Good Old Games calling it quits?

Brian Ambrozy 19 Sep, 2010 at 1:18pm ET Article published in Gaming

The original retro PC gaming service, GOG.com, appears to have shut its virtual doors today after almost two years online. When I originally covered the launch of the public beta in 2008, I was really excited about the idea. The core of the reason why a service like this is needed is thus: Good games don’t stop being good because they’re old. However, operating system and hardware updates can make old games difficult to enjoy, but GOG took the pain out of the process by offering fully working versions of classic games for modern hardware and operating systems that also happened to be DRM-free.

There’s no word other than what’s on the website, but their Twitter feed seems to back up the idea that the site is going through some major changes. One of their most recent tweets says,

Sometimes it’s really hard being DRM-free… hard to keep things the way they are and keep management and publishers happy 🙁

Comments

19 Sep 2010 ~ 3:33pm UPSLynx

GoG was an awesome service. This sucks.
19 Sep 2010 ~ 5:30pm Winfrey I hope beyond hope that they are able to re-launch, but I have a feeling if they do it will be with some sort of DRM.
19 Sep 2010 ~ 5:40pm Basil Sucks.

I actually rebought stuff with them in the hope it would catch on.
19 Sep 2010 ~ 7:04pm Cliff_Forster This is a shame. I hope that maybe they can work something out to re brand their service as a partnership with Steam Maybe? The ports they do are really solid. What a shame.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 1:10am Tim I never heard of this gog site until now.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 1:41am primesuspect Thank you for sharing, Tim.

Class, thank Tim for sharing his thoughts.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 5:52am DeeTee Thanks for sharing Tim. ^_^
20 Sep 2010 ~ 8:24am Kwitko If Tim doesn't know about it, it must suck horribly.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 9:41am Cliff_Forster What concerns me a little bit, if you look around at the discussions on several message boards, many people are upset, so much that they are going so far as to question their decision to ever go digital distribution for their content delivery needs. They are asking questions like, what service will go belly up next, how are my purchases secured, will I loose my content? In short, can I trust any service enough to give up my precious optical disk. Makes me cringe a bit.

I understand that GOG may be having problems, but they have a responsibility to be transparent with their customers. This cryptic message is bad PR on so many levels. People are freaking out. We all know how obsessive gamers are.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 10:25am mertesn http://www.joystiq.com/2010/09/19/digital-distribution-retailer-good-old-games-shuts-down/

There's an update indicating they may not be completely shut down yet.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 10:26am mertesn ...and just a few seconds ago this was posted to the GOGcom Twitter feed:

"The official statement from GOG's management about the situation will be announced soon. We'll have more details about this tomorrow."

http://twitter.com/gogcom
20 Sep 2010 ~ 11:49am Myrmidon WHAT?! This sucks, surprising no-one! If bad were a boot, this would fit it! I had relations with [the idea that GoG is shutting down]'s mother! [The idea that GoG is shutting down]'s mother was not that good in bed!
20 Sep 2010 ~ 12:11pm Bandrik I want to be sad, but sadly I've never even heard of GOG. So the really depressing thing to me is that I'll never know what I had really missed out on.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 12:13pm UPSLynx

Cliff_Forster wrote:

What concerns me a little bit, if you look around at the discussions on several message boards, many people are upset, so much that they are going so far as to question their decision to ever go digital distribution for their content delivery needs.

Yeah, that concerns me too as digital delivery doesn't need any major hiccups right now. However, GoG stated very specifically that they would have a solution up within a week for customers to download their games. Of course, for the angered few to understand that would require them to read the original post, so I realize my expectations are unrealistic.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 2:40pm Canti
20 Sep 2010 ~ 2:42pm Thrax LOL.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 3:09pm shwaip gg wp
20 Sep 2010 ~ 3:46pm Ryder Canti, I love you.

Carry on.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 4:14pm Tushon I read somewhere on the internet that this might just be a marketing ploy for their move from beta to final (but that did not have any reference and stated so). Not to spread internet rumors or anything ...

Also, Canti, you encapsulate the world in so few paint moments that I am in awe.
20 Sep 2010 ~ 4:35pm UPSLynx LOL.

I saw that post on Neogaf that claimed the same thing, Tushon. That'd be a pretty crappy thing to do, they'd piss off a lot of people. I'm not completely ruling out that possibility though.
22 Sep 2010 ~ 1:23pm Basil PR stunt then.
22 Sep 2010 ~ 1:31pm primesuspect PR stunt indeed:

http://gaming.icrontic.com/news/gog-fakes-out-gamers-is-back-and-fully-revamped/