The Humble Indie Bundle

supersloshy writes "Last year, 2D Boy, the developers of the popular independent game World of Goo, had a pay-what-you-want birthday sale with curious results. For the next seven days, Wolfire Games is attempting the same kind of sale, but with some new twists. Wolfire Games' Humble Indie Bundle contains five independent games (World of Goo, Aquaria, Gish, Lugaru HD, and Penumbra) with no DRM and they are all cross-platform. In addition to directly supporting the developers of these five games, part of the money also goes to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Child's Play Charity. No matter how much you spend, you also get to choose who your money goes to (charity only, developers only, evenly, or custom)."

Comments

Cross-platform

[by (1706743)]

From TFA:

All of the games work great on Mac, Windows, and Linux. We didn't want to leave anyone out.

No *BSD, but still kinda neat!

Re:Cross-platform

[negRo_slim]

No *BSD, but still kinda neat!

I agree, this is a great and legitimate means of getting people involved with supporting the work of the people who make the medias we know and love.

Re:Cross-platform

[Anonymous Coward]

No *BSD, but still kinda neat!

Kinda neat? Alright, then! I'm glad to see you've been working on your people skills, Theo! Keep it up, and BSD might get a user!

(Lol)

Re:Cross-platform

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree, this is a great and legitimate means of getting people involved with supporting the work of the people who make the medias we know and love.

Information Age economics in action, effin awesome. The customer determines what value the information product has, to them, then pays that amount. This, in my opinion, is the evolution of open market economics in the information age, and is a fine model for other digital industries to follow (rather than shove copyright and IP down " customers' " throats). I've watched them for a couple hours, and seen them gain $20kUS in that time. Go man, GO!

Re:Cross-platform

[spazdor]

Mod parent insightful. I would normally call this flamebait, but in light of the weirdly oblivious GP comment, it hits the nail on the head.

Re:Cross-platform

[Peach Rings]

Seems to me more like a publicity stunt. The reason they're getting $20k USD in a few hours is because news sites like slashdot are advertising them for free, not necessarily because the model is viable.

Don't get me wrong, some of those games (Aquaria!!) are really, really good. But that "information Age economics" stuff, while perfect for indie games, music, and coffee shops, would be grossly inappropriate for a multi-million-dollar big-title release.

Re:Cross-platform

[Daengbo]

Right now, they've only got an average contribution of $7.99, but the total raised is $112K. That's just in a few hours. I know that Lugaru is pretty much a one-man show. (I think they've actually got five official employees.) Anyway, if that $112K is divided evenly -- who knows, right? -- Wolfire Games just made $16K in a few hours. I'm willing to bet that's a record for Lugaru's sales. The business could very well see an extra $100K in sales this week, and get a number of new customers for the devs' upcoming game, Overgrowth.

The point I'm trying to make is -- the average may be low, but they make it up on volume!

Re:Cross-platform

[Peach Rings]

Of course, half of that is going directly to the pockets of unrelated charities. Child's Play has to be the worst charity of all time. Dying children in hospitals, or too poor to afford medical care at all? Buy them video games.

Re:Cross-platform

[True Vox]

Yeah, God (or Science, or Beer, your choice!) forbid that we do something to raise the quality of life for terminally ill children. WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!? Child's Play may or may not be the best, but in my opinion, it's WAY above the worst. They spawned DBfH, FFS!

Re:Cross-platform

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently, the consuming public disagrees with you. I'll wager this is not the first time it's happened.

Re:Cross-platform

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you've got your finances dyslexified. A big-money project would have the resources to finance advertising, be able to get the word out far more easily than an independent can. Small indies have to work very efficiently, with wee budgets, making every expenditure carefully. The big project, with the anticipated large consumer-count, has fewer financial restrictions. This open-market model is entirely appropriate for big-dollar projects; given high popularity, it may even yield greater efficiencies and nets than Big Corp's current models. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's likely not going to be the same profit as a company throttling a consumer's throat, but the model itself is both a functional and relevant evolution of the free market, for big or small, IMO. The great thing, is that it doesn't require government legislation and enforcement.

Re:Cross-platform

[tannnk]

But that "information Age economics" stuff, while perfect for indie games, music, and coffee shops, would be grossly inappropriate for a multi-million-dollar big-title release.

Radiohead seems to disagree with you...

Re:Cross-platform

[PHPfanboy]

Something tells me that you're not using *BSD because of the range of available games.

Re:Cross-platform

[AP31R0N]

Enjoy your self imposed exile.

Re:Cross-platform

[h4rr4r]

DIAF you stupid fucking piece of shit.

Child's Play makes chemo not so fucking horrible for kids who are on death's door. What was the last thing you did for a little kid with cancer you retarded son of a bitch?

Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

If the customer's were the selfish Ayn-Randians, they wouldn't earn anything.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[TheKidWho]

Which they shouldn't.

Why release your work for free? Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Yeknomaguh]

Maybe they "shouldn't" but they WILL. I'm sorry your circle-jerk of a philosophy doesn't pan out in the real world, really. You can go cry in the corner with the communists and every other extremist.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[chill]

Not true. Ayn Rand-types won't necessarily pay zero for this. You're assuming they give no thoughts to future desires and only think of immediate costs and instant gratification, and that just isn't true.

The developers get advertising, which they would otherwise have to pay for -- hence a measurable, monetary cost and a selfish desire on their par. Their similar stunt with World of Goo led me to purchase other games they developed because WoG showed me they were delivering quality, entertaining games. I no longer purchase games for any system without trying them out first. I've been burned too many times with over-hyped commercial games that turn out to be shit and a waste of money.

