Yeah, it seems that GOG is the last stand against DRM. Hopefully GOG can get more publishers like Microsoft so they can survive.

and Fireflower - http://fireflowergames.com/

Fireflower is worth a look - a very good DRM free store - www.fireflowergames.com

Edit: Ninja'd :)

I used my $5 store credit for Chronicles of Emerland and NarcoGuerra. Downloaded them and checked if my backup for the rest of my library is up-to-date.

Guess I'm done with ShinyLoot. Still sad to see them go.

Bye bye, I will miss you!

and Itch.io, and I'm sure there are others (dotEMU?).

ShinyLoot's problem wasn't being DRM-Free or anything like that, their biggest problem was marketing and a tiny library, in my opinion. They seemed to rely exclusively on the occasional Groupees' bundle for marketing, which is pretty bad. Their other PR effort was that looong summer sale a year or two ago, ya know...the one that was about three months long and consisted of the same few dozen games getting shuffled around on sale?

I would actually say that another problem was...the site never really seemed "alive". With Itch there are always new games coming out (even if some visibly outright suck), there are game jams going on pretty often and there are always new features being rolled out. With ShinyLoot the front page seemed to be frozen for weeks at a time, even during its big sales.

That's too bad, I have a few games with them and just downloaded them for backup. They have many games not available here that are DRM-free, so now that's one less alternative.

Only place I knew that sold Arcania: Gothic 4 Fully 100% DRM-free and running great!

Im truly going to miss them :( good people, great prices you just cant beat them!

But if amok is to believed, it will certainly fold soon too, as DRM-free gaming is so niche.

It seems GoG.com is doing so great job with their DRM-free business that there's very little reason for the existance for others.

Oh well, as long as the games are DRM-free, people are able to download and keep playing their games, something that will fail with DRM games. Thank god for DRM-free, even though amok and Pheace seem to dislike it for some reason.

For what it's worth, from what I've read Arcania (on Steam) received a patch a couple of weeks ago that removed the DRM (Securom I think it was?).

Yeah, one of the main benefits of DRM-free is that it gives games longevity for years if not decades. One never has to worry about some abstract "authentication" server shutting down, or the loss of an internet connection, to prevent a game from working.

Yes, the joys of DRM-free gaming are truly endless. No wonder GoG.com is pushing it so much.

so in the end we end up with only Steam and gOg, as " there's very little reason for the existance for others."

especially considering gOgs... eclectic... acceptance policies.

Clientwise, it's almost always bad when a store closes. Less competion isn't always a good thing! I have 3 adventure games, if I recall correctly I have bought in the past, which weren't available DRM free and in a good price range in other stores. Thanks for letting us know about this.

I must applaud the founders of ShinyLoot for their transparency. They have run their company with integrity, and for that I give them much respect.

Despite the doom and gloom mentality in this thread, I think that a business model built primarily around DRM-Free indie game distribution can be successful. Where there's a will, there's a way -- it's just that it requires a very strong will to succeed and the creation of business strategies to disrupt and develop new markets amongst people traditionally considered as "non-gamers". The casual/mobile/browser-based phenomenon is a great example of this.

As ShinyLoot's founders mentioned in their goodbye, they lost the drive and passion for it as it was affecting their lives in adverse ways, and devoting the time, energy, and money into it to see the store become what they had envisioned was going to take too much of a toll on their personal lives. It's not easy to step away, but probably the best for them in this case and I do wish them much luck in their future endeavors.

Just received the message too. Granted, the site seemed to be going that way all year, considering the lack of activity, and the way they said it after the sale, that it was good but tiring to do that again, had a "last words" feel to it.

But one thing I didn't notice mentioned on the thread here: ShinyLoot still did flat pricing. Only ones I know of to have still held on to that (FireFlower adds 25% to EU purchases, says VAT, regardless of the user's country's rate). So from where I'm standing, still trying to wave that banner (and mostly shove it in GOG's, since they also used to), this is a far bigger loss than that of just another small retailer.

Recall my e-mails with them after GOG's "good news", asking if they have a strategy to attract GOG customers disgruntled by the change, and they basically said no, they'll keep their flat pricing policy even if they'll be hit way harder by the new rules, being an US company, but that's it, they doubt enough would jump ship just based on that to matter basically. And they were openly losing steam (heh) on the DRM free front too, and what few more recent additions were there were mainly Steam keys.