this post was submitted on 03 Jun 2026
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If you can buy from GOG do it. Need to make sure viable competition sticks around plus they actually let you own the game
Let's be clear. Both Steam and GoG sell you the same licence for a game.
Steam comes with optional DRM that requires you to use the Steam client. Whether or not this DRM is present on a game is the publisher's decision, not Steam's.
Steam could certainly be criticised for providing the functionality but it's not mandatory.
Cyberpunk 2077 on Steam for instance has no DRM and can be run without Steam. Even if a game has Steam DRM it's usually trivial to bypass it.
The official Stean documentatikn even says Steam DRM should not be used as antipiracy because it's easily bypassed
I really wanted GOG to be a viable competition, but their years and years of broken promises are not going to make me leave Steam.
...such as...? Whenever I'm shopping for a game, I check GOG (and 3rd party sites for steam keys via ITAD) before I buy from steam. If it's available on gog and drm-free, that's where my money goes.
The only issue I see with gog is that devs don't give a shit. One and done, one pump chump. Why give customers choice, when you can be jerking it with their money already instead?
They can't even keep their original promise of DRM free games.
For example, they thought they could get away with selling latest Hitman with its always-online DRM, and only changed their minds after the backlash.
Also, from the beginning they've been promising to support Linux.
Nothing but empty promises so far, they didn't even have the decency to publicly admit it's never happening.
Valve, meanwhile, didn't promise anything, but quietly funded the development of Wine and all kinds of related open source software.
Thanks to their work I've been able to completely ditch Windows a few years ago.
For this reason alone I'm glad to buy from Steam whenever I can.
GOG isn't really competing in the same market as Steam.
Most importantly, GOG games don't include Steam keys, which is what's the issue here.
Steam lets publishers include Steam keys if they don't sell them for cheaper than on Steam.
These suits have nothing to do with steam keys.
I read that elsewhere. Maybe it's fake news, maybe it's not all cases. Idk
Yeah the valve boot licking brigade is out spreading that falsehood for who knows what reason. I've heard of 3 lawsuits. None of them are about steam keys.
Then how come official retailers like GMG are consistently able to sell Steam keys at 10% discount for nearly every new AAA release on launch?
Cause they're key retailers without a platform. Steam already got paid for those keys.
GMG also publishes games. They're like the only games with the same price on both sites.
GOG takes the same 30% cut though and they have less features and dont improve linux compatibility like Steam does with proton. I dont see the benefit of using GOG
I don’t know what I have to do to get a game listed on GOG though. I don’t buy a lot of games but I think the last three I tried to buy were all unavailable on GOG. There’s that page where you can wish for a game on GOG but I’ve no idea how effective that is.
GOG only sells DRM-free games. If a game isn't there, it's probably because the developer/publisher refuses to allow that, requiring DRM in their game.
GOG uses GenAI for marketing.
Eh, take some leave some. I'm as anti AI as any other, but comparing those negatives with the positives GOG brings it's a little better than a wash. You actually own the game and I'm 99.9999% positive that somewhere in steam's multiple streams of revenue ai is being used regularly and heavily.