Because *I* want these developers to continue what they are doing -- a selfish desire on my part -- I will pay cash towards that end. Consider it an opportunity to invest in future products by these developers. Speculation in the market, or an investment in future return if you will.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Supporting something you enjoy is acting in your own self interest.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[KDR_11k]

Freedom allows us to fulfill our desires, not just our basic needs. Food and shelter alone are not enough for happiness.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[LighterShadeOfBlack]

Which they shouldn't.

I'm sorry, what? There is no "should" or "shouldn't", there's merely what is. And clearly these people are eating just fine. So anything or anyone that says they shouldn't is plainly wrong. What you fail to grasp is that people are willing to pay something more than they necessarily have to for the knowledge that they are contributing and therefore encouraging future work - both from those particular individuals and others who can see from that example that talent and hard work can be enough to make a living.

In other words, there are plenty of consumers who need only the carrot (the prospect that their payment will be rewarded by production of future works) to pay fairly. Unfortunately most established industries are managed by people who like you who continue to deny what's actually happening with the belief that their philosophy will prove true in the end, and therefore always fall back to the stick method of threatening, DRM-encumbering, and generally treating their (potential) customers like criminals.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Bombcar]

The Dwarf Fortress guy made $16k last month. And his game is donation-only. And the donations aren't required.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[MtHuurne]

Any sufficiently advanced selfishness is indistinguishable from altruism?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[toastar]

Which they shouldn't.

Why release your work for free? Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?

Only if you sell advertising for your free product.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[kainewynd2]

Why release your work for free? Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?

I paid $10 for it... that wasn't free.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Jaysyn]

I wish he'd integrate & improve Stonesense into Dwarf Fortress. Awesome idea, I just can't get into it personally.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

Hey, at least I'd deserve a Flaimbait tag.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

However, there's no guarantee that they'll make future games ...

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Eponymous Coward]

For some of us, programming is about recreation. Slashdot likes car analogies, so how about this: I know people who make money working on cars, and I have friends who do the same thing for themselves on the weekend because they enjoy it.

You know, there are lots of individuals and businesses whose business plan includes giving something away for free. It absolutely does help pay the bills.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

If only they get that kind of money month after month...

2010
April Donations: $16,104.49
March Donations: $4,387.99
February Donations: $1,452.57
January Donations: $2,291.50
2009
December Donations: $4,762.98
November Donations: $5,122.29
October Donations: $1,759.27
September Donations: $2,138.21
August Donations: $2,510.86
July Donations: $2,202.37
June Donations: $2,723.83
May Donations: $2,221.92
April Donations: $2,549.15
March Donations: $2,997.46
February Donations: $1,428.62
January Donations: $2,099.48
2008
December Donations: $5,279.49
November Donations: $1,305.10
October Donations: $1,868.30
September Donations: $1,695.48

source

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Any sufficiently advanced selfishness is indistinguishable from altruism?

_The Origins of Virtue_ is an excellent book on this subject. Turns out the "fuzzy-headed, emotional" choice is often the most correct for survival in a complex society where people will remember you and your actions can have repurcussions beyond the immediate.

(GP is right about what Rand would have said, though Rand's followers at the Rand Institute and friends would likely say the best choice is to be a cheapskate who convinces other people to give the developers cash. But they're a bunch of parasitic assholes.)

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[NikLinna]

That's brilliant! I wish I'd thought of such a pithy way to put it. I usually end up going on about keeping the full context in mind (something Ms. Rand went to some lengths to emphasize, but clearly not enough given how people interpret her work*), what goes around comes around, etc. * Not that she wasn't batshit crazy about some things. Ever read her essay about why a woman should not want to be President?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Maybe. Does the free release of my work gain me notoriety that helps me to make future sales? We're not all short term minimalist thinkers.

And besides, both food and housing are guaranteed to all US citizens.*

* Some restrictions may apply, see county jail for details.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness. Even anonymous donors donate because it makes them feel good.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Nadaka]

He isn't doing so bad. If he fails to pay taxes, he earned more money in those 20 months than my take home pay for my 9 to 5 programming gig.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, don't trash this guy. The post was about different business-models so dragging some economic philosophy in isn't really that trollish.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[biryokumaru]

You know, it's funny that you say that, because all a homeless person really needs to do is heartlessly slaughter and rape a few innocent people and they've got food and shelter for the rest of their lives. I guess no homeless people are short-term, minimalist thinkers either.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

So when EA does overwork their developers, so that they finally burn out, and get cheap new ones, is because they hate games?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[aesiamun]

True but without them life sucks.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Conchobair]

That's all very nice, but when will he be brought up on charges for what happend at Boatmurdered?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

I mean, your 20$ (or whatever amount you choose) will only matter, if others are speculating in the long run as well. If they're in short term returns, they'll pay minimum amount, and the company call still go bankrupt, see tragedy of commons.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

You bastard! You breathe to satisfy your selfish desire to live!

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

You don't want to fail to pay taxes when self employed. The IRS scrutinizes you much more closely.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[PopeRatzo]

Which they shouldn't.

"Shouldn't"?

When you say "Shouldn't" you are making a judgment. You don't say "'won't" or "can't", but "shouldn't".

I'm really interested in hearing you explain your worldview that allows you to judge whether or not these game makers "should" or "should not" earn anything. Please help me here.

Are you saying that they "shouldn't" earn anything because they have decided to deal with their customers on the honor system? Or is it that they "shouldn't" make any money because they don't share your view of the world where only cutthroat business plans are worthy? Maybe you think they "shouldn't" earn anything because they are "small fish" and in a true "free market" the big strong fish must always eat the little weaker fish and if they should succeed it would throw your entire "free market=DRM" philosophy into question.

