Happy people like Raider (go do a search for him, heh) have proven that not making people pay to unlock GliDOS will cause people to, uh, not pay. While I can understand your point-of-view, the fact is that Paul deserves some retribution for the difficult task of making GliDOS and without enforcing payment, well, he won't get any money.

Paul has said before that once he loses interest in GliDOS and decides to stop developing it that he will release the program and source without any registration codes required. If he, like, DIES or something, that's okay too (well, you know what I mean), because I've got the private key generator to unlock it. If we BOTH die, I guess you're screwed. But the probability of that happening is, uh, extremely improbable. (No infinite improbability drives are allowed to be used in this forum for the sake of my and Paul's health. Thank you.)

You don't need to re-register the program every time you install it -- only if your hardware/operating system changes will you need to get a new code.

There isn't really a monopoly here, since you're perfectly welcome to go out and purchase an old Voodoo card. You're also welcome to write your own equivilant program. Paul won't hate you for it. We won't hate you for it. And we won't try to drive you away. So, really, it's not a monopoly, unless you consider the niche market for DOS-Glide-to-OpenGL-wrappers something that is large enough to be monopolised. Besides, if Eidos decided to re-release TR1 with OpenGL support, would you rather pay another $40, or $10 for a program that does (virtually) the same thing?

I agree that it is an unfortunate fact that Paul has to mandate registration to play without a nice spinning "GLIDOS" logo, but if he didn't, as has been shown time and time again, nobody would give him any money. At all.

Oh, and, all, don't start the troll train. I must point out that Dan T has taken a much different approach than Raider did. (He's not asking for a license. He's just asking about the whole $10 surcharge thing.)

By the way, Dan T, have you donated to VOGONS lately? 😉 😉

Originally posted by Snover
Paul has said before that once he loses interest in GliDOS and decides to stop developing it that he will release the program and source without any registration codes required. If he, like, DIES or something, that's okay too (well, you know what I mean), because I've got the private key generator to unlock it. If we BOTH die, I guess you're screwed. But the probability of that happening is, uh, extremely improbable. (No infinite improbability drives are allowed to be used in this forum for the sake of my and Paul's health. Thank you.)

hahahahahhahahahahahahahahhahahahahaha,
Pause
BWAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHHA!

😀

Thanks Snover, you've put my mind at ease about the registration at least.

I still feel that $10 is an excessive price for Glidos though. Sure it may have been tricky to program and is able to bring back some nice graphics to some great old games, but its those old games that hold the majority of worth and value. not to sound too harsh but in a sense Glidos is freeloading off the back of these games popularity, since the effort it took to make Glidos would surely be far less than to make the original games. I might be being a bit picky here but prehaps Paul should be thinking of donating a percentage of Glidos earnings to the original game developers? I would say at least though that $2-5 is a more reasonable price range for Glidos.

I have now decided to bite the bullet and pay the money, but won't pretend to be very happy about it. As Snover points out Vogons is a worthy cause too, and I agree, so i've made a donation for that too. Vogons has bandwidth overheads and so forth to pay for, and it provides a valuble resource for great number of users completely free of charge. Personally I would consider it a much more worthy cause, and I'm happy to donate money to it.

Dan

Dan T wrote:

Is it right to charge to use Glidos?

This question has been on my mind for the past couple of days, and for some reason it won't go away. Personally I have a big problem with it... but I'm not entierly sure i can explain why! I'd like to hear what others in the community think about it, perhaps I and others like me can be persuaded that its right?

A point very reasonably stated, so deserves a reply (Thanks to Snover for already putting a lot of good points).

I know some people will say "its only , quit whining and pay up!", but its not just the money that troubles me. Like most people here i can afford for a program, but to me theres a principle at stake too. Does the program really justify such a fee? or is it exploiting a monopoly in the market?

Generally (not always of course) you have to pay enough for software to make it worth someone's while to develop it. In Glidos's case, you are paying nowhere near that amount. I make a loss on Glidos... well, that depends on how you look at it.

One way to look at it: because of the way I work (as a contractor paid by the hour and free to work any time of day), all the time I spend on Glidos is time when I could be earning my usual hourly rate. Looking at it that way, Glidos loses me money big time. From a business point of view, I really ought to give it up.

The other way to look at it though is, sad person that I am, its my hobby. So making a little income from my hobby is rather good, so I'm not complaining.

