[Mongoose]

Now that GOG.com has expanded their service to cover more recent (and even brand-new) titles, I've started facing a bit of a dilemma with where to purchase several games.  We all know that GOG is an awesome site, and I fully support the trust they show in their customers by offering DRM-free games with unlimited downloads.  They offer all sorts of fun bonus material with most of their releases, and the price is usually right too.  On the other hand, while Steam does implement DRM, it's probably the most unobtrusive I've ever seen, and the overall integrated client makes it extremely easy to keep your whole game library organized in one place.  I'm also only slightly ashamed to admit that I'm a total achievement whore, so I see Steam offering them with certain titles as a definite bonus, and one that unfortunately can't be resolved just by creating a shortcut in Steam to the GOG purchase.  The crazy part of my brain has even thought about double-dipping on a few titles, until I remember that I don't even have enough spare cash to single-dip on everything that I want.

So have any of you guys run into having to make this choice?  And if so, what did you go with?

(As a side note, the main game that brought this thread to mind was Alan Wake, which everyone and their mother needs to play.  I got a free copy of it with my brother's 360, and I'm planning on buying it for PC too...as soon as I figure out where to buy it...)

[Unknown Target]

I try to buy from GOG whenever I can. I don't like DRM and I like to have full control over my games.

[Scotty]

I honestly prefer Steam.  Then again, I really like Valve, and try to support them wherever I can.

[MP-Ryan]

If price and all other factors are identical, I usually lean to GOG if only to support them.  Usually I buy my games in sales though, which means I buy way more titles on Steam than anywhere else.  Both have their strengths, so it's really nothing more than personal preference.

[deathfun]

I prefer hard copies of my games
There's no new game smell when you download something from Steam or GOG

[Sushi]

I prefer hard copies of my games
There's no new game smell when you download something from Steam or GOG

Also no physical media to store and get scratched, lost, or broken.

[General Battuta]

Buy everything on sale, wherever it's on sale!

[BlueFlames]

If a title that I'm interested in buying is offered on both services, I will get it from GoG.

[LHN91]

Since I A)Care absolutely nothing about achievements and B)Have limited funds, I always buy at whatever is cheapest.

[Fury]

I prefer hard copies of my games
There's no new game smell when you download something from Steam or GOG

Also no physical media to store and get scratched, lost, or broken.

Physical copies usually also come with cd-checks. So you either have to keep the CD in drive when you play, or download a cracked game exe. Both are annoying and stupid. But in the end it comes down to where price is cheapest. At least for now, we finns have an unusual opportunity to buy games tax-free from certain place, it means retail physical copies are cheapest to us.

[Mongoose]

The price is pretty much what it's come down to for me, too, which in most cases means Steam.  GOG has decent half-off publisher sales, but they can't exactly compete with the insanity that is the Steam summer/winter smorgasbords.  There are definitely several GOG exclusives that I still need to buy, though, to say nothing of working through what I already have.

[deathfun]

@Sushi: Quite true unless you're OCD about taking care of your games

[Droid803]

Can't you buy it from GOG then add it in Steam?

[Mongoose]

You can add it via the shortcut thing, which works great for some titles, but not so much for stuff that has achievements in the Steam version.  If you don't care about those, though, then it's good.

[karajorma]

How's about you buy it from GOG and we give you the achievement "Not a DRM Whore!"

[Flipside]

If something was on both, I'd go with GoG, purely for portability.

[Mikes]

GoG hands down.

You order it. You download it. You actually get to keep it.


I do have a lot of Steam games, granted, but if I could have gotten them on GoG instead, I would have.

Steam is still a hassle for me when I want to do some mobile gaming on the notebook or tablet.
I don't want to check that 3G is off so Steam doesn t ruin my data plan by downloading gigabytes of updates....
I don't want to mess with WLAN because it's still connected to some hotspot on the train (without internet access) and Steam just doesn't get it.
I don't want to deal with the hassle that is steam offline mode at all. Heck... I don't want to start up another program... especially not a bloated ressource hog like steam that takes ages to start on a tablet with a weak CPU.

When I want to play a game on the train or the bus... I want to click it and play it.... GoG allows me to do that. Steam does not.

[Dragon]

I use whatever is cheaper. Both are good, and both offer decent prices. Also, both occasionally practically give games away, and that's what I like in such services. Yes, I'm a cheapskate.

[G0atmaster]

In terms of game ownership, I prefer GoG because, on my archaic system, having Steam run in the background squanders resources, and at times when Steam can't even get to offline mode, I can't play any of my games on it.  That said, I like to spread things around a bit, that way if one service goes belly-up, I don't lose 100% of my library.

[Akalabeth Angel]

You can also get newer games from Gamer's Gate apparently, and from what I understand that doesn't include a middle-man client like steam:

http://www.gamersgate.com/

Never used the service myself only heard about it