GOG is increasing game preservation efforts and making it easier to see which games run well on up-to-date PCs

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Over the years, GOG game retailers have moved from almost exclusively offering classic games to offering more and more up-to-date blockbusters in their stores. In a way, they’ve gone from being the master of game preservation to a slightly dustier DRM-free Steam. Now, however, GOG has declared a renewed focus not only on selling older games, but also on improving more of them to run on non-older hardware. You’ll be able to tell which games have been refurbished by the fancy badge stuck on them.

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The GOG Protection Program, as this endeavor is called, is a continuation of the store’s previous efforts to restore older games (see their recent patches on Alpha Protocol and the first Resident Evil trilogy). It is also connected to elements of Valve’s Steam Deck Verified system, which tells you whether a game runs well on a mobile device.

First, GOG’s internal software specialists set about eliminating all the bugs and adding all the missing features (up-to-date video codecs, Windows 10/11 compatibility, etc.) that could prevent them from playing well on a up-to-date computer. Games that pass this process will then receive a certified “Good Old Game” badge on their store list, which immediately shows that they are ready to play and do not require many unofficial tweaks or mods.

Badged games will also be the “most complete version available” in terms of DLC, expansions, and even the availability of manuals and alternate languages. They will also come with offline installers and of course DRM-free.


Image source: Capcom

To kick things off, over 100 games will be re-released with Good Old Game status. These include Resident Evils 1, 2 and 3, the original Diablo (and its Hellfire expansion), System Shock 2, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, both the OG Fallout and Fallout: New Vegas, The Curse of Monkey Island, X- COM: UFO Defense and dozens of other classics. Is it wrong to say that I would be particularly keen to play the updated New Vegas as part of this (significant) batch of games? venerable-antiquities? In any case, its relative newness drives me crazy that I have to modify it so much to keep my post-2008 graphics card from breaking frame rate physics and sending my Courier zipping around like it’s on rocket-powered Heelys. Anyway, you can read the full list here.

“Our goal is for all games, both recent and classic, to eventually become part of the Protection Program,” say GOG themselves. “There are many classic games available on GOG that may already be eligible, but our team has not been able to confirm this yet. Our goal is to support as many games as possible, but this is not always entirely up to us. “

Indeed, such restoration projects require the original developers/publishers to consent to messing with their games’ code, and this is probably not always possible. And those involved in game development won’t be the only ones thinking about the consequences: GOG ultimately exists to sell games, not immortalize them in museums or give them away to people who owned an original copy of the CD-ROM in the past. yesteryear.

Still, overall, it’s probably better for someone to benefit from a hearty game storage process than not have it at all, so it’s challenging to complain too much about this extremely niche return to GOG’s roots. It’s also a timely move, considering disgruntled players are resorting to suing publishers for making the game harder to play through server shutdowns. Let’s hope GOG perseveres despite all the backlash and can produce these offline-compatible and preservation-friendly semi-remasters for a long time to come.

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