it has nothing to do about for when the games have made, but what OS people are using today. according to latest Steam Hardware survey, XP users accounts for 0.21% of the users now.

XP is quickly becoming an OS only retro gamers are using. A vast majority of computer users are on newer OS versions, so it's not really surprising that GOG will be phasing an OS MS isn't supporting anymore out of their store as well.

I'd sooner subject myself to Linux than deal with Windows XP again. Mostly from a design language standpoint, as XP was before the era of dark themes, whereas I can GTK my way to victory any way I want in Linux.

That, and I'm less likely to pull out my hair trying to figure out what Visual C++ version this program needs.

Too often people seem to pair being against DRM with being a Luddite. XP isn't even supported my its maker anymore, let alone others.

This is correct, not to mention newer games requiring newer libraries to begin with. For example, I'd expect no Vulkan game to run on Windows XP, or more sensibly, I'd expect a hard cutoff for say, a Visual C redistributor.

OK, guys, let's look at it.

Five years ago I see GOG and I say to myself - Wow, cool, these guys sell old games digitally, and with tuned-up DOSBox, so I can replay all those good old games I had on CDs long long ago when the grass was greener and the girls were thinner. And I don't need need to mess up with torrents, emulators and stuff.

I buy more than 500 games, mostly DOS-era and up to XP-era. I have a desktop with Win7 and a desktop with XP. The former is for the family things (watching movies, cartoons, online surfing and shopping and whatever), the latter is just for me, it has no Internet and it's destined to run those good old games flawlessly and perfectly.

And more, I think to myself - Wow, cool, this site is not only the buying place, it's also a cloud-storing place. I still back up some games but not everyone.

And NOW, some very very bad guys (not from GOG, I believe, those from THAT GOG were kind and old-school fashioned) tell me - Hey, you, we don't support your dinosaur OS anymore, and we can't give you a guarantee that your games (installers) stored here will be untouched or unmodified. Just burn your stupid XP to ashes and get a Win7 PC.

I say - gentlemen, I DO have a Win7 PC, but I want to keep my XP running just because games I bought from you run much better on it than on Win7.

But no one cares. So, the question is what all my purchases were for? I have no reliable storing place for my purchased games anymore, and I have no assurance these games will run at all on OS they were destined to run anymore.

Why should I spend my money at all for games I had already bought once, on CDs, and now having NO pluses of having them bought for the second time here? My duty for developers was done long ago. All these games are on torrents and thematical fan sites aplenty. Now I just throw my money to GOG, having NO real reciprocal benefits.

Now I'm said to try to run my purchased games on OS that is much worse adapted for 'em (and is much worse in principle) but is supported by gentlemen that sold me all these games.

Why should I care for these gentlemen's business when they don't care about mine? Where is the guarantee that in five years these gentlemen won't come to me saying - Hey, you, we don't support your stupid Win7 anymore, get Win12 instead!

short answer, you shouldn't. Find a store that fits your needs, and go there. If they don't care about you, then, indeed, you should also not care about them and take your business elsewhere

Likewise. you will never have any guarantee that anything will work in the future, because no none knows what the future holds. It's a bit like me ranting that gOg dont support AmigaOS.

(but good luck finding anyone support a dead OS these days...)

Indeed. But these gentlemen make very serious money. No one asks 'em to test every NEW installer on machine with XP. I just say they could buy a damned 16Tb hard disk to store XP-friendly and XP-tested installers for hundreds of old games they sold to me and to thousands of other old-school gamers. Ah, but it's such an "inconvenience" - to bear responsibility for what you sell to people... One fine day, the wind will blow from another side, and - pooof, "no one knows what the future holds, sorry, but nothing personal".

no, because it is not that simple.

XP installers then still needs to be made future proof, any updates have to be done to the new installers as well, increasing the amount of work hours. They then needs to be tested, again work hours. Any new old games needs to be made available in XP and non-dead OS's, again with testing increased work hours. Not to mention that it is not only about "getting one 16 TB hard disk" (this is what you need t do to have backups), but they need backups of these files and they need bandwidth. In addition, if a store sell it they need to support it, which again is potential increased cost.

You then also set a presidency for those who want the games on Windows 3.1, or 95 and so on - why should they support your dead OS and not theirs?

All this for about 0.2% of the customer base, is illogical and do not make any sense

No, I say only about old games they sold before they stopped to support XP. What said is done, so don't support it anymore, blaze away. I just can stop to buy XP-era games here, that's all. But do keep support (store) XP-installers for games you sold while you were supporting XP.

So I would be sure that I'll get XP-friendly installer for, say, M.A.X. or Age of Wonders or whatever old game, that they introduced into their catalogue in times they were supporting XP and that was sold in that times to thousands of people.

and from all my post... that was the only thing you picked out... which means the rest stands, I suppose.

And if gOg do this, as you say here, the next thread we will see on gOg is "Games where gOg threads XP customers as second class citizens" - which is worse PR than a thread like this. Because that one would be logical in relation to what gOg then offer, while a thread like this is a minority rant.

Well, I think the worst possible PR is to change the terms on which you sell stuff to people, more exactly - the terms that concerns stuff you already sold to people.

Now the situation is that stuff I've bought changed its essential qualities. Now, when I download the game I've bought 3 years ago, I risk to get the broken game, just because they changed something in their installers. But wait - I paid not only for the game itself, I paid also for the option to store what I bought, on GOG servers, isn't it? So where is my forfeit? ;)

Support does have some older installers, so if you find yourself needing one, contact them and see if they can help you.
Either way, I would suggest that if you need specific installers, backup said specific installers.

aye, you bought an XP version, and gOg gave you an XP version. When you bought it it was your responsibility what to do with it.

That you did not take care of this is not gOg's fault. It is their right to do what they want with with their files on their end, and they never promised you future proofing. All this is in the ToS, that you agreed to when you did the purchase, by the way.

You didn't.
You bought 2 things.
First one is a license to the game. You can now play this game, assuming you have the required files.
Second one is access to GOG's current files for said game. Said files may or may not be updated at any point. Access to said files can also be revoked at any time.

Depending on local laws (and if you truly wish to pursue it, I would suggest asking a proper lawyer about them), the license could mean that you could download the files for said game from the internet, or grab them off a friend. And that is because that is independent of GOG service access.