Pay at least $1 and get 4 games
Making History: The Calm & the Storm (Steam Key)
Beat Hazard (DRM Free)
Razor2: Hidden Skies (Steam Key)
Ironclads Collection (5 Games) (Steam Key)
Pay more than $3.99 and get 8 games
Space Empires 4 Deluxe (Steam Key)
Battle Mages (DRM Free)
World Rally Championship Racing (DRM Free)
Bad Rats: Rats Revenge (Steam Key)
Pay more than $5.99 and get 12 games plus "For everyone who pays more than the average number 2: Awesome indie music and extra goodies unlock in the second week!"
Disciples II: Rise of the Elves (Steam Key)
Puzzle Kingdoms (Steam Key)
Ninja Blade (DRM Free)
SBK X: Superbike World Championship (DRM Free)
You get to chose to split your purchase across the following.
Developers
Gala Tip
Able Gamers (Charity)
Help Emilia (Charity)
This time INDIEGALA has decided to support victims of the earthquake which damaged Emilia Romagna region of Italy.
For this reason part of charity share can be donated to sustain Croce Rossa Italiana (CRI) in its fundraising for Emilia Romagna.
The other part will be given away for another important mission: supporting AbleGamers http://www.ablegamers.com/ a foundation dedicated to bring greater accessibility in the digital entertainment space so that people with disabilities can gain a greater quality of life, and develop a rich social life that gaming can bring.
Is it WRC, SBK or something else? The first two didn't seemed so great to me to be honest... Well, what else could I have expected from those type of fundraisers...
What can you say about Making History and Space Empires 4 - are those games worth to be interested?
If it were in the $1 section I'd have bought this bundle just for the lols of playing Bad Rats but $4+, no way. I also don't like how their tiers work with it requiring such a disproportionate amount for the music I just don't bother instead (same as the first 2 bundles were good on the music front).
Apparently this bundle they might make gala points actually do something.
The Making History version included in this has a pretty severe memory leak, rather than continue patching it they released a separate Gold Edition (not on Steam, only Impulse/retail last I knew) that included a ton of fixes, including for the memory leak, along with other updates to all sorts of things.
Then they stopped updating the Gold Edition and released a Making History II with new updates and stuff.
In both instances some of the things that were supposed to come to the previous version only wound up in the "new release" which is more or less still the original game but tweaked and updated. They have continued patching II however as it's what the original game was supposed to wind up being.
That said, it's not the worst strategy game in the world, especially for a dollar. Though it is very easily exploited, and has that memory leak, in this version.
Could it be that the bundle-makers are simply running out of good indie games to pack in?
Conversely, could it be that 2009-2010 was a short-lived "golden age" for indie development, where digital distribution was finally coming into its own through services like Steam, GOG and Desura, and small teams could finally self publish their own projects without the invisible, yet suffocating and censorious hand of Big Pubs getting in the way, leading to classics like Super Meat Boy, Braid, VVVVVV, Frozen Synapse, Spacechem, Killing Floor, Terraria, and the like getting the attention they deserved? And that, by putting lots of such awesome games into online bundles with the promise/option of paying whatever you want for these awesome games AND some of that going to worthy causes, the likes of the Humble boys and the Indie Gala crew both set themselves up with an unsustainable business model and blew their figurative load too soon?
Now, I'm not going to say that indie devs aren't making awesome games at this minute, because a quick browse of Rock Paper Shotgun will tell you that that's a dirty lie. But these games take time to make, self-publish and, in many cases, self-advertise. When the Humble Indie Bundle first started, there were a ton of great indie games to choose from, and many indie devs eager to donate their games to "charity", as it were, for the added publicity and internet cred (oh, and their small cut). However, as time goes on, the supply of great/good indie games that haven't been bundled before/elsewhere gets smaller and shallower; that's why we're seeing just plain bad games (Bad Rats), repeats from other bundles (Beat Hazard was in a previous Humble Bundle, wasn't it?) and non-indie games (Ninja Blade, WRC, SBK X, Disciples 2!) start to appear in these bundles, especially this new Indie Gala one.
Also, we're seeing ever more consumer-unfriendly pricing structures being imposed upon bundles as the companies realised that their "pay what you want" systems were becoming unsustainable, like the tiered approach of the Indie Gala V, which is substantially less generous than previous Gala bundles, or the "raise $xxxxx, unlock goodies" system employed by the Groupies bundle, or, far less egregiously, the Royale method of "pay above $xx, unlock extra stuff". One gets the feeling that these bundles are either finding it tough to continue, or trying out new ways to fleece customers for all they're wor--um, I mean, of "monetizing" their products for maximum ROI.
Essentially, the days of great charity bundles may be over...for now. What do you guys think?
inb4 "We think you should've made a new thread for this"
...anyone got a spare Ninja Blade they could send me, if possible?
Well, I bought the $6 one because I was half tempted by the £3 deals on Gamersgate for WRC and SBK X anyway. I have Disciples 2 twice now until I use the free £3 of credit, and a free key of Puzzle Kingdoms if anyone wants it.
No steam key for Ninja Blade? That's the only game I'm remotely interested in, and I hate to be that guy, but I probably won't get it if it can't be activated on steam.
I don't know how a bundle containing Disciples II and Space Empires IV can be a bad bundle to anyone. Those are hundreds of hours of great gameplay alone.
bought, 10 Bucks for about 5 games I'll probably actually play and the indie music, which has been awesome in every Indie Gala pack up to now. Thanks for the heads-up!
I'm not sure why people are saying this is the "worst bundle ever". I mean sure, some of the games aren't indie, and it does have Bad Rats in there... but it also has Ninja Blade, WRC 2010 which was actually very good, and one of the recent SBK games, plus lots of other games, for $6 / £4.
I've never heard of Bad Rats before. Checked out Youtube videos and this was the description on the official video uploaded by the devs.
Computer game Bad Rats: The Rats' Revenge, by Invent4 Entertainment.
Physics puzzle game, where Rats have Cats prisoner, and are ready for revenge.
The game presents comic cartoon violence, and cartoon blood.
Laughters are surely included when playing, with all humor that the game presents.
I don't think it's the worst bundle ever at all, especially after some recent ones. It's actually fairly appealing. The current Indie Fack Kick looks way worse than this. I do wish there were more Steam keys provided though, especially since they divide the two more appealing DRM free games into parts.
