Wow, sorry on the late response on these!
If the new AI War expansion has no key, does that mean it won't be downloadable in a demo/pay to fully unlock form from the Arcen website like the rest of AI War?
This will be downloadable in a demo format on the Arcen website, BUT that demo version can't be unlocked into the full version of the game (unlike the rest of the AI War stuff, you're correct). You'll have to have the full version download separately from the Arcen store (or another store).
Eh? Just not clear what you mean on this. As far as no longer having CD keys, that was our decision, not Valve's. It was partly made to increase convenience with customers, and partly to open up a partnership with Gog.com
Does that mean we can expect Skyward Collapse on GOG soon?
Possibly! Right now the trouble is the fact that Skyward is going to be having expansion packs, and that's not something that Gog.com typically allows. They are considering things, and right now I don't know how that will play out. I know that some of the Gog.com audience is ideologically opposed to the idea of DLC content. And really I am too when it comes to things like horse armor or the F2P model. I don't think those things are good.
But I just absolutely love expansions, both as a player and as a developer, for reasons I've explained at length in the past. The basic points of that being:
- Expansions are awesome because they give more content to the players who are really like the game, without costing the less-intent players more to get the baseline experience.
- Expansions are better than sequels when it comes to strategy games or other games with replay value, because then you get a combined experience with all the content rather than two separate (and thus likely lesser) experiences.
- Expansions are better than sequels when it comes to costs for players and developers. Assuming the expansion has a good value (which you also have to assume about base games for a good comparison, really; there's no difference), then an expansion is cheaper for both parties. The developer isn't expected to reinvent the base part of the game, which makes the whole endeavor cheaper and the savings pass to the player since it's not cool to charge the same for an expansion as the base game itself (unless that is one heck of an expansion with just ginormous amounts of content, I guess).
- Expansions are best when paired with free content, so that players don't feel forced into buying an expansion just to get
any more life out of their base game purchase. But at the same time, expansions provide a much-needed new revenue source for the developer with a given game. In other words, if you like a game but it's not selling like Terraria or some other huge outlier game, the developer likely can't afford to just keep giving you free content for years. But a mix of free content plus the expansions can let a game stay profitable for a developer for years, and thus something that grows and grows and grows for players. In other words, a favorite game of players doesn't just get abandoned after release, which I think we can all agree is frustrating if the game is something we really like.
All that said, at least some of the Gog.com audience lumps expansions into the "this is a bad and unethical practice" bucket along with the horse armor and pay-to-win sort of DLC. I think that's something that has to be overcome carefully, and it may just make Gog.com not feasible for developers who do expansions. We'll see how that shakes out.
My understanding so far has been that Valve is either not doing it, or is too busy to have time to do it.
I bought Skyward Collapse from Green Man Gaming and activated it on Steam using a provided key, so this is clearly not the case.
I meant the cross-key thing. Buy from Arcen-> Activate everywhere. Buying from GMG does provide you with a Steam key (always) so it's not odd you could do that. In fact, that's the intended way.
For players who buy Vengeance of the Machine during the beta, we'll be giving out Steam keys to them -- same as with the Ancient Shadows expansion. Beyond that, there's no cross-registration, no.
