The interesting tidbit being: "We're initially going to be launching our Linux support on GOG.com with the full GOG.com treatment for Ubuntu and Mint."
> This is, of course, going to include games that we sell which already have Linux clients, but we'll also be bringing Linux gamers a variety of classics that are, for the first time, officially supported and maintained by a storefront like ours.
Even if this is via e.g. dosemu, it'd still be offering something new compared to storefronts that already have Linux support.
However, there are a lot of games where it feels like they should work on linux, but they just don't. For instance, Interstate76 runs fine in PlayOnLinux, but Interstate82 doesn't. There are probably a bunch of those games where the GOG team is in a position to make it work under linux whereas we users alone can't.
I'm excited. Even if they'll just push the games that already run through PlayOnLinux, official support and the publicity are both worth it.
Yeah but for those that have no native linux clients that's not an officially supported way to play them, neither from GOG nor from other retailers.
The reason it matters is not for people like the typical HN user but for, say, my dad which is now using a linux laptop and plays some GOG games on it from "his past" but isn't technical enough to know how to fix it when there is a slight unimportant mis-configuration. If I wasn't there, he wouldn't be able to.
Game only works on a particular version of Wine? No problem, POL will install that specific Wine version for this game without any adverse effect on the other games.