"Epic Store Games You Can Play Without The Epic Launcher" GOG source now defunct

[ab5000 5]

Sadly GOG have just changed their Terms and Conditions on their forums to forbid linking to or discussion of competing stores:-

"I wanted to give you an update regarding our stance on threads/posts focusing on advertisements and referrals to other stores. After I warned one of our Forum users for advertising, they brought up several threads of similar theme to my attention and made a very good point that it wouldn’t be fair to moderate a user for advertising and leave threads like this open after it has been reported. After reviewing them internally, we came to a conclusion they violate our Code of Conduct. That also included this thread, so I will be closing it and any other similar threads that violate our Forum rules."
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/gaming_deals_thread/post69035

As a result one of the threads closed includes the "Epic Store Games You Can Play Without The Epic Launcher" information thread that links to the related spreadsheet list:-
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/epic_store_games_you_can_play_without_the_epic_launcher/page1

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16BjnaBO40vkt6kFVl0QWMWVh86UFnr-j_yWhQbASJ58/edit?usp=sharing

Since the spreadsheet is based almost entirely on that GOG thread which is now permanently disallowed / uneditable, and speaking as the primary maintainer of the spreadsheet, would the PCGW Moderators here have any objection if I posted the following direct link into the spreadsheet, redirecting people directly to below related page?

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games_on_Epic_Games_Store

I thought I'd ask first! Thank you.

[Dandelion Sprout 10]

>"Sadly GOG have just changed their Terms and Conditions on their forums to forbid linking to or discussion of competing stores:-"

That definitely sounds like something GOG would do. Ever since their scandals about Devotion and Hitman 3, I personally have got such little confidence in them that I'd expect them to hush down any criticism.

>"would the PCGW Moderators here have any objection if I posted the following direct link into the spreadsheet"

If I understand the question correctly, I as a PCGW senior editor (though with no actual mod rights) have no objections to it. However, I feel it could be specified in some way that the PCGW list would be updated by editing the game pages themselves, and not the list page (the latter of which is automated and fetches data from game pages).

[ab5000 5]

5 hours ago, Dandelion Sprout said:

If I understand the question correctly, I as a PCGW senior editor (though with no actual mod rights) have no objections to it. However, I feel it could be specified in some way that the PCGW list would be updated by editing the game pages themselves, and not the list page (the latter of which is automated and fetches data from game pages).

Thank you for your reply. I added a note to the old spreadsheet list clarifying "The above list automatically fetches data from PCGW game pages and lists only games where the Epic Store version is marked DRM-Free. It gets updated by editing the game pages themselves." Hopefully this should avoid any confusion.

[dave247 8]

By all means feel free to link to the list or any page on the Wiki for that matter,as while it's kind and thoughtful gesture it's by no means required to ask for permission to do so, as it along with all of the other lists exist for everyone's benefit to do with as they please. 

[ViperAcidZX 4]

Should we mention on the List of DRM-free Steam Games article that the GOG forum for examining potentially DRM-free Steam games is no longer being maintained thanks to GOG throwing a hissyfit over competition of DRM-free providers thanks to their sudden change in their totalitarian Code of Conduct?

[ab5000 5]

7 hours ago, ViperAcidZX said:

Should we mention on the List of DRM-free Steam Games article that the GOG forum for examining potentially DRM-free Steam games is no longer being maintained thanks to GOG throwing a hissyfit over competition of DRM-free providers thanks to their sudden change in their totalitarian Code of Conduct?

It might be a good idea as GOG locked that thread too a day after mine:-
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/steam_games_you_can_play_without_the_steam_client/page1

I only maintained the Epic version though and although I did contribute to above Steam version thread, I didn't edit the Steam Wiki page myself though. Also I forgot to mention, aside from asking permission above from moderators here to link to the new list, the other reason I created this thread is that I know some people here who edited some PCGW entries for the Epic-Store DRM field referenced my now defunct spreadsheet / closed GOG thread as a source. Example:-

Afterparty:-
References - 1. Epic Store games you can play without the Epic Launcher - last accessed on 2020-07-05
https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Afterparty

I don't know if those references & URL to the now locked GOG thread are still classed as valid under PCGW guidelines for referencing / need updating or not? Thanks.

[Dandelion Sprout 10]

9 hours ago, ViperAcidZX said:

Should we mention on the List of DRM-free Steam Games article that the GOG forum for examining potentially DRM-free Steam games is no longer being maintained thanks to GOG throwing a hissyfit over competition of DRM-free providers thanks to their sudden change in their totalitarian Code of Conduct?

Presuming you're referring to https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games_on_Steam, the descriptions on our list pages (A large majority of which I've assisted in editing at some point) tend to be pretty barebones, so a note like that would look slightly out of place.

