Posted June 02, 2019
To GOG devs,
TLDR version. You need a chronological list of new releases. Only games, no noise. I am not saying it should be the only thing on the main page, or even the first thing we see, but it does need to be within one interaction (one click, or scrolling down 1 page) from the default view. Either think about your target audience or just trust me on this one.
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Part of the reason I preferred GOG to Steam is that you had less trash to wade through. I don't read gaming magazines anymore. There are no good ones left. I don't have time to monitor dozens of YouTube gaming channels.I listen to audio books instead of podcasts. GOG UI was perfect for me, since it worked as a gaming magazine of its own. I could visit it once a week and look at a manageable, chronological list of new releases. There was no utter garbage there. I would click on anything that looked interesting, read the well-written description and buy it if I liked it.
First, you made this way of using your website inconvenient. Then nearly impossible.
- The chronological list of new releases is now at the bottom of the main page.
- It's "behind" bestselling tab.
- It's polluted by DLCs, soundtracks, light novels, "soon" placeholders and now "collections". Real games constitute the minority of that list.
- Even on the dedicated "new releases" page is full of trash and there is no way to filter things out.
Your main page used to be classy and readable. Right now it has literally the same layout as Steam, but contains less information, more noise and loads several times slower. If you do the exact same stuff Valve does but worse you will go out of business.
It's simple, really. I have money to spend, but I don't have time to wade through trash. I don't care about sales and I am perfectly willing to pay the full price for a game that is worth it. If I can see a list of new releases without trash I will browse it regularly. This significantly increases the probability that I will buy something here. I am not the only one.
---
While I'm here, there is another thing that used to work, but became unusable after the last big redesign. Roughly for the same reasons. The page with highest rated games on the site. It's drowning in items that aren't standalone games and often have very few reviews.
TLDR version. You need a chronological list of new releases. Only games, no noise. I am not saying it should be the only thing on the main page, or even the first thing we see, but it does need to be within one interaction (one click, or scrolling down 1 page) from the default view. Either think about your target audience or just trust me on this one.
---
Part of the reason I preferred GOG to Steam is that you had less trash to wade through. I don't read gaming magazines anymore. There are no good ones left. I don't have time to monitor dozens of YouTube gaming channels.I listen to audio books instead of podcasts. GOG UI was perfect for me, since it worked as a gaming magazine of its own. I could visit it once a week and look at a manageable, chronological list of new releases. There was no utter garbage there. I would click on anything that looked interesting, read the well-written description and buy it if I liked it.
First, you made this way of using your website inconvenient. Then nearly impossible.
- The chronological list of new releases is now at the bottom of the main page.
- It's "behind" bestselling tab.
- It's polluted by DLCs, soundtracks, light novels, "soon" placeholders and now "collections". Real games constitute the minority of that list.
- Even on the dedicated "new releases" page is full of trash and there is no way to filter things out.
Your main page used to be classy and readable. Right now it has literally the same layout as Steam, but contains less information, more noise and loads several times slower. If you do the exact same stuff Valve does but worse you will go out of business.
It's simple, really. I have money to spend, but I don't have time to wade through trash. I don't care about sales and I am perfectly willing to pay the full price for a game that is worth it. If I can see a list of new releases without trash I will browse it regularly. This significantly increases the probability that I will buy something here. I am not the only one.
---
While I'm here, there is another thing that used to work, but became unusable after the last big redesign. Roughly for the same reasons. The page with highest rated games on the site. It's drowning in items that aren't standalone games and often have very few reviews.
Post edited June 02, 2019 by Gambler.224
