GOG digitally signs their games and have no DRM, thus no need for cracks.

If you can get a hold of a GOG version, you can check its validity.

For games outside the GOG ecosystem, they are all unfortunately at risk.

I played Baldur’s Gate 3 via a pirated GOG version on release with friends until I was able to afford my own copy, then moved the saved game over to the legit copy.

Running any binary that you can’t examine the source of (and confirm it was built from it without modification) is risky. It’s mostly a balance of trust and risk. Even developers have been known to insert what we could malware.

That said, if you get your cracked content from a trusted source, I’d say it’s generally safe. Otherwise, exercise extreme caution.

Is GMG an official reseller? Maybe I am out of the loop, but I thought they operated in the grey market.

No.

I pirate everything, but am very very reluctant to do so with software or games.

I only pirate in cases where the company involved is just too gross to support (looking at you, Adobe), or if there’s absolutely no other option.

But I consider pirated software and games absolutely suspect 100% of the time, because I’m old enough to remember when every keygen was also a keylogger, and every crack was also a rootkit and touching any pirated software was going to give you computer herpes without fail.

So maybe it’s not that bad anymore, but I mean, do you fully trust in the morals of someone who would spend the time helping you steal someone else’s shit to not add just one more little thing to it for themselves?

I only trust two things when I pirate games: official GOG installers and FitGirl repacks.

depends on the source, but generally no, run the game in a vm or container