Bloody-Piggy: from your post to STEAM's ears. Couldn't agree more!
Only time will tell how things change. With STEAM and G.O.G. and DOSBox and Virtual PC there may well be another clampdown on AW, as publishers think about publishing all their old product to earn extra cash, and their first step will be to come after AW Sites.
I say all this, by the way, with no axe to grind. As I am a hobbyist, no a past-timer when it comes to PC games. I still have my X-Com's (all of 'em!), I still have my Ultima Undergrounds and Ultima VII's and Pirates and Civilization II (the best!) and Command and Conquer and Fallout 1 and 2 and all the Looking Glass games every released, etc, etc. So I won;t really need G.O.G. that often. Think the forums could be interesteing though. Where I do need AW sites is where patches are difficult to get, so for example, I have the original boxed Darklands by Microporse which is version 1.0 of course, and very buggy. The version available on AW sites is 7.0 with about 5 patches included. This has meant that in my Darkland box I now also have a burnt CD with the 7.0 version on it and that's the version I play.
This is why what Bllod-Piggy said was so important. If nort handled correctly these games will go 'undergoriund' and will be downloaded illegealy again, so that patches and mods can be applied!
Someone needs to start getting all the demo's that were made that had gameplay or no-interactive scrolling, because I think there will be a demand for those in this new world of retro gaming! I know I have the two demo's from Terra Nova: Task Force Centauri, that between them have four new missions not in the original game!
Only time will tell, but with the X-Com series on STEAM and G.O.G. starting up at the end of September, things may never be quite the same again!
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