Question about gog

AMD A10 7870k

Asus Strix R9 390 8GB

16GB GSkill 2400mhz

Benchmark after update today : 1080 , High , 54.4 FPS

                                              : 1080 , Crazy , 32.2 FPS

Wondering the same as well. I'm just gonna copy paste these questions from the GOG forum:

 

1.
On the GOG store page for this game it says that it requires the GOG Galaxy client. Any reason for forcing the Galaxy client instead of providing a Steam key? Just wondering since the Galaxy client itself is still in "early access" and still buggy, incomplete and far from done. So... if I run into problems I won't even know if it's the alpha of the game or the alpha of the client that's causing the problems!?


2.
How is multiplayer between Steam and Galaxy being handled? What if I want to join my buddy in a game and he owns the game on Steam and I own it on Galaxy?


3.
There are quite a lot of games that are getting different updates and are actually running on different versions on Steam and GOG. Latest example should be familiar to you, it's Sins of a Solar Empire. This is not only breaking the multiplayer, but also the mod community. Do you have any plans to stop this from happening with this game?

Hey! I can't answer all the questions, but I can answer some of them.

 

1. Steam and GOG multiplayer will not work together at launch. However, it is something we are looking at and researching for the future.

 

2. Ashes requires the Galaxy client for Ashes multiplayer. You can play offline without the client. As for updates - you can download them from the GOG website just like any other game.

Ouch, that is a hell of a risk splitting the multiplayer community like that. That should be on the GOG purchase page if it isn't already. Multiplayer needs to hit a critical mass in numbers if it is going to survive. I don't have all the numbers but man I hope you weighted the pros and cons to it. You could end up with some upset customers if they don't think things through as well as the guys in this thread have and wonder why no one is online.

 

Edit: Can the people who buy it on gog then take the key, convert it and then use it on Steam should they wish to? That would at least give them the option to move over if they wish.

Not much we can do on that. The platform provides the connectivity (Steamworks and Gog Galaxy).

 

You could not sell it on GOG, at least until you have worked out a system where by Steam and GOG play nice for multiplayer. There are a lot of places you can get the game already. The more I think about it...unless you put it on the GOG page you are going to potentially get some major kick back from this, and either way I think it is going to hurt the multiplayer side of things. Anyway, I'll leave it there.

So my friend owns the game on Steam and I own it on GOG. I can't join his game I see in my Steam friend's list (by clicking on "join game" within the Steam client) because that would require Steam to launch the Galaxy client and share connectivity data between clients. Obviously you can't make those clients talk to each other, so that can't work. I understand. ...However I don't see why I can't launch the game, create a multiplayer match and my friend finds said game WITHIN Ashes.

 

How does Ashes handle multiplayer anyway? Is it an open lobby where anyone can host a game? Additional automatic matchmaking? I mean the game isn't hosted on Steam servers and another game instance is running on GOG servers, so I don't understand why whatever system you have in place isn't shared globally. Can't Stardock host the matchmaking / lobby system globally and Steam and Galaxy plug into that?

 

Do you really mean to say that I can't join the game my friend is playing at all? If so, that is totally insane. Why would you split the online community like that? Do you plan to release paid map packs and paid for armies or units, too?! Since those kinds of DLC are a great way of splitting the community further... 

I'm sorry if those questions are harsh, it's just that Ashes is supposed to be a new kind of RTS pushing the technology....you're doing all kinds of new exciting stuff like multicore AI, DX12, ...but a multiplayer lobby system is beyond your capabilities?

The platforms provide the networking services these days.  GOG has theirs. Steam has their own.  Unless we wanted to build out an entire networking infrastructure for this, we can't do it.  Eventually we hope to actually do that but no time soon.

The short answer, unless Valve/GOG  create some sort of shared MP platform, that's the way it is.   

Creating a lobby is easy.  Creating a worldwide internet connection infrastructure is a different thing. Same thing happens on XBOX vs. PS4 games regularly too.

Well I didn't realize that buying the exact same game on the PC on two different retailers is now like buying a PS4 and a Xbox game. Maybe there should be a press release and a warning on the store pages that there is basically Ashes Steam and Ashes Galaxy now and that you have to decide between the two.

 

By the way, have you noticed the irony in splitting your community between retailers and your slogan "Planetary Warfare. On a Massive Scale."? It'd be really funny if it weren't so sad.

Frogboy why would you(the developers) risk splitting the community on what would appears to be a heavily multiplayer game, would it be more advisable to lose some sales by not allowing the game on gog but keeping the game alive longer by having a stronger SINGLE core online community? I as a gamer can not see how this is a good decision for the game and the community at a whole. At the very least it appears like a quick money grab. 

