I agree to everything salve that once you license a game, even if it is taken out of the store, will still be available in your library.
In my case: Outrun 2006: coast to coast and Castle of Illusion (remake).
Comment on steam vs gog, which game store to buy from?
mech@feddit.org 20 hours ago
You can’t buy games from Steam.
You can only license them for private use, subject to a change in licensing terms or disappearance of the game from the platform at any time.
massive_bereavement@fedia.io 20 hours ago
Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
But they can take it away, if they want to. They just haven’t done so yet. Unless you own DRM free installation media, you don’t own a game. Steam has been relatively low on the enshittification scale so far, but there is no guarantee that this will never change. Once Gabe is out and the beancounters take over, it’ll go the way of all corpos.
massive_bereavement@fedia.io 19 hours ago
Technically yes, and probably if Gog did the same we would have time to download it before they removed it out of our libraries.
But I was thinking: what happens when we die.
Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 18 hours ago
The games will be transferred to the great SSD in the sky.
MagnificentSteiner@lemmy.zip 17 hours ago
Buying a game on Steam gets you the same perpetual license for your copy of the game as it does on GoG (the same as any software). The difference is Steam’s DRM (requiring the Steam Client to run the game). AFAIK Steam have said in the past that they have a plan to remove it if Steam shuts down.
Here’s a video that lays it out in detail as to what game ownership means amongst other things www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUAX0gnZ3Nw.
The big question about all this stuff is how far companies (both game and non-game software) can push their “you don’t own your software” agenda before facing a significant legal challenge and what the outcome of that legal challenge will be.
boletus@sh.itjust.works 16 hours ago
The difference is you can download and keep the installers from gog and back it up yourself. Gog just acts as a store front and download service. You always keep it. It’s the only true form of software ownership. If you had your steam account removed right now, some games you have installed would no longer launch.
Orygin@sh.itjust.works 15 hours ago
Some games you have bought on gog would also not launch if the publisher decides it. Not all gog games are DRM free.
OTOH, some games have no DRM on steam (not even the steam DRM), and can be kept on your machine forever.