Supraland, the colourful and inviting first-person puzzle game from Supra Games is now going to be removed from game store GOG after less than a year being there.
Looking at the dates: it released on Steam in April 2019, then came to Linux in July that same year and then onto GOG in that same month. Today, June 9 in 2020 the GOG team posted on their forum that Supraland will be delisted from their store at the developer's request but it will stay in your GOG library. That's not long to be on a store to then ask for it to be removed, so why?
The developer has been quite vocal about it all, as it turns out. Back in July 2019, we posted an article about the developer saying some strange stuff about both GOG and Linux and it seems their opinion didn't change after being live on GOG for some time, as they said on Steam in May this year:
Going onto GOG I expected maybe something like 10% of Steam, but it's more like 1%. Same with releasing a Linux version. It's all worth so little for us that it's rather annoying to have to do the extra work all the time and carry that weight around. I wouldn't do it again.
Sounds like a case of heavily inflated expectations, mixed with some naivety. Still, it's better to request removal than to leave it up and not support it at all, so it sounds like they're doing the right thing overall.
In other posts they also mentioned how in relation to DRM-free gaming that "98-99% of players don't care" and that if there's any "crying about DRM stuff in the gamer scene, it must come from a really vocal but tiny minority. 1-2% tiny". That's some pretty tough words for the DRM-free crowd.
As for the Linux build of Supraland, it appears to have been suffering a few issues lately as posts on Steam will show and the developer isn't sure what they will do so the Linux build may be pulled too see: #1 and #2. They've never been particularly confident about it either as they said before a few times, and it appears they don't know how to support the Linux version. If they do announce a decision on that bit, we will let you know.
"Just" an obfuscator? Weirdly, that sounds like you're defending it.You've said that it messes with an OS kernel, I've said it doesn't. I don't like Denuvo either. It still doesn't let me play my games sometimes, e.g when I lose my Internet connection. Yet I prefer Steam over GOG.
In other posts they also mentioned how in relation to DRM-free gaming that "98-99% of players don't care" and that if there's any "crying about DRM stuff in the gamer scene, it must come from a really vocal but tiny minority. 1-2% tiny". That's some pretty tough words for the DRM-free crowd.
Well if the DRM is obnoxious, most of the people i know are happy to wait for the DRM-free release (so to speak :) ).
You are right to make that point, but the fact I didn't make a link between DRM and those devices is quite revealing. I think more of DRM like "let's go through our customer's stuff because something may be wrong" than a simple automatic check (stuff paid for/stuff not paid for). In that case, CD Key looks more like theft prevention than DRM. But that's just how I see it.You complained that "DRM doesn't trust you and treats you as a potential criminal apriory." - and that's what you're doing with random foreign people as well, and for a reason. There's bad people out there.I don't know where you're from, but here in France if a shopkeeper starts being suspicious towards his clients, they just leave the shop and never come back.
So, you cannot demand trust from companies (or other foreign people
So, shop detectives, electronic door devices to scan for stolen stuff labels (CDs, clothes, ...) or other theft prevention isn't a thing in our neighbor country? I find that hard to believe (and would search on my own of you insist that would be true).
I was only talking about if there's a justification for DRM, not about how it is done. I don't know if there's a working non-intrusive way to do it... I don't want people to sift through my stuff, neither in shops not on my PC for sure.
The answer is - there isn't a way, unless there is a probable cause. To put it differently, searching through someone stuff becomes justified if someone is investigating a crime or something. But to do it preemptively - that's already a problem and overstepping of privacy. DRM oversteps it always, so that should give a hint that it's never valid.Yeah, the comparison to the shop owners would be instead of just cameras looking for shoplifters, they actuvely search you from head to toe before you enter the store, and before you leave it.
Think of basically the TSA every time you enter a shop. Would you shop there?
The DRM choice from what I understand is usually one made by the lublishers, nit the developers. And I think most publisher / developers these days think of DRM as only an initial protection to try to make as money as they can before the pirates crack their stuff and distribute it for free. It is a cost / loss analysis. I think as soon as they realize they are making less money from new sales as they are for paying for their DRM, then drop the DRM, as Conan Exiles has done.
One thing that is weird to think of? Video games finally got to the point where companies make all of their money selling their Engines to other video game developers. DRM has done the same thing, where they are just paid for licensing!
Remember the days of Codewheels? Those were cool.
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