By saying they "shouldn't earn anything" you are saying that they should somehow be punished for some violation of the Order of Things.

I think your very telling use of the word "shouldn't" says a lot more about you and your own place in the Order of Things than you might care to think.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[kalirion]

But not for long.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[robi2106]

Like every quarter. And you have to pay both sides of the tax equation, employer and employee. Figure on loosing 25% to taxes at a minimum. Probably more like 30%.

Which is why the tax law is hideously complicated; to allow for deductions to help offset their own crushing red tape requirements. It helps a little, but I quit my biz for the regulation reqs (and a down economy).

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Nadaka]

True. Even after taxes, it is likely comparable to the salary he would have earned if he had stayed on at the math department.

And he earned it working on his life goal, crafting video games. Whereas, I spend each and every day having my soul sucked out in a monotonous grind of code reviews and ever shifting and contradicting requirements.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[ooshna]

-1 Troll. No /.er ever uses a car analogy that fits perfectly with their point. Nice try.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Which they shouldn't.

Why release your work for free? Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?

Well, it looks like it is going to this time (latest balance showed $70kUS) . Maybe they are just better at what they do, than you are at what you do? I mean, really, they COULD slap a mandatory price on the product, then alter it over the following months until they found a price point that customers are happy with. Instead, their sales and marketing tactic has just eliminated all that dinking around. But you go ahead and stick with what you're comfortable with, even if the market is leaving you behind. Some people just aren't comfortable floating the risk a market segment demands.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Except when it's about the homeless.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

In most cases, homeless people are not rational thinkers at all. Most homeless people have serious mental illness problems. It's just not hard to acquire housing (at least in this country) if you're mentally whole.

And if they were at all rational, they'd probably realize that the rape and slaughter strategy is not their best option. Grand theft will get them food and shelter for life without the risk of lethal injection or the moral quandaries of rape and murder.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Trepidity]

That's a somewhat different kind of selfishness, though. Rand, being somewhat Nietzschean in orientation (especially early on), isn't a pure hedonist (do what makes you feel good), but feels that some kinds of instincts and desires are "better" than other kinds, and (like Nietzsche) classifies some of the things traditionally thought of as "altruism" as bad ones.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[SETIGuy]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness.

That's some pretty bizarre bullshit. That's right up there with concluding that every human behavior is logical and can always be explained. In aggregate, maybe there is a small tendency for altruism to improve the status of the altruistic. But for individual actions, you could never make that claim that an altruistic person always expects a benefit.

Not to mention that Rand felt that altruism was ethically unsupportable. That claim has led her followers to propose some really zany ideas.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[bazald]

"Unselfish concern for the welfare of others" is always a disguised form of selfishness? A dictionary definition is sufficient to refute your position.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[interkin3tic]

there are plenty of consumers who need only the carrot (the prospect that their payment will be rewarded by production of future works) to pay fairly. Unfortunately most established industries are managed by people who like you who continue to deny what's actually happening with the belief that their philosophy will prove true in the end, and therefore always fall back to the stick method of threatening, DRM-encumbering, and generally treating their (potential) customers like criminals.

To their credit, I, a potential customer, am a criminal (though less in terms of pirating and more in terms of public urination) and I hate carrots.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[morty_vikka]

Have you even read Ayn Rand? She may have been a right-wing cracker, but her utopian hideaways (e.g. in Atlas Shrugged) involved a payment system for hard work. Her little crew of elite businesspeople may have been snobs but they weren't thieves.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

I don't care at all for what Rand felt or thought, she had crazy ideas. But the notion that altruism is just a form of selfishness is straight out of fundamental psychology. Why does any organism engage in any behavior: either shaping by genetics or shaping by environment. Either way, it's the reward based feedback system that creates altruism.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

My point is that altruism doesn't exist in reality, not that the definition is incorrect. All actual instances of something labeled 'altruism' are in fact examples of the positive feedback mechanism of fundamental psychology. There are only two things that shape all behavior: genes and environment. All behavior comes from those two sources. 'Altruism' exists because it gets reinforced, either in genetics or by the environment.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Hal_Porter]

And to be fair you get unlimited slashdot time.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[geekoid]

Yes in fact, it does.

Ann Rand was full of shit. the exact kind of shit the fits well with people just beginning to learn under their own responsibility. i.e. collage.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[geekoid]

Yes, but if there was free public toilet, would you have used it?

How can you hate carrots and their sugar goodness? you're weird.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[geekoid]

If there lucky, it might just get them a free car to sleep in.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[bazald]

Then be more careful about what you say in the future.

Regardless, seeing as you insist on using words like "always" and "all", you're still making life difficult for yourself.

And your new point about genetic and/or environmental reinforcement doesn't seem to have anything to do with the possibility of the existence of altruism unless you intend to deny that we have any responsibility for our actions at all. If I choose to help others at my own expense because of my genes or my background, that doesn't seem to preclude the possibility that my actions are genuinely altruistic.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[h4rr4r]

Indeed you can make quite a wonderful collage out of the chopped up covers of Ayn Rand works.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

But what would you expect to expect to feel if you were altruistic? Bad? No, you would still feel good. In fact, a lot of things make you feel good. The fact that you feel good by charity and the fact that you give to charity rather than, say, feel good by doing something else is, in fact, a perfect example of altruistic behaviour. (liberal use of in fact in this context focuses your brain on ... you guessed it ... the facts)

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[mdielmann]

Wow, that sounds like my proposal that all models of government are equally good in an ideal world. It's just too bad we don't live in an ideal world, although it isn't as dystopian as your statement implies. Any action can be self-serving, that doesn't mean it is. Or are they just lying to themselves and you know better?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Burpmaster]

Ayn Rand-types won't necessarily pay zero for this. You're assuming they give no thoughts to future desires and only think of immediate costs and instant gratification, and that just isn't true.

