GOG Galaxy For Mac

Most of you have probably heard of GOG Galaxy, the DRM-free game distribution platform and launcher that serves as an alternative to the very much DRM-reliant Steam, Origin, Uplay, and the more recent Epic. Well, the long-expected 2.0 version is finally out of Closed Beta, and it may just change how you manage and play all your games, not just the ones purchased through GOG.

GOG Galaxy 2.0 was designed to allow users to bring together games and friends from all distribution platforms under one roof. Not only can you launch and organize them more easily, but the client can even track playtime and achievements across all supported platforms.

Unless you were a big fan of GOG Galaxy before, your library may be quite modest after first installing the client. Thankfully, importing your games from Steam, Origin, and other platforms is a piece of cake. Just log in to each of them, give GOG the necessary permissions, and you're good to go.

While the games will, of course, be run through their respective platforms, you can launch them directly from GOG Galaxy. The big advantage is that you can see and organize all of them from one UI, making it much easier to keep track of everything.

The app can track total playtime for all your games, and existing statistics are imported from other platforms. You also don't have to worry about missing various achievements if you launch a game through GOG, as they are completed normally.

One big drawback of using multiple game launchers is that your friends are scattered across multiple lists. With GOG Galaxy 2.0, you can see who is online on any platform, and soon you will be able to chat with them as well.

As far as managing your games is concerned, you have quite a few tools at your disposal for keeping everything in order. You can tag games, naturally, and tags can even be imported from other platforms.

On top of that, you can change each game's information, title image, background, and icon. While not everything can be modified yet, it's good to see that you will be able to make your library your own.

You can switch between multiple viewing modes, specify what information should be displayed for each title, as well as sort, group and filter your game in various ways.

Those who took part in the Closed Beta know that GOG Galaxy has evolved a lot over the past few months, and there is still a lot more work to be done until we get a complete, stable release. Many features are missing, and bugs are fairly common.

For instance, in my case, the app was unable to import friend activity and sometimes failed to show when they were online. These issues will no doubt be resolved soon, but keep in mind that not everything is going to work perfectly for a while.

GOG Galaxy 2.0 takes a big step towards unifying all your games into one library, no matter where you bought them from or where you play them. It supports most popular platforms, and additional integrations can be added by the community.

It still needs some work, but given that distribution platforms seem to be popping up everywhere, a launcher that can bring all your games together will become invaluable in the future.