No, they should still show up like normal when you're on your library page. They've always been kind of buggy though, sometimes having a delay or never showing up at all.

option 1 is what I was going to propose but I see someone already did..

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also, I would like to add my thoughts to the galaxy integrated installer move.
I know I'm still new to the community, I have a low reputation and bla bla bla, but maybe just because I'm new someone (even you at GOG maybe!) could be interested..

I don't have nothing against Galaxy (apart from the name you gave it :D); I like the features it has and I hope it'll become always better (also thanks to the suggestions we give into the Wishlist); I installed it even before buying any game: that says everything about it.

It really was no difficult at all to find, download and install it: how can you think that on 2017 someone could be able to miss it? Whom who miss it it's simply because they don't want it, period.

If you're really concerned about users who ignore it's existence, you have tons of way to remember them, by sending newsletter, by making it even more visible on the homepage, etc etc etc.
Last but not least, ask every time you download via browser if you want to install the client too and illustrate all the advantages it offers..

This way you'll keep your base users (to whom I do not belong, unfortunately) happy and you'll make the experience of new ones better as you planned. Otherwise I fear that the results would be unaware installations of the client (let's say it all: how many people look at the check-boxes nowadays? I do, but I know for sure most don't! And this point is part of your decision - that's sad); and you can never tell if they'll keep it just because it's already install or - as I think - they'll remove it asap!
In both cases I'm sure they'll think you acted not very polite..

So, please listen to your users, don't make the errors every company does each time it ignores its users..

I guess, they believe that having more users with an installed Galaxy is worth annoying other users. It probably has nothing to do with tech savyness. They just argue this way trying to placate upset users (not working very well I guess).

They might have miscalculated here. For me (not wanting to use Galaxy) GOG has become less easy to use which lowers the value of it for me. I will not recommend GOG anymore and I will certainly think twice before throwing money at it.
Very nicely written. You nicely sum up all the important points.
Or not going away. Nothing is worse than missing notifications except for notifications that don't go away.

But why should it work for Galaxy and not for the web site? Seems a bit like the love is much greater for Galaxy. That's the part that annoys me.

It's just marketing speech. Sad story but true. The university in my town does not offer journalism as major anymore, only marketing and communication. The demand for the art of verbally dressing up garbage and transforming it into good news is currently much higher than the demand for the collection of facts and spreading them in an comprehensible format. That's just how the general times are.

GOG Galaxy is now the digital equivalent of AOL discs.
HURRAY

And congratz GOG.com

Thanks for the GOGmix link. I missed two of those when removing the listed games from my wishlist before, and only noticed them now on the GOGmix. Though it made me sad- I was realy looking forward to playing Candle for a while now. I hope GOG enjoys not gettting even more of my money.

Yes, compliment us before insulting our intelligence. Your motivations are incredibly clear, we just have to snap out of denial to see them.

And somehow these users who buy "a game" but can't figure out how to install Galaxy (without having it slipped into their system) are more important than the long-term users who have 300+ games who simply don't want it?

That's great, just point them to the GOG Galaxy download page and they're good to go.

Who are these unspoken people anyway? Is there some forum thread that I overlooked with 500+ posts of people demanding this?

How many people voted to have the Galaxy installer piggy-backed as an "opt-out" in the offline installers? Somewhere around 0 right? Even people who want Galaxy don't want to re-download the Galaxy installer data with every game they download.

Having the Galaxy data packed in with the installers makes no sense, and you know it.

But that's all part of the plan right? To get us to stop downloading the offline installers in favor of using the unpacked Galaxy versions?

It's the beginning of a massive Galaxy push that will end in the very offline installers that delivered it being retired.

It's all about what you guys want. You want your client on our computers because you believe it will ultimately result in more $$$.

The user experience I want doesn't include opting-out of anything, and it sure as hell doesn't include you guys knowing everytime I install or play a game.

By the way, why even give the option to "opt-out"? Afterall, some users might "opt-out" by accident right? Don't you want them to have the best user experience too?

In all seriousness, you owe it to us to let us know your intentions, so that we can decided if we want to continue supporting your company.

The stupidest thing about all of this is that Galaxy is a good client. Not perfect, sure, but it's lightweight, unobtrusive and only does what you want it to. It's perfectly possible to just use it as a replacement for the GOG Downloader (and maybe for keeping track of updates) even if you're not interested in any of the other features. There's no need for GOG to resort to these kind of nagware tactics to get people to install it; just stick a big 'download with Galaxy' link on the game download page, above the offline installers, and the vast majority of new users will happily go for that. Anyone who doesn't go for it almost certainly doesn't want Galaxy anyway.

If GOG does go ahead with this tomorrow, it's the end of the line as far as I'm concerned - I'll be deleting my current Galaxy installation and won't be buying anything else from GOG until they change their attitude. The sheer disrespect for their current users, who have almost universally stated their opposition to this move, is unbelievable. I might as well go with Steam at this point, given that they have a larger community, more features, and a much wider selection of games. I've always held off in the past due to the DRM and mandatory client, but when GOG seems to be heading that way anyway, what's the point?

