Windows 7 and connection issues with GOG servers...

[BenjaminK]

Hello there,

GOG's provides a great service I sure wish more people would use, but it also, obviously, faces issues quite similar to any other online store. I stumbled upon a recent one with its servers regarding Achievements in various games and wanted some advice from Windows 7 or network enthusiasts...

I run a retro-gaming rig from time to time, using a dual boot with Windows 7 x64 and XP x86 in a RAID 1 structure, which has worked very fine for many years, still proves its value regularly and actually has (almost) no issues with GOG Galaxy. I don't use this client a lot - what for ? -, but it is unavoidable in rare cases of games whose Achievements are somehow fun or interesting to chase after.

Problem : apparently, quite recently - I don't know exactly since when -, GOG servers have started refusing to communicate with OSes older than Windows 10 specifically for unlocking Achievements which require non local data - understand not the simple "Has started to play game Y" or "Played game X for 10 hours". I've now experienced this issue with many versions of Galaxy, from the most recent one down to v1.2 - which is, as far as I'm concerned, already enough. All other common functions seem to work as intended, even though I also spotted issue with Cloud Saves - but I don't use those usually. This, anyway, simply means no Achievements at all for older rigs in any game bought through GOG. Nothing dreadful from my perspective, mind you, but I was still a bit startled for not a single post in GOG's forums mentions that change as far as I know... That is, before I wrote a short one about it. I've exchanged with GOG's support to obtain at least a clear, technical and definitive confirmation - apart from the usual "... no longer supported by... may not function correctly on..." (etc.) -, but last emails were pointing in that direction. It still seemed quite a touchy subject : the guy on the other side apparently genuinely didn't consider the possibly of an issue specifically related to older OSes at first, only thought about it after, and then wasn't really allowed or in position to give a precise stand on that matter. All he could say repeatedly was that, as anyone would expect, GOG couldn't guarantee anymore that functions such as Achievements (Cloud Saves, etc.) would work as intended, due to newer connection standards, security protocols and infrastructure updates... So, even though this isn't a huge hassle on my side - it's just about a couple of Achievements... -, I don't know what to think about it and, obviously, can only add that on top of anyone's reasons not to use that kind of launcher.

What's anyone's take on that matter ? Did people already run into that issue ? And is there any common networking method would allow someone to fool GOG's servers into believing that it receives packets from a 10+ rig instead of a Windows 7 one ? Apart from virtualising 7 from a Windows 10+ Hyper-V or VMware machine of course...