'Steam is winning with its ease of use,' GOG's new owner says, but he's not interested in picking a fight: 'I think much can be done in GOG without losing its core values and the way it operates'

CD Projekt wrapped up 2025 by selling off GOG, its famously DRM-free digital storefront, to Michal Kiciński , a co-founder of both CD Projekt and GOG. In the years since it launched, GOG has expanded beyond 'good old games' to carry a selection of newer releases, but it remains relatively niche, and has never been a big moneymaker for CD Projekt.

But in a new interview with GamesIndustry, Kiciński and GOG managing director Maciej Gołębiewski said there's room for it to flourish and find success, even in a marketplace so utterly dominated by Steam.

The core of the strategy seems simple enough: Throwing hands with Steam is a bad idea, so don't do it.

"Steam is obviously a Goliath," said Gołębiewski. "So for any company to try to tackle Steam is a very hard battle. We've seen Discord launch their store, we've seen Epic Games launch their store—and thanks to the lawsuit with Apple, we know how much it has cost them to launch this battle against Steam.

"So the fact that GOG is expanding, developing, and still kicking, I think it's a testament to the fact that GOG really has its space on the market with its mission of making games live forever."

Gołębiewski said Steam is "doing an awesome job," but it also has different values than GOG: "Certainly we can do more for classic retro and modern classics in terms of accessibility, in terms of discoverability." And while GOG is expanding the number of new game releases it carries, something Gołębiewski attributed in part to "more and more independent studios that are willing to work with independent stores," it's not going to try to beat Steam at that game.

"GOG has its own strengths and really should focus on maintaining them and even strengthening them," Kiciński said. "There is no need to try to be like the others. GOG has its own identity and its own uniqueness, which is very much appreciated by gamers."

GOG is also a "very curated platform," he said, while Steam obviously is not. "This is, I think, one of our strengths: we don't release hundreds of games daily, 95% of which are really not super high quality."

There is at least one area where Kiciński thinks GOG could be more Steam-like, though: "Steam is winning with its ease of use. In that regard, I think much can be done in GOG without losing its core values and the way it operates in general."

I think that's true to an extent, although my feeling is that what might be seen as "ease" is merely ubiquity: Steam's been around forever and everyone uses it, so the Steam way of doing things naturally appears, well, natural. I would argue that GOG's barebones 'download, install, play' approach is the true ease of use, but I know that's not really how things are done these days—GOG's Galaxy client brings a lot of functionality to the table, it's not the most intuitive piece of software ever put together. Coming at it from that direction, a little more user-friendliness probably isn't a bad idea.

One thing that won't be changing under the new ownership is GOG's foundational principle: no DRM. "This is a core value of GOG, and there's no signs that it might die in any visible future," Kiciński said. "This is not only an ethical value, but it's also very pragmatic. It helps people to enjoy games no matter what happens with the software provided by the platform or what internet connection they have."