GOG tweets out a little “friendly fade” towards competitor storefronts following the signing of a law in the US that requires digital platforms to declare to customers the scope of their game purchases.
Buying Games on GOG Means You Own The Installers
Games Still Playable Even If GOG Gets Taken Down
GOG appears to have taken a stance against the consequential loss of access to games that are purchased on competitor platforms. Following the passing of a California law that requires digital storefronts to declare that gamers don't actually own the games they buy, GOG tweeted an apt photo containing its fine print that says: "A purchase of a digital product on GOG grants you its Offline Installers, which cannot be taken away from you."
This new law takes effect next year, which requires storefronts such as GOG, Steam, Epic, and such to tell consumers that they are merely purchasing a digital license of a game (digital product), which has appeared to be the cause of particular grievances among gamers. For one, when your game purchases don't grant you offline installers, and in the instance that these games get taken down or entirely offline, you lose access to the games they have paid for.
Additionally, the law prohibits storefronts from advertising or selling digital products that would purport "unrestricted ownership" of the game. Other digital storefronts, such as Steam, don't grant offline installers, which could mean that if a particular storefront goes offline or gets wiped from the face of the internet, you'll lose access to your library of games.
Buying games on GOG grants consumers access to an offline installer which is used to locally install and play the game. This means you'll still have access to your digital goods even if the license to the game has expired or in the event that GOG gets (hypothetically) taken down. A number of gaming companies have taken some of their games entirely offline as of late, which in turn have made them unavailable to be played. Back in April, Ubisoft took its racing game series The Crew completely offline citing "licensing constraints" as one of the reasons for The Crew's shutdown. Often, this would happen without prior warning from gaming companies.
Digital copies of games are still licenses, however, what GOG has pointed out is, more or less, its "unrestricted" and unencumbered access to the game, as well as an insurance that you'll still have your game using the offline installer GOG provides.
Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin has previously explained that the new California law is aimed at aiding consumers in having a fuller understanding of what they are paying for. "When a consumer purchases an online digital good like a movie or TV show, they receive the ability to view the media at their leisure. Oftentimes, the consumer believes that their purchase has given them permanent ownership of that digital good, similar to how the purchase of movie on a DVD or a paperback book provides access in perpetuity," Irwin said. "In reality though, the consumer has only purchased a license, which, according to the seller's terms and conditions, the seller can revoke at any point."
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GOG reminds everyone why they should buy games there and not Steam or Epic Games