For those complaining about "overreactions", I'll try to spell out the longer term concerns:-

DRM, copy protection and anything which adds "layers" between installing and playing is the natural enemy to maximising longevity of older games (which is all about minimising obstacles, not adding more layers). I don't just mean the obvious Steam-style DRM "this game refuses to even start without a client", but the more subtle variant of "without Galaxy, this GOG game will appear to run fine for a while but may be more likely to crash if it attempts to contact a Leaderboard / Achievement server via Galaxy DLL if not installed / there's no Internet / outbound connections are firewalled by default").

There's nothing wrong with Galaxy as an option NOW as the general expectation is GOG games work offline. But the potential longer-term problem is this:-

What happens if the *expectation* of GOG users having Galaxy installed and / or an online connection becomes "normalized" amongst games developers in 5-10 years time, and they start writing code in games to utilize it exclusively whilst (unlike today) no longer even considering a workaround if client + Internet is not present, ie, if future games without Galaxy may become more "glitchy" when any online event (Achievement, cloud autosave, Leaderboard access, etc) takes place and are treated as 2nd class "unsupported" methods of running? All of a sudden the client would no longer be "optional", and Galaxy's "DRM-free" becomes no functionally different to Steamworks from the end-users point if you suddenly "need" 3rd party client software to "enable" a game to work reliably offline (whether that was the initial intention or not).

I don't think GOG are dumb enough to intentionally do that knowing a large percentage of their customers are all about DRM, but the issue isn't just GOG it includes the "slippery slope" of how games developers could potentially react to "even on GOG, everyone has Galaxy and always-on Internet so let's just require that" by coding future games to "require" Galaxy in years to come. Not really paranoia to think about the possibilities for those of us who've seen the creeping "slippery slope" of all sorts of anti consumer things in the gaming industry becoming "normalized" over the space of 10-15 years.

Also, you have hundreds of DRM free steam games to choose from as stated in this thread, you only need to use the Steam client once when you download them, then you never have to use it again when launching the given game. That's sort of where GOG is headed but steam just has more to choose from.

That says exactly what I feel too. It feels like either GOG made quite some mistake or they don't care about users not using Galaxy at all. One of the two, I guess.

I called this a long time ago but was mocked for my foresight.

This is nearing Microsoft levels of arrogance and underhandedness. I'm going to have to reconsider whether or not I buy anything from gog.com in the future.

Judging by the decisions that lead to this thread, the chances are good they are actually dumb enough...

Do you have the answers to my main two important questions now? Note that we cannot wait any longer for those who dislike the idea to voice their final disagreement on it, after all, tomorrow is Friday, the day your new installers will be up. So we ought to know of the fine details now before the clock ticks and says "it's Friday." Please immediately see if the staff has any answers to give us and also relay them to this thread and the countless other threads created in response to this action. We are voicing our disagreement on your idea in unison, and whoever is cheering for the idea whether outside this forums or inside is 100% not worth chasing after in return for losing the userbase who stood with you during the hard times.

This is not a sound decision in general. Please point your staff to the thread here and let them judge for themselves just how bad the potential outcome of this move is.

The issue for me is that I like my installers to be as "clean" and "timeless" as possible, devoid of prompts to install gamespy clients or toolbars or whatnot.

I also dislike the weight of the installer files to be increased by such irrelevant data, be them secondary installers, or downloaders, or even the queries themselves.

And the expressed rationale is vaguely insane. Videogamers that would be incapable to find the galaxy installer on the GOG website, galaxy links that have to parasite game installers instead of catching the users at the website's download page ? Is there really such a huge untapped crowd of players incapable to deal with file installation ? Is the ability of downloading a file and installing it now an rare elitist, "tech savvy", experise ? Amongst vigeogame nerds ?

But I suddenly realised the only factor that can justify this strategy in the eyes of GOG. These new installers are not meant for the clients of the shop. They are meant for those who short-circuit all the galaxy announcements and links of the website. They are meant for the pirates.

They are meant to have the pirated games encourage their users to install galaxy, to appreciate its benefits, and to make an account. It's galaxy adverstisement, galaxy-fishing, for those who never get close to this website. And that's why it's on by default, that's why the overwhelming galaxy reminders on the website are not considered sufficient, and that's why intercepting potential users on the downloads page is not considered as an option.

So, basically, this IS a form of light DRM. Not coercitive, just symbolic, inbetween a client and a "please buy" reminder. But it is still :

- Nagging the legit buyers, for whom it is useless and parasitic.

- Existing only as a measure to discourage piracy.

It's its purpose and intent. And the whole thing only makes sense through this perspective. The saddest thing is maybe how the gog team wouldn't be open about it, fearing more outrage about light DRM strategies than about apparent incompetence and irrationality.

To be honest, I'm not even sure which would be the worst.

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Oh by the way. The proper, non-manipulative version of the thread title is : "Offline installers with an option to not install GOG Galaxy". Thank you.