the F2P model that Valve has popularized in full fat PC games. Minecraft's first April Fool's joke is a parody of the TF2 store, long before its Bedrock Edition had a similar store for itself. It's not a stretch to say they planted the seeds for games like Star Wars Battlefront 2017 which had you grind for too long of a time just to play the iconic Darth Vader.
and used games well i think the digital switch killed it
The killing started very slowly with HL2, which was the first physical game to require using steam keys to even be able to play it. Selling your copy of HL2 with a used key means the other person can't legally play it. This practice really sped up with 2011's PC physical version of Skyrim which did the same, and at that time many more games did it. Before long, we started seeing discs that don't even have the game files. Microsoft tried to track and limit used games for the X1 console, but backtracked due to backlash. Bethesda continued "innovating" with the Fallout 76 cardboard disc. Now the practice has bled over to current gen consoles.
Tangentially related
The PSP Go was the first digital only console and since the PS Store was discontinued for it, yep, no more buying games for it.
i think for non-DRM Games you can Still own it on Steam???
There are very few of these games and the only way to know about them is a community-made spreadsheet compiled through trial and error. Unlike GOG, they're not guaranteed to stay DRM-free - they can suddenly become DRM'd at any moment.
IIRC that was Australia. But even their refund policy now is shit. Two hours after you click launch on a game? GOG back then had a 14 day money back guarantee, now extended to a full 30 days refund policy.
IIRC Steam is Two hours after you click launch on a game or 14 days after you bought the game,But i always thought GOG'S refund policy is more generous
There are very few of these games and the only way to know about them is a community-made spreadsheet compiled through trial and error. Unlike GOG, they’re not guaranteed to stay DRM-free - they can suddenly become DRM’d at any moment.
Yeah your right and there is no legal way to bypass it
Example of Video games on Steam that dont use DRM
(but AFAIK BeamNG and like PPG does not have the DRM and All Adobe AIR Games for example)
The PSP Go was the first digital only console and since the PS Store was discontinued for it, yep, no more buying games for it.
I wonder if people ever homebrew'd it to circumvent it (idk if this is even legal)
If they did, then they caved to them despite their wealth and resources. Meanwhile GOG gave away a bundle full of NSFW games and they’re also served by Visa and MC. AFAIK only they and itch.io publicly shot themselves here.
I think the only non-NSFW/NSFW-adjacent Game GOG gave out was Postal 2
and i get it now.
But i always thought GOG'S refund policy is more generous
Not to mention it they had it way before steam ever heard of refunds.
I wonder if people ever homebrew'd it to circumvent it (idk if this is even legal)
People have! Homebrewing it for piracy is definitely not legal, but you can hack it like any other PSP (okay technically you can get original homebrew for it kinda but not really legally). But if you're a law abiding citizen, you can't buy new digital games for it.
I think the only non-NSFW/NSFW-adjacent Game GOG gave out was Postal 2
Postal 2 was one of the games in the bundle I mentioned. HuniePop was included IIRC along other games like Fetish Locator. It was given away just after the other two stores caved in.
Not to mention it they had it way before steam ever heard of refunds.
People have! Homebrewing it for piracy is definitely not legal, but you can hack it like any other PSP (okay technically you can get original homebrew for it kinda but not really legally). But if you’re a law abiding citizen, you can’t buy new digital games for it.
Oh cool
Postal 2 was one of the games in the bundle I mentioned. HuniePop was included IIRC along other games like Fetish Locator. It was given away just after the other two stores caved in.
Yep
I don't care much at all that they used an AI generated banner ad for a store sale, but plenty of people do, and it was predictable that they would. If they wanted to save money, it would have only cost them a single game's revenue to find someone on Fiverr to make a similar graphic.
I agree but if it was just used in minor or very minor places.
But the job requirements require you to use AI tools which is not fine with me(it would be fine if it was optional)
If it results in less or worse work getting done, we'll either see it manifest as the customers and it will affect my future purchasing decisions with no harm to what I've already bought, or they'll stop drinking the kool aid. I worked on a game project with a die-hard NFT believer, and even he eventually backed down on trying to shoehorn them into the game after it was clear they were more controversial and less productive than monetizing the game with more ordinary methods.
As somebody who has used Fiverr, there's a lot of good artists on there, but it does not cost five dollars.
Not anymore, but I doubt a graphic like the one they used would have cost a pretty penny.
But people on Fiverr are probably now using AI too. So you might end up paying someone to use AI instead of just using AI yourself.
Reminder to actually download and archive all the game files you bought on gog. They might not be there for much longer.
Any projects to auto archive everything?
I hear of lgogdownloader. There's plenty of projects like this. I second the notion to download all your stuff, or as much as you can now.
I can vouch for lgogdownloader.
It‘s sad to see they use the very tool that has become a true menace for anyone who wants to play games right now. There are so many aspects to it that put the entire concept of ownership at risk and they just use it nilly willy. I‘m not even surprised anymore but still so very disappointed.
Damn, I won't be buying games on GOG at all until they fully course correct into a better state of being. I will be downloading all of my installers that I care about, because if things are this desperate, they might not have long.
It's sad to see so I'm going to keep a close eye on what GOG do from here.
tl;dw?
GOG caught using AI tools, head of product tweeting AI Instagram scams
We all float down here
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