2K Finally Shows Up On GOG, X-COM Included

Very late to the party, yesterday 2K finally showed up on GOG.com with a selection of classic games. And what a selection. What on Earth were they waiting for? Anyway, at last you can now get DRM-free working-on-your-PC versions of Freedom Force and its sequel, all the classic X-COMs bundled together, three Railroad Tycoon games, and the awful Sid Meier's Pirates remake. It also suggests the possibility that the GTA games could finally make their way to the store, although not yet.

In the olden days, I used to write a section for a magazine you won't remember called "PC Gamer". It was a strange thing, all papery, and to get to the next article you had to physically drag the pages across - very odd to think about now. The section was They're Back, the awkwardly named budget section that hid at the back of the reviews, and I wrote the blessed thing for a decade. 148 of the blessed things. During that time I covered these games sooooooo many times that I feel like they're old relatives I avoid meeting at Christmas. The idea of having to find a new way to write 280 words on Railroad Tycoon or Freedom Force Vs The Third Reich fills me with dread, hence this blustering anecdote.

But still, it's a long time since I did any of that, and while all these games are already on Steam, the GOG releases are DRM free. The X-COM bundle is the most exciting, I think. There you've got UFO Defense, Terror From The Deep, Apocalypse, Interceptor and Enforcer, all for a teeny $7.45 at the moment. That's £8.99 on Steam. Somewhat less generously, Railroad Tycoon 2 Platinum, Railroad Tycoon 3 and Sid Meier's Railroads are currently $8.65. Both the Freedom Force games are but $3.98, which is about half the price they are on Steam (but when this sale is over looks likely to end up costing more). And then bloody Pirates is half-price at $4.99, but everyone is wrong and it's just a collection of really shitty minigames. (The only time I met Meier was to go see this crap, but he was wearing a lovely jumper and seemed very nice.) Again, when it's full price it'll be the same as it is on Steam.

So yeah, slightly cheaper than Steam if you get them now, possibly about the same if you don't. Still, there are far more of 2K's games over on Valve's shelves for the moment.