[Coates87 3]

On 4/4/2022 at 1:21 PM, ab5000 said:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16BjnaBO40vkt6kFVl0QWMWVh86UFnr-j_yWhQbASJ58/edit?usp=sharing

Since the spreadsheet is based almost entirely on that GOG thread which is now permanently disallowed / uneditable, and speaking as the primary maintainer of the spreadsheet, would the PCGW Moderators here have any objection if I posted the following direct link into the spreadsheet, redirecting people directly to below related page?

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games_on_Epic_Games_Store

I thought I'd ask first! Thank you.

Thank you for opening this forum topic. As a long time GOG fan (10+ years), and someone who relied on both the Steam and Epic forum topics regarding the games that are drm-free on those respective stores, it greatly annoys me that the GOG mods would lock those threads.  If I end up finding any other drm-free games on Epic or Steam, what is the preferred way for you to be contacted (PC Gaming Wiki, GOG, ect.)?

[ab5000 5]

7 hours ago, Coates87 said:

Thank you for opening this forum topic. As a long time GOG fan (10+ years), and someone who relied on both the Steam and Epic forum topics regarding the games that are drm-free on those respective stores, it greatly annoys me that the GOG mods would lock those threads.  If I end up finding any other drm-free games on Epic or Steam, what is the preferred way for you to be contacted (PC Gaming Wiki, GOG, ect.)?

Thanks. You could always PM me here or on GOG (2nd link in the first post). One thing I have noticed though is that whilst the list of DRM-Free Epic Games here is up to date and accurate, there are a lot of Steam games flagged as being DRM'd here (mostly from being added that way by default) that seem very out of date vs the Steam Wiki through not being tested. I did update a few "Steam games that run without the Steam client" games here the other day (eg, Pinstripe) after testing them myself, but there's quite a lot that aren't. Perhaps PCGW could have some "DRM-Free Blitz" week of updating with accurate info?

[Dandelion Sprout 10]

On paper, assigning a game as being DRM-free on Steam or EGS on PCGamingWiki is pretty easy. For Steam games, one goes to the individual PCGamingWiki game pages, finds a string akin to "{{Availability/row| Steam | 1341050 | Steam |  |  | Windows }}", and changes the 2nd "Steam" phrasing to "DRM-free".

[Coates87 3]

14 hours ago, ab5000 said:

Thanks. You could always PM me here or on GOG (2nd link in the first post). One thing I have noticed though is that whilst the list of DRM-Free Epic Games here is up to date and accurate, there are a lot of Steam games flagged as being DRM'd here (mostly from being added that way by default) that seem very out of date vs the Steam Wiki through not being tested. I did update a few "Steam games that run without the Steam client" games here the other day (eg, Pinstripe) after testing them myself, but there's quite a lot that aren't. Perhaps PCGW could have some "DRM-Free Blitz" week of updating with accurate info?

I'll keep that in mind for when/if I find any other drm-free games on Epic/Steam. For what it is worth, I do try to update the some of the games that I've found to be drm-free on their respective pages, but obviously, it would be difficult to test them all since many of those games I've never heard of or not that interested in. Again, I really do appreciate all of your hard work.

[future-proof 3]

Hey, everybody, I'm the one who started the GOG topic for Steam games that can be played without the client, which was also closed, as mentioned above. I created a Steam group and migrated everything over to there, so we can continue contributing to the list.

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/drm-free-and-client-free-games

I still feel pretty burned that the topic got locked (especially since the original post didn't link to the Steam store or the Steam website in any way), but at least we can continue it at the source. Pretty ironic, considering that GOG obviously didn't want us talking about Steam over there; well, now we're just going straight to Steam and bypassing GOG, I guess.

[ab5000 5]

7 hours ago, future-proof said:

I still feel pretty burned that the topic got locked (especially since the original post didn't link to the Steam store or the Steam website in any way), but at least we can continue it at the source. Pretty ironic, considering that GOG obviously didn't want us talking about Steam over there; well, now we're just going straight to Steam and bypassing GOG, I guess.

Thanks. Good to see you're up and running again! It's definitely a good thing to move non-GOG stuff off of the GOG forum given the current 'direction' they're heading in...

[Coates87 3]

9 hours ago, future-proof said:

Hey, everybody, I'm the one who started the GOG topic for Steam games that can be played without the client, which was also closed, as mentioned above. I created a Steam group and migrated everything over to there, so we can continue contributing to the list.

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/drm-free-and-client-free-games

I still feel pretty burned that the topic got locked (especially since the original post didn't link to the Steam store or the Steam website in any way), but at least we can continue it at the source. Pretty ironic, considering that GOG obviously didn't want us talking about Steam over there; well, now we're just going straight to Steam and bypassing GOG, I guess.

I've already joined your group, but I do appreciate this.