I don't think that's the assumption. A $30 donation isn't enough to produce future games from these developers. Neither is a $300 donation or $3000. An individual isn't going to have enough money to donate to single-handedly ensure future games from these developers.

A donor has to understand that even though their own individual actions are insignificant, the collective behavior enabled by themselves and others donating small amounts will make a difference. But the defining trait of randites is that they do NOT understand this, because the philosophy is founded on a complete abject failure to understand the commons dilemma.

Therefore, a randite would pay zero.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[chill]

No, never read it. I've read enough about her to agree she was batshit crazy, and egotist of the first order and a major hypocrite on many subjects. I'm not a follower of Rand so much as I'm intrigued about much of her philosophy in Atlas Shrugged.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[chill]

Well, I'll agree that Rand didn't seem to understand the Tragedy of the Commons and many of her direct followers also don't. Again, I'm not so much an acolyte of Rand -- who had many flaws -- as I am intrigued by much of the philosophy of objectivism. Some is wrong, but it has a good base from my perspective.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[PylonHead]

I am here to ask you a question. Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

'No,' says the man in Washington, 'it belongs to the poor.'
'No,' says the man in the Vatican, 'it belongs to God.'
'No,' says the man in Moscow, 'it belongs to everyone.'

I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose...

Rapture.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[chill]

Except that the rules are slightly different in software. Specifically, there is minimal marginal cost involved after the initial creation, which isn't true with physical goods.

So, with the World of Goo experiment you can see that they sold over 83,000 copies with an average payment of between $2.00 and $3.00 over a 13 day period. That works out to about $160,000 to $240,000 over just that 13 day period. Blizzard they ain't, but that isn't a bad haul for 2 weeks. While a typical game of their type may sell for $20, what percentage of that goes directly to the developers as opposed to marketing, distributors, duplication, etc.?

http://2dboy.com/2009/10/26/pay-what-you-want-birthday-sale-wrap-up/

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[chill]

Further details. 2D Boy, the makers of World of Goo, consists of 2 people. Their marginal cost on the software was $0.30.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Peach Rings]

Dwarf Fortress is awesome, but I wouldn't donate unless it's open sourced.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[shovas]

Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?

Yes, it does. Yes, it does. Next question.

That is some severe lack of thought put into that question and a severe lack of foresight.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Aklyon]

He's not planning on selling DF, EVER. pure donationware. Isn't that enough for you?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Daengbo]

In most cases, homeless people are not rational thinkers at all. Most homeless people have serious mental illness problems. It's just not hard to acquire housing (at least in this country) if you're mentally whole.

I agree that most homeless people have other problems: for some, the problem is mental, but for others, it's drug related or something else. Once you lose a job and a place to live, it's very hard to get one back. Try getting a place to live without income, or a job that will cover rent without an address or phone number. It's tough to climb out of that hole.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness. Even anonymous donors donate because it makes them feel good.

This argument makes the definition of altruism worthless.

For instance, lets say temperature wise you can call everything HOT, because anything greater than 0K is actually hot (and equate that to selfish). If someone says -10 degrees is cold (altruistic), you'll just say, no, that's actually some form of hot. It renders the terms hot and cold worthless because you're just playing semantics.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

He's not planning on selling DF, EVER. pure donationware. Isn't that enough for you?

NOTHING is ever enough for zealots.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[CODiNE]

Not true. Ayn Rand-types won't necessarily pay zero for this.

Actually nobody will pay zero for this, I tried, they don't accept it. You get a picture of a developer begging for change and it sends you back to correct your amount.

Dunno what the lowest allowed is.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[CODiNE]

Lowest acceptable amount is $1. If I really like it I'll donate more later.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness. Even anonymous donors donate because it makes them feel good.

Except that the money spent donating to charity could just as easily be spent directly on the self, probably engendering even greater feelings of 'good'. So why do these individuals spend on charity instead of themselves?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Meh, I reread my post and I think it was clear enough that my quibble with altruism was not with the definition but rather with its nature.

If you choose to do something altruistically, why do you do so? Is there nothing to your choice, are you a simple automaton? Is it an act of pure randomness? Or is it because it makes you sad to do so? Because it's the 'right' thing to do? (reinforcing yourself for right action).

The remaining choice would be that it makes you feel good to do so, in which case the altruism is gone.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Move out of your Mom's basement.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[lennier]

Pretty much. 'Enlightened self-interest' and 'altruism' are just different words for expanding the horizon of the self.

Thinking about 'me in the future' rather than just acting on the current desires of 'me in the past' is a form of altruism, but it's usually called 'self-control' or 'good planning'. Thinking about 'me in another person's situation' is usually called empathy' but is pretty much the same thing. What goes around, comes around.

Ultimately, we're all sufficiently interconnected and interdependent and share so many critical resources (as the ecologists are starting to realise) that it's as true to say 'I am you' as it is to say 'I am me'. So self-interest is altruism, and that's where Rand fails. She thought people were strictly separated point-source singularities with absolutely zero interests in common; that's not actually true either of matter (overlapping waveforms and fields of forces is a better model), or of personality, but the connections are becoming startlingly obvious in the world of information, which does exist in multiple 'places' at once.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[lennier]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness. Even anonymous donors donate because it makes them feel good.

It's not necessarily about anything as mushy as 'feeling'. They may well donate for hard-nosed rational reasons: they sincerely want to live in the kind of world their donation will bring about. That's just good strategic thinking - otherwise called 'investment'.

