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General discussionParticipation of developers in the game forums in general.(13 posts)solved(13 posts)solved
(13 posts)solved
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This is my favourite topic
Posted May 07, 2023
I wonder why the participation of developers in the game forums in general is very low. It seems is not possible to get answers from them posting messages there. Could people here share the reasons? What are the communication channels GOG uses instead?.

And having the opportunity: Could you share game forums with high participation of developers as well?.
This question / problem has been solved by F4LL0UTimage
Posted May 07, 2023
Most devs are either using their own channels on social media like Discord or their are using the Steam forum.
Posted May 07, 2023
Because the gog forums are dead for the most part, and most developers can't be bothered to dedicate a pinned tab of chrome to gog.

Some do though, some make a real effort to include gog.
Showrunners dev has been quite active here, answering everyone.
8BitSkull has always been responsive afaik, very accessible and helpful.

Tunguska: The Visitation, Minotaur, Space Haven, Foundation, Stellar Tactics, Astrox Imperium...
Just to name a few.
Posted May 07, 2023
As already pointed out, it's a case-by-case thing.

Most developers/publishers tend to focus on and stick with the place where there most likely is a high degree of social engagement and communication to occur.

Which the GoG forums (general discussion as well as the game-specific subforums) with a smaller user base, of which only an even smaller portion are regulars, who actively partake in discussion, apparently are not.
The bulk of the GoG user base either seems to only irregularly throw in their two (commentary) cents here and there and where it makes sense (like bug reporting, posting news, pushing indie titles GoG for whatever reason seems ignorant of, etc) or just quietly purchases games and instead of wasting time by talking about them (or other things) then plays them.
Posted May 07, 2023
A lot of smaller developers wont have the time for it (and may in fact not be good at that kind of communication). Some have community managers for it. Others still have preferred contact methods (as mentioned already).

On the whole though, there is a certain undercurrent of disdain for the GOG forum in the industry given a few things over the years.
Post edited May 07, 2023 by Sachys
Posted May 07, 2023
The main answer is because all of the game-specific forums on GOG have very low traffic, which makes devs not want to bother checking them since very few people will read their posts there.

The secondary answer is because many/most devs see GOG as a "dumping ground" for their games, meant to gather up a few remaining dollars to milk out of their game, but at the same time, they don't take the GOG store seriously and they also don't take supporting their games on GOG seriously either.
Posted May 08, 2023
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Ancient-Red-Dragon: The secondary answer is because many/most devs see GOG as a "dumping ground" for their games, meant to gather up a few remaining dollars to milk out of their game, but at the same time, they don't take the GOG store seriously and they also don't take supporting their games on GOG seriously either.
I'm not sure about that. But fact is, they can't rely only on GOG to sell their games, if making games is a job it has to pay off. That's a fact of (real) life. I want to believe some/many devs believe in GOG DRM-free approach, they just rely on it to make a living... Also, devs are not publishers. There's an economic reality to take into account.
Post edited May 08, 2023 by maxleod
Posted May 08, 2023
Death Trash developer posts changelogs for all updates immediately when released (updates themselves are super fast as well, on par with Steam, that's including offline installers) and participated in other topics. Probably could participate more but forum is basically dead and chngelogs are only posts in months.

Generally A+ GOG treatment on all fronts despite it being 2 persons project. That's commendable approach and dedication but also hard to blame small devs that don't care that much about forum activity.
Posted May 08, 2023
Nox Archaist's developer does regularly post on the sub-forum, including things like the announcement of the recently released DLC.

I also remember seeing the developer of the Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap remake posting, and many years ago burgerbecky unexpectedly posted on the Dragon Wars subforum.
Posted May 09, 2023
Funnily I actually stumbled upon this thread while checking up on whether there's been any new posts about Showgunners which we just released a week ago. :)

We actually have always had some presence on the subforums for our games (Hard West, Phantom Doctrine and now Showgunners) but I must admit, it's probably mostly because I was a GOGer before I was a game developer and I have always also urged colleagues to take GOG seriously.

(side note: our presence on our past games' subforums stopped when we lost ownership of those and literally couldn't support them anymore)

Anyway, Steam is far more significant than GOG in pretty much every way: Sales are higher, a high user rating on Steam is one of the most significant drivers for sales, pretty much every game developer is personally familiar with it already and so on. Importantly, there is also much more user activity on the Steam communities than on the GOG subforums. For comparison: on Steam we have over 150 threads about Showgunners already while GOG has... 2... both of which were created by the same user. On Steam there's basically an ongoing stream of feedback while on GOG it can sometimes take days, weeks or even months for anything to appear.

It is comprehensible that with such proportions most developers figure that they should just focus their efforts entirely on the Steam community. It is also relatively unlikely that on GOG a user will report anything significant that has not been already reported on the Steam community - and fixes based on Steam community feedback will also make their way to the GOG version unless a developer has simply given up on supporting the GOG version altogether (which I personally consider unforgivable).

And I really don't want to take a dump on GOG itself, I love this place for many reasons but of course there's also the matter of convenience for developers themselves. GOG has been gradually improving developer tools and support but it is still a far cry from the competition and I hope GOG will keep improving these things for the developers' sake, the users' sake and ultimately also their own sake.

Mind you that I don't condone ignoring the GOG community this way at all but I think that's most of the reasons why developers aren't generally active here. GOG is peculiar place with a peculiar culture, a peculiar community and also peculiar demands. I can see how it's difficult to even understand GOG and its community if one wasn't a user of it first - and even becoming a GOG user is a choice that requires a peculiar mindset. :)
Posted May 10, 2023
I must concur with the poster before me. We are an odd bunch of people. In that we have an expectation of buying products and dealing with a company that does not explicity screw us over.

But generally, I like gog, in spite of the company faults, for maintaining games I play. I would not even play games much except for the lists of freebies, save gog.

So thanks gog employees.....even though they dont come here either lol

(cant help being an intelligent donkey sometimes)
Posted May 10, 2023
I noticed that the developer of Crystal Project has made a couple posts on the relevant sub-forum. (Username is "riverrungames", and his posts do not have the orange developer text.)
Posted May 12, 2023
The majority has spoken. Thanks y'all for the detailed feedback and the developers mentioned. F4LL0UT, your double perspective gives you the points. There's nothing wrong with having preferred ways by logical reasons, what surprises me is the low number of pages providing contact details. Take Nox Archaist from dtgreene's post,

We invite you to join our Discord server! [url=https://discord.gg/kwcFxVphttps://discord.gg/kwcFxVp[/i[/url]]

That guy also gets double points; game forum participation plus an alternative. Developers could easily include contact info to reach them when needed.
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General discussionParticipation of developers in the game forums in general.(13 posts)solved(13 posts)solved
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