Unlike Steam and Epic, GOG Provides Offline Installer For Games Purchased Through Their Store

I’ve acquired a few digital games — mostly as freebies via Amazon Prime Gaming — through GOG (https://www.gog.com/en/), but nothing even remotely close to Steam. There’s a feature GOG is touting in response to Steam reminding us that we don’t actually own any of the games we buy through them:

“GOG’s big selling point that more people should shout about is that it sells games DRM-free. When you buy a game on GOG, you get access to an offline installer for it, which you can use to install and play your games even in the event a license for it ends. It essentially uncouples the license from the game and lets you have some actual ownership of the things you buy.” – GOG reminds everyone why they should buy games there and not Steam or Epic Games | Windows Central

Thanks for caring about game preservation, GOG. Maybe we should be buying more games through GOG? Are you, readers?

This issue has been more pressing thanks to a law California passed in that requires stores to notify customers that they are purchasing a license, not a copy to own forever, and it could be gone if/when the license disappears. Although I’m not a fan of too many laws for things, this is actually a pretty good idea. The FTC should be covering stuff like this, however, not an individual state having to do it. Still, it’s a good thing to put in consumer’s faces, a la OPINION: Sony reminds us that the illusion of “owning” Digital Movies and TV Series are lessons in Hollywood Thievery