If you look at other communities such as the emulation scene, some programmers put a great deal of time and effort in to creating emulators, the vast majority get of whom nothing other than a few donations for their efforts.

I don't know what you do for a living, but there may well be people that do voluntry work of the type you do. I don't think that would stop you taking your paycheck.

Anyway a lot of these people that develop free software are at a stage in their lives when they have plenty of time and few responsibilities, and what they do probably cuts off income from exactly the type of people they will be in ten years time. Not that I'm against it. I think each person has the right to do what they like with their hardwork. But I can't see that anyone in particular has the moral high ground.

If they decided to charge for their efforts the communities would pretty much not exist as the price tags would quickly add up for the users.

Certainly people who develop software for free are contributing a lot to the users of their software. I use ePSXe and love it.

I think you are probably wrong about the communities not existing if the developers charged. I mean the game-playing community exists and game writers charge.

Crackers would have a field day though (so long as they didn't start charging!:D). The copy protection system is an issue for […]
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Crackers would have a field day though (so long as they didn't start charging!:D).

The copy protection system is an issue for me too. Am I to understand that I would have to re-register the program with Paul every time I install it? What happens if he stops supporting the program, and what incentive will he have to continue honouring the re-regestering agreement in the future? In a few years time I might decide to dust off my old copy of TR (quite likely 😀) only to find Paul has dissapeard from the Glidos scene and I can no longer get the program re-registered?

An important point. As Snover says, you pay once, but you do have to get new codes at times. I think one day, looking after the unlock procedure is going to get to be too much of a pain, but if do I will release a free version.

I want to emphasise that i'm not having a go at Paul. I still respect his right to charge for his efforts, but I do hope I can […]
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I want to emphasise that i'm not having a go at Paul. I still respect his right to charge for his efforts, but I do hope I can stir up some debate on this topic and perhaps he can be persuaded to re-consider his position on this issue.

Dan

Absolutely fine. The spirit of your question was very clear.

I will say though: I think the bottom line is that its my hard work and lost time so I should have the right to distribute it or not, charge for it or not, whatever.

Dan T wrote:

Thanks Snover, you've put my mind at ease about the registration at least.

I still feel that is an excessive price for Glidos though. Sure it may have been tricky to program and is able to bring back some nice graphics to some great old games, but its those old games that hold the majority of worth and value. not to sound too harsh but in a sense Glidos is freeloading off the back of these games popularity, since the effort it took to make Glidos would surely be far less than to make the original games.

Half right. I wouldn't say I'm free loading off anybody's back. Unless you think nVidea are free loading off game-writers backs when they sell graphics cards. Or is it the game-writers that are
freeloading off of graphic card manufacturer's backs. Looks to me like a symbiotic relationship to me.

You are right to say there is a lot less work involved in Glidos than eny of the games it supports. But then it hasn't got the market the games have. If you put together the amount of work with the small market then Glidos is cheap. I should charge about 0 for it. Then it would pay for the time I put into it... maybe (if the same number of people bought it, which of course they wouldn't).

I might be being a bit picky here but prehaps Paul should be thinking of donating a percentage of Glidos earnings to the original game developers? I would say at least though that -5 is a more reasonable price range for Glidos.

A lot of people think its the other way around. The game developers should pay me because I've saved them the trouble of updating their games to run on modern operating systems. The developers aren't intereted in bringing their games up to date because they know that there's no money in it. They have to think like that because they are employing people, a big responsibility, so we shouldn't knock them for it.

I may in some case have given their games a new lease of life, so they might get a bit of extra income. In any case, they've already had their money from these games and plenty of it. It me who is getting relatively little back for my efforts (though obviously a lot more that those that give their software away).

One other thing worth mentioning. Game developers are against things like Glidos. They want you to spend as much time as possible playing their latest games, not wasting time on they old ones, especially if it means you can wait to buy their new ones until the price has dropped.

I have now decided to bite the bullet and pay the money, but won't pretend to be very happy about it.

You shouldn't be unhappy. I'm not ripping you off, and its obviously worth to you.

As Snover points out Vogons is a worthy cause too, and I agree, so i've made a donation for that too.
Dan

Good man. Just shows there are a few people who will support a good cause without their arm being twisted.

Hello,
I've just find and installed Glidos - I'm glad with the possibility
to play TR1 again. I'd purchase Glidos (to vanish the spinning
logo) but PayPal does not support my country (Hungary). 😢 Is
there any other way to pay for this software?
Thank You for help, in advance

The other way I've had some people use is to send a 10 UK pound note by post.