Not everything real can be measured by money unless your money is defined strictly in terms of real things. Even gold isn't as real as water, food and oxygen in the sense of translating directly into human happiness. What you measure, you get; if your society's money measures fleeting social popularity (exchange value), then making hard-nosed rational decisions about the true value of things will necessarily involve making decisions that, valued in transient monetary terms, seem irrational - but aren't.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

I don't believe that's true. There's widespread evidence that beyond a certain basis covering the necessities, that additional consumer indulgence actually generates a net negative experience.
There's lots of psychological literature on this phenomenon.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

I'm doing the opposite of semantics ... the problem is actually with the semantic definition in my opinion.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

They are lying to themselves, and I know better. Read the psych literature, this is well established fact.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Asic Eng]

Why does any organism engage in any behavior: either shaping by genetics or shaping by environment. Either way, it's the reward based feedback system that creates altruism.

The terminology is arbitrary and awkward though. Altruism has a benefit not for the individual but for it's descendents, other relatives or other members of it's species. So saving someone from drowning might have the effect of making yourself feel good (at the risk of losing your own life), but so would taking his money (while he is drowning) and then going partying with some hookers. Now when someone chooses to make himself feel good by pursuing the former option instead of the latter, we would call that altruistic behaviour. Someone picking the hooker option to make himself feel good we'd call selfish. You might as well say that we have a built-in sense of altruism it fits the terms and the behaviour.

Also even if acting altruistic makes you feel good, that on it's own does not imply that you are doing it because it makes you feel good. If you jump in front of a car to save your child, you are not calculating: "hey saving my child's life will make me feel good" - it's instinctive you are not even thinking about it. So it's not a rewards-based system which will train you to always pick the option "save the child".

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Thanshin]

That's some pretty bizarre bullshit. That's right up there with concluding that every human behavior is logical and can always be explained.

Every human behaviour is logical and can always be explained as the inevitable result of the laws of physics applied to the matter it's made of. Everything else is mysticism and superstition.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

My claim is only that altruism, pure of any selfish motive, doesn't exist. You seem to agree. That some things are better for others as well I also agree.

However, on the child bit, I disagree. Save the child comes from selfish genes, rewarded over many generations.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[sourcerror]

Rand argued that selfisness is the ultimate moral, therefore I think she would choose paying the lowest price possible ($0.01).

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Except they found the Altruistic gene. It is the altruistic persons nature, not a motivation like selfishness, that causes them to behave the way they do.

Many an altruistic person will rationalise that they did what they did because it was the right thing to do, NOT because it made them feel good.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[TheThiefMaster]

He doesn't want to open source it, because he wants to keep control of the project. It's HIS game.
Also, I believe he said that he doesn't want to get stuck being a manager for all the other people who would be working on DF if he open sourced it, he wants to actually code.

As much as I'd love to help code DF, I understand his position, and play it, have donated, and await each new version eagerly.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[dave420]

That's bullshit. Plenty of people give money to those without just because they have money, and those without, don't. Not to feel good, but because they see something they can do to help, and choose to help.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Upsilonish]

Their similar stunt with World of Goo led me to purchase other games they developed because WoG showed me they were delivering quality, entertaining games.

What other games have the WoG developers made?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Yes, but what's the motivation behind the choice? Do they do it because they are emotionless robots? Or because giving that money away makes them feel bad? None of our decisions happen in a void.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Altruism and selfishness are sides of the same coin, whether shaped by environment or by genetics, both options support my point.

And 'rationalise' is precisely what they're doing, which is my point, exactly.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[marcosdumay]

Well, altruism evolved somehow.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's naive to claim they don't do it because derive pleasure (feeling good) from helping the less fortunate. I don't see why people are so defensive about that; the needy are still getting helped, everyone wins.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually I paid $0.53 and it worked fine.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[SETIGuy]

I think the problem is you used the term "always." I might agree that altruism can often be due to selfishness, but "always?"

Anyone who uses the term "always" to describe the cause of any human behaviour has obviously never met a human being.

Again, in aggregate pushing someone out of the way of an oncoming bus may benefit society or the species and therefore be selfish. I can't imagine what form of "self" that applies to. Self implies an individual, not a species or a society.

If I pushed an old childless lady out of the way of a bus and I got killed in the process, in that specific case there would neither be benefit to me or to the species. And I doubt I'll feel good about it while I'm dying. I find it hard to consider that sort of behavior selfish.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

I use the term always because I truly believe this is all behavior, and behavior has only two inputs. This is particularly true of the bus case ... you're talking about what has to be a split second decision. Why does that decision go the way it does? Have you been trained to be good, and therefore you act good? What causes you to make a split second decision that puts someone else's life before your own?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[h4rr4r]

For 5 games you paid $1. Go fuck yourself.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[CODiNE]

I bought World of Goo last time it was offered, and I'm only interested in TRYING Gish. Didn't actually like it. That's $1 more or less well spent in my opinion. Like I said if I liked any of them I could always pay again later. I paid $1 for a game demo that's hardly ripping off independent publishers. But if they don't allow flexible feedback options they may think the same thing you do, that's their problem.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[tehcyder]

there are lots of individuals and businesses whose business plan includes giving something away for free

Sadly, prostitutes and brothels aren't amongst them.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[tehcyder]

Altruism is always a disguised form of selfishness. Even anonymous donors donate because it makes them feel good.

You can always dispute whether something is wholly altruistic if you're cynical enough.

A soldier throws himself on a grenade to save his buddies - you can say he is just selfishly thinking of his posthumous reputation, glory for his family or whatever.

