CD Projekt’s DRM-Free Games Provider GOG.com Turns 10 Next Month

There are a number of things that can make me feel like time is flying by just a bit too quickly, and realizing that GOG is about to turn 10 is one of those things. I remember being so excited at the launch of the classic game-focused service, that I wrote about it not long after its launch. 2009 still doesn’t seem too long ago for some reason, even though we’re nearly at 2020!

Over at PC Gamer, a new interview with GOG’s Piotr Karwowski fills us in on some of the company’s lesser-known facts – some which will help you gain an even greater appreciation for the work that’s being done in bringing classic (and DRM-free) games to us.

One of GOG.com’s original splash pages

One fact that many seem to manage to avoid is that GOG isn’t an independent company. Instead, it’s owned by renowned Polish developer CD Projekt, makers of The Witcher series, and the upcoming Cyberpunk 2077. 10 years ago, CDP didn’t mean much to the world at large, but since then, the company has won many hearts with its hugely immersive games.

What’s interesting to glean from the interview is that piracy has always been a major issue in Poland, but despite that, GOG has worked hard to keep its store filled with DRM-free content. It’s so confident that it’s doing the best thing for the consumer, that its own Witcher games which have DRM on other stores do not have it on GOG. You can download the game, and take it with you. There are no servers to constantly phone home to or do battle with.

Piotr mentions that in the earliest days, the idea behind GOG could be summed-up on a Post-It note: “two price-points”, “DRM-free”, “simple user experience”, and “classics”. It’s the last one that made me discover GOG in the first place; if I were standard on an island (which happened to have power outlets), I could play classic games until the end of my days.

If I could ask one thing of GOG now, it’d be that the GOG Galaxy client be released for Linux. It seems like such a build has been a long-time coming, except there’s been no confirmation that it’s going to happen, or when. If you’re a Linux user who cares about a GOG client, you can leave feedback here.