Would be great - how could I acquire the address money should be sent to? Shall I register to this forum and will I be informed by e-mail?

Yeah, or just email me using the contact email on the web site.

Hi, a newbie here, just thought I'd put in my $0.02!

Personally, I don't think Paul should charge $10, he should probably charge $20 or more, either that or release it for free and don't support it at all. The problem is, it's more than the time spent understanding how to wrap each individual game engine. It's also the time setting up a very nice web site, responding to forum questions and requests, setting up a payment system and reg code generator, replying to payment problems and the list goes on. If you count all that time (or even if you don't) he is losing out big time. If he didn't charge for it and just released it as is, when is, didn't respond to questions or change requests, no web site, etc. you probably would not even know about this program and wouldn't be asking about the $10 today.

Go ahead and count all the game emu projects out there where the developer lost interest due to whining (and sometimes downright nasty) freeloading users. It's an old psychology experiment, if you give something to people for free, they think it's worthless, if you charge them for it, their attitude changes completely. If Paul has at least some small financial incentive to keep him going I think there is a much greater chance of it being continued, more games added, etc.

My opinion: Paul can charge what he wants for Glidos as it is his work. I have not (yet) made the purchase, but the demo shows me it is far more stable and easy to use than the other Glide wrappers I've tried.
The reason I'm replying is this: you say that it is the old games and not the graphics Glidos provides that holds the appeal. If that is true there's always the option to play the game in software mode.
Obviously, Glidos pretty graphics do hold some appeal. It's up to the player to decide if they are worth the $$$.

First off, hello to the forum.

Now, godamnit!, Glidos is foocken cheap, cheaper than a 50yo whore with chipped nails, pricing such a nice app under that would be an utter crime, just to not mention how ridiculous....2$?!, that's more of a "representative" value rather than a real cosr for a thing.

I'm all a for freeware Glidos though, while I can afford it (who can't anyways?), I have no credit, no bank account, absolutely no nothing at all, just cash, plus I can't even get my hands onto a single $ with cos my country is currently being assaulted by some mercyless assain communist gang, hence any hope of trading a few local coins vanishes as days pass. Of course, that could only apply in case you'd accept payments via Western Union, which's unlikely...

All of your work and efforts are keenly appreciated. If you ever consider language tranlation packs for Glidos, let me know it, I might help for an unlock code 😁

I have recently downloaded Glidos 1.30, to play Tomb Raider, and after a few problems that I have now resolved I decided to pay the $10 to Glidos, everybody has to decide whether this is right for them or not, it is your choice, nobody is falsing you to do it. For me personally it is worth the money, I am now able to enjoy playing a game which was unplayable before. Thank you Paul.

I paid the $10 for the unlock codes just a couple of months ago, but I regret having registered Glidos, because Paul has dropped Win9x support. Now my license is useless for newer versions of the software, and as I said before, it's been only TWO MONTHS since I purchased it, and I'm already an unsupported user. This is not the kind of support that deserves to be paid for.

No, IMHO, it isn't worth the money.

I haven't dropped W98 support. I'm just delayed by ATI taking their time in supporting W98 on the X800. The v1.30 changes were problems specific to XP anyway. W98 support will be back.

Glidos wrote:

I haven't dropped W98 support. I'm just delayed by ATI taking their time in supporting W98 on the X800. The v1.30 changes were problems specific to XP anyway. W98 support will be back.

Ok, that sounds better. But, if I don't misunderstand, you mean that only X800 series were having trouble with Win9x and Glidos. I'm using mainly Nvidia cards (GF4 on primary comp, GFDDR on secondary), so ATI issues should not affect me. Well, it's just I was a bit annoyed with the more and more programs that are dropping their Win9x support. Sorry for the paranoid ranting.

There was a problem with XP and ATI. The correction was to change the whole threading structure of the program - surprisingly easy as it happened. But the change required some extra work specific to W98, and I didn't want to so that part until I could test it. I think the change is an overall improvement, so it'll be nice when I have W98 working again, but I doubt any difference will be noticable.

are you sure that ATI will release any nonNT drivers for their new products? you should'nt hold your breath 🙁

They have now. I just need to find the time to finish it off. I don't feel any great rush, because there is nothing in v1.30 that is any advantage under W98, so its not asthough some users are missing out on stuff.