All in all, how does this benefit Ashes of the Singularity? As i can see no real benefit to splitting the multiplayer communities even if it means selling more total games. 

Edit: A possible and simple solution if you do pull support for gog is to offer everyone who wants to switch over a Steam key after they become aware of the multiplayer community issue. That way if they chose to stay its their own decision. 

 

~football13tb

I'm also wondering how you are going to sell the game on other digital retailers and in stores. Which multiplayer platform is going to be the standard one that gets bundled when you buy the game somewhere else? If I buy the game digitally on amazon or physically in a brick store, where is my multiplayer taking place? Whatever your choice, it's going to kill the other one. If every buyer outside of Steam and GoG gets the Steam version, what about those poor folks on GoG? Is GoG going to accept refunds a couple of months after release, because the multiplayer is dead on GoG, but alive on Steam? I mean the game is technically working fine, it's just that there's no one to play with... is Steam going to accept refunds based on that? Is GoG?

 

GoG is going to be pretty dead multiplayer wise regardless if there's no cross contamination between them.  A small fraction of the player base will actually play multiplayer, a small fraction of that will play it regularly, and of that small fraction, a small fraction of those would have the GoG version in the first place.

 

Once word spreads that they wont be able to play hardly anyone, that number will shrink drastically going forward.

Strange is that there already exists technology produced by gog.com that enables crosconection of Steam and gog.com multiplayer. As much as I know a few games already use it.

So I wonder why Stardock does not see Crossplay as an option? It seems to me as if the company is not aware of this option at all.

 

I'd like to know this too. GOG Galaxy is advertised as being Crossplay, meaning it allows GOG players to play with Steam players. It's strange to hear that that's not the case with Ashes. Is there anything preventing this from happening? Does it require extra programming on Stardock's side? I kind of assumed if a game was built into the Galaxy framework that it would automatically work with crossplay.

 

As Murchus stated GOG already provides the functionality to do crossplay between Galaxy and Steam. Rise of Triad (2013) currently does this. So I'm not sure if your just not aware of this or what but you might want to look into it.

Another game that confirmed uses crossplay between gog and Steam is Grand Ages medieval.

 

Which would be very few, even though it would be an option. Most people who use GOG are there because they dislike Steam. Granted GOG doesn't have a strong MP community, which is because GOG never had one before Galaxy. So many who by the game are going to be into it for Single Player. That's mainly how I play an RTS myself. I would rather see the game have a divided MP community than the game be tied to Steam which I will never buy from.

 

 

From the GOG FAQ:

Crossplay-enabled games offer online play between GOG and Steam. Because where you buy your games shouldn't prevent you from playing with friends.

So I'm not entirely sure how you need to do extensive research into multiplayer infrastructure or why Valve/GOG need to create a shared platform - since GOG is already offering crossplay. Do you mean to say that all the crossplay-enabled games on GOG are not using networking services by Valve and GOG, but are all running on their own worldwide multiplayer infrastructure?

 

Based on what the Rise of Triad devs stated, they just had to inject some specific code to do this... it didn't seem like it was something that was overly hard. Wish a Dev would comment on this though.

I personally have no idea.  Obviously if it can be done reasonably easily we'll do it.   We've just gotten the SDK on the GOG stuff recently. 

 

GOG Galaxy cross play requires that everyone everywhere playing multiplayer uses GOG Galaxy's servers. GOG's multiplayer platform is still quite new and cross play has limitations. Player invites between services are not possible for example. Unfortunately it is not suitable for Ashes of the Singularity today. When GOG Galaxy is more mature we will re-evaluate.

I don't understand why both games above have it working and Ashes, that is supposed to be enhancing with new features and to keep a centralized community, can't have cross play.

Did you even tested it to check if it is possible or not, how it will behave on Ashes?

It doesn't make sense to wait Galaxy be more mature when we are talking about a game that just left alpha, right?

 

Not native speaker, sorry if I did sound mean, it was not my purpose.

 

Thanks for the awesome game!

Really sad news for all the Gaming Community, I do hope Stardock will find a way to connect both Services into Ashes and It's Future List of upcoming games.

My perception is that people who buy games on GOG are not especially interested in MP anyway, so no big loss as far as interconnectivity? Am I wrong? Are GOG purchasers going to be interested in ranked MP automatch for Ashes?

There might be a slight trend in that direction but more people will be simply chasing the cheapest price, or like to support GOG, or like the idea of the DRM free game etc., not thinking it will rule them out of MP with the wider community. To split a community for a niche game like this, well, it is not a good thing, there is no two ways about it really. If you have to do it then there should be transparency, large writing over the GOG version letting the potential buyer know how it is so they can make an informed decision. Last time I checked there wasn't anything like that.