A parent donates a kidney to their child - they are just selfishly thinking of prolonging their DNA.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[tehcyder]

I quit my biz for the regulation reqs

You are allowed to employ help such as lawyers or accountants you know.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

Yep, exactly. There's always that little bit of ulterior motive driving things.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[doobydoobydoo]

I am about to buy this. , and will pay much more than I *have* to. Just because many companies are happy to screw me on price whenever they get the chance hasn't (yet) made me want to screw all companies when I get the chance. *I* still have some morals.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

But. That's also a job. Work is work. Tarn Adams doesn't just program video games, he also has to keep the community involved by talking with them, fulfilling wishes, confirming the status of bugs, blogging about progress.

The Wolfire guys have it easier there. Their games require less of each because how skilled these guys are in designing & programming them in the first place (they are good for a small team like that). Honestly, Tarn has to compensate way more for not so good programming skills, even after these years. Sort of like you probably do. =)

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[WNight]

Oh yes, the zealots who merely play other games. Wow, look at the zealotry.

It's not an issue of price, or commercialization, but of having the source.

If you like writing or tweaking games it's not an academic difference. All you show is that you can't imagine ever modding a game.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[WNight]

It's his game, yes. But he wants others to play it. Don't both go without saying?

I too eagerly await new df, specifically not having to set my gridsize and playing natively again.

But I'd think about it more if I had the code, and especially if I could tweak it. I know I'm a niche customer and all but that's the difference between a $5 donation for a game I visit every month or two and a $50 repeating donation for my favorite game.

Admittedly the new version answered a lot of my specific gripes, but being open source would mean I don't need to track down changing memory locations between each build to keep using my tools.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[WNight]

Communists aren't extremists, people who take things to extremes are extremists. Many extremists believe the same things you do.

Why would you lump libertarians with communists, btw, even in wanting them to cry in the same corner? They're about as different as you could imagine. Just because they've both got unusual views? At that, apathy is the consensus these days, every actual view is a minority one.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[TheThiefMaster]

I know I'm a niche customer and all but that's the difference between a $5 donation for a game I visit every month or two and a $50 repeating donation for my favorite game.

Have you ever done a repeating donation of that much for your favourite open-source game? Presumably DF wasn't always your favourite game.

being open source would mean I don't need to track down changing memory locations between each build to keep using my tools.

So would a decent API, or improving the interface (e.g. grid view of dwarf vs skills) so that the tools are no longer necessary.
Personally the only external tools I use are visualisers, which would be better served by an API than hacking.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Omestes]

You forget habit, or conditioned response.

I grew up in a family that gave to the needy (my dad buys sleeping bags, then drives around town handing them to anyone who looks like the need them. He also buys pallets of bottled water at Costco to give to shelters during the summer, etc...), so I give to the needy. It is just something I do reflexively.

I don't even really think about it.

I'm sure I might get some small modicum of pleasure from it in retrospect, but that is completely tertiary to the act. I do it because my upbringing tells me that it is what people should do.

Not everything in our life is a biological prerogative, nor is everything a rational weighing of consequences.

Personally I don't understand this debate one bit. What purpose does it serve?

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Anonymous Coward]

God I love Blondie. /me dances.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Surt]

No, I definitely count conditioned response as environmental, as does the field of psychology.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[WNight]

I have never had a favorite open source game that wasn't totally open source - ie would prefer code rather than cash. I played a lot of OpenTTD for a while, but that's about it.

Presumably DF wasn't always your favourite game.

It isn't now. It could be, if all the things he does that I don't like were removed. I'd love a quick-save key. Losing a fort to a magma leak is the game, losing hours of work to a crash is NOT fun and cancels a lot of what was fun.

Toady will *never* change that because it goes against his view of how the game should be played.

I'd also have changed the date format it uses for saves to have the year first so I can sort the damned things.

Have you ever done a repeating donation of that much for your favourite open-source game?

No, but I can imagine being absolutely hooked on Dwarf for longer than on most. If I was still playing heavily when significant enhancements came out I'd donate again. I wouldn't set it up to repeat, I just mean I could picture being around that long.

So would a decent API, or improving the interface (e.g. grid view of dwarf vs skills) so that the tools are no longer necessary.

Depends which tools you use - if you're satisfied with Dwarf Therapist, etc, then yes. If you're trying to write your own, no, again. It's unlikely Toady's ever going to see my need for finding the most traveled areas, etc, or at least not outside of the pathfinding algorithm. Certainly not up where I'd be able to get feedback for fortress layout.

Personally the only external tools I use are visualisers, which would be better served by an API than hacking.

Amusingly, that's the thing I've never gotten to. I really want to be able to issue my own orders from Ruby.

If you've heard of Armadillo Run (unfortunately not open source), I wrote a Ruby library for outputting maps. With a little code in IRB I can generate huge truss structures, rocket wheels, etc.

I'd love to be able to play Dwarf the same way.

What tileset do you use when not using a visualizer? I use Kelora16 for the diagonal walls. It's nice because it reflects how dwarves can move diagonally, but also for how sharp a properly smoothed fort looks.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[TheThiefMaster]

I use Guybrush, because it was in a pre-made graphics pack yonks ago, and I'm used to it. I use a dwarf/animal graphics pack that came with it, which I've ported to 2010 and added a little to (medic dwarf, donkey, goat).

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[Omestes]

It is environmental, sorry to imply otherwise, but my point was that it is an example of a motive towards altruism that isn't driven by (at least immediate) "self-interest", though I'm sure we can draw this back further and claim that, yes, even unthinking habitual responses evolved out of self-interest. But when we get to this level I would like to wave my hands and proclaim that the argument has become rather silly.

Re:Ayn Rand, do you hear me?

[TheThiefMaster]

Oh, and I have played Armadillo run. 'twas fun.

Very nice.

[Jaysyn]

Great games. I've already bought WoG last year, and I will probably snag the rest of these for $25 or so.

Re:Very nice.

[sourcerror]

When I saw World of Goo first I thought it's just a BridgeBuilder clone, however with the elasticity, the ballons they spiced it up significantly.

Re:Very nice.

[KDR_11k]

That and the realtime nature, in Bridge Builder you can leisurely build what you want, in WoG it has to be stable on every step along the way and the gameplay varies a LOT throughout the game, not everything is about building structures.

Re:Very nice.

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree. I paid $16. But I think if they are trying to make any money (and not prove some kind of point or just get attention), they should not tell you what others have paid. I imagine potential purchasers might look at the bundle and decide it is worth $10 or $20, but seeing people are paying less than $8, they will feel less guilty of paying less.

Re:Very nice.

[h4rr4r]

If you do not tell them, then they may feel not guilty about paying $5. Posting the average tends to help more than it hurts.

Really should have a $1 minimum though. If people want it for free let them get it from the piratebay and not waste the bandwidth you are paying for.

Re:Very nice.

[Barny]

No, it just means we can laugh at people more who pirate them, since obviously spending however many minutes of their time finding it on TPB was worth no more than $1 they must really consider their time to be worthless :)

As a side note, I already own 4 of those titles (all great games), buy them and consider it a donation.

Re:Very nice.

[h4rr4r]

I already owned WoG and under my "if your game has a linux binary" general rule I bought this pack.

Re:Very nice.

[xouumalperxe]

That and the realtime nature

And the polish. World of Goo is a really well-done game, with a brilliant presentation, and a unique, quirky sense of humour.

Cheap, Fast, Good

[srussia]

Guess which one they didn't pick.

Re:Cheap, Fast, Good

[Jaysyn]

Fast?

Re:Cheap, Fast, Good

[sourcerror]

I just checked out Penumbra on Youtube, and the control system was really innovative, and people raved in comments. Do you have any idea what these games are, or you just felt to urge to use a cliche?

Re:Cheap, Fast, Good

[Anonymous Coward]

Half the bundled games are from 2007, and Gish dates to 2004.

So "fast", apparently.

WoG...

[VMaN]

World of Goo alone is worth your time and money.

Re:WoG...

[Monkeedude1212]

Obligatory

Re:WoG...

[PylonHead]

Really? Because I only beat WOG out of some demented need to finish something I start and an unfulfilled hope that at some point I would understand what everyone else saw in the game.

On a scale of 1 to 5, I give it 3.

Re:WoG...

[pinkushun]

Don't forget the delicious Goo Balls

- Signed, the /. Sign Painter

Re:Cheap, Fast, Good (Aha!)

[KingAlanI]

Aha!
If I pay a lot for it, that will make it fast and good

Support these guys!

[khellendros1984]

I went in for $40. I've got World of Goo already, but I thought it would be nice to have Linux versions of these games. I figure that if even the indy devs don't get financial support for publishing Linux versions of software, the market will stay slow and dry forever.

Re:Support these guys!

[RogueSeven]

Agreed. It's offers like this where we Linux users can show we're a growing market, and we deserve games, too. I bought WoG during its previous name-your-price sale. It was good enough that I took the Humble Bundle plunge based on its inclusion, despite me knowing nothing about the other games offered here. I just figure they have to be good if they're next to WoG. The charity options really sweetened the deal. What's not to love here?

Re:Support these guys!

[2obvious4u]

I was going to purchase just to donate because I like companies that are DRM free. Then I was going to Donate because I love this business model. But when they said cross platform Linux didn't even cross my mind. Now that I see I can get these for my linux box, I'm going to have to buy these games at top shelf prices!

Re:Support these guys!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll chip in to get some other games, as I already have World of Goo as well (bought during a previous "name your own price" deal). I wish they'd include World of Goo for the WiiWare download as well, since I've already bought it before. $15 is steep for a WiiWare title to me, especially since we have it on all of our PCs, and we've already got the free WiiWare demo download.

So much for consistency..

[VMaN]

World of Goo: .deb
Aquaria: .run
Gish .tar.gz
Lugaru HD: .bin
Penumbra .sh

Now that's just silly :D

Re:So much for consistency..

[godrik]

NO ! This! Is ! Linux !
*kick*

Re:So much for consistency..

[joey]

Also, Gish is x86-64, the rest x86-32 (except World of Goo, which works with either).

Re:So much for consistency..

[KDR_11k]

To be fair there's no way Gish could come in anything but a tarball.

Re:So much for consistency..

[Anonymous Coward]

At least it wasn't a hairball... I've just about #%&ing had it with these lolcats and the cat hair everywhere!

Re:So much for consistency..

[RogueSeven]

WoG is actually available as tgz, deb, and rpm.

Still, fair point.

Re:So much for consistency..

[sabernet]

Well, I picked up Aquaria last year, and so far as I knew it was Windows and(later) Mac only. I'm sort of impressed they have a Linux version period :P

But yeah, welcome to the world of Linux, so many standards to choose from ;)

Re:So much for consistency..

[Blakey Rat]

Wow that meme is like 3 days old and already incredibly unamusing.

Re:So much for consistency..

[PhireN]

I contacted them about this, and he added the 32bit binary into the tar.gz in just 5min.
Excellent customer service.

Re:So much for consistency..

[IBBoard]

Hang on? What? Aquaria does support Linux? I know it says it on the Humble Indie page, but the website says "maybe soon, but it looks a bit complex" and the demo is Windows only :\

Not that I have a clue what Aquaria is about yet...Or GISH! Rather minimal information on both sites. I've got World of Goo and that was (still is) fun, though, so maybe I'll take a look.

Re:So much for consistency..

[godrik]

Wow that meme is like 3 days old and already incredibly unamusing.

really ? I thought it was 3 years old...

Re:So much for consistency..

[Anonymous Coward]

no clue why this was modded funny. This is exactly why linux gets nowhere. No consistency inside or outside.

Short review of Aquaria

[twoallbeefpatties]

It's a Metroid-like game set underwater with you playing as a sort of a mermaid. The world is fairly large - maybe a bit too large, even. Good mix of puzzle solving and action. The control style takes some getting used to, but that helps to add to the sense that you're not playing the same old platforming game. Some of the boss fights will make you want to throw a controller. The art design is seriously beautiful - it's 2D sprites for everything, but the overall direction of the graphics is really lovely, as well as the excellent music. I recommend it (though I haven't finished it yet - it really is a bit long.)

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[Pteraspidomorphi]

I finished it and it was great. I think it took me 22-24 hours (without all the treasures and recipes but with everything else). Too bad Bit Blot are no longer together, or so it seems.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[Anonymous Coward]

Similarly, a review of Penumbra.

Penumbra is a series with two titles and one expansion back, it's a survival-horror adventure, and takes a lot of cues from the Cthulu mythos and HP Lovecraft's writing (though has a rather unique story). Overture is fantastic - you need to get used to it though, so give it at least 30 minutes or an hour before just saying "pft!" There is very little focus on combat, and a lot more focus on stealth, avoidance, and problem solving. The story is brilliantly written and atmospheric. The only real problem they have is this first chapter (Overture) does permit very rudimentary combat, but the enemies don't have a good AI for combat, so you end up with the enemies you actually can kill (spoiler: some hell-hound type dogs) not being that scary once you figure out the trick to killing them. Outside of that though, it's really one of the only games that has ever been _haunting_ to me. Highly recommend it.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[mewsenews]

Too bad Bit Blot are no longer together, or so it seems.

Alec Holowka of Bit Blot went on to form Infinite Ammo. He is very talented.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[IICV]

Aquaria confused me to no end; in the very beginning, you talk to someone - and then apparently your character has never talked to anyone? What? I had no idea what was going on; it seemed like for no real reason the main character suddenly decided to go exploring, despite having been content with life before that.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[adamofgreyskull]

Can anyone review Gish or Lugaru HD? Have already bought WoG and Penumbra and doesn't sound like Aquaria will appeal to me much..

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[adamofgreyskull]

ACK. I haven't finished Overture yet. Last I played I'd made it to a store room with a single way out under siege by some creatures that are scared of/damaged by light. I don't know when the next time I play will be, but it will be in the middle of the day with the radio on. Love it and recommend it.

If anyone doesn't already own World of Goo or Penumbra, the bundle is easily worth £20GBP/$40USD for those two games alone. The fact that the sale benefits Child's Play should make you dig a little deeper...

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[Draek]

I laughed all the way through Resident Evil 2 and found Dead Space no scarier than a bag of kittens, yet I played an hour of Penumbra and had to stop because I was closing my eyes everytime I heard a sound and was scared of even turning a corner. In fact, I still haven't finished the game in spite of owning the entire series for about a year now.

If you like horror games you really can do no better than Penumbra, though those with heart conditions may wish to stay with World of Goo and Aquaria instead.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[Pteraspidomorphi]

Gish was plenty of fun back when I played it. Perhaps a little short for some, but it can be very challenging, especially in the normal difficulty level or higher. It's mostly pure realistic-physics-based platforming, including opponents that walk around sometimes. You play a blob of tar. You can jump, become heavy and solid (most useful when you're in the middle of the air), squishy and slippery (sliding down small cracks) and adhere to walls and the ceiling. It has a level editor.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[bersl2]

Lugaru's got a demo.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[AP31R0N]

i played one of those from Steam and hated it. i got stuck right away after finding that hatch in the snow. i went to look for a walkthrough and the solution, the thing i missed offended me to the point that i deleted the game.

Glad you got more out of it.

Re:Short review of Aquaria

[MobyDisk]

It is hardly Metroid-like since there are no platforms and no jumps. It's is more like Ecco the Dolphin + Loom.

Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[elrous0]

I wish more console games in the Xbox Live Marketplace, PSN, etc. would/could do charity stuff like this. A lot of us have went over to console gaming and just don't game on our PC's anymore. I would love to be able to participate, but so many things like this are PC-only--and I am NEVER going back to the "Gotta upgrade my video card...gotta upgrade my CPU...gotta get more memory...now I gotta upgrade my video card again..." mess I was in back in the 90's.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[binarylarry]

You only *need* to upgrade you PC hardware about as often as new consoles come out.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[elrous0]

That's true, providing you're okay with turning the sliders down for new games more and more each year. When you're a truly obsessive gamer, there is no way you're going to do that for very long. And every new game ups the ante a little more, until you find yourself almost buying a new rig every year. Not going back there, thanks.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[binarylarry]

You don't want to turn options down for a PC game so you're willing to settle for console which doesn't compare to current PC systems on launch and get even more behind year after year?

Doesn't make any sense to me, but whatever floats your boat.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

When you're a truly obsessive gamer,

Then you got a problem. Prozac is what you're really looking for.

  OH NOES I GOTTA TURN SETTINGS DOWN SO IT ONLY LOOKS AS GOOD AS THE GAMES I PLAYED LAST YEAR! HOW WILL MY E-PEEN SURVIVE THE SHAME?

Shit, man, I be turnin' sliders down all the time. Sometimes I don't even know what they do, and I just turns 'em down for the hell of it. Maybe it makes the game faster, maybe it makes the Baby F4t4l1tY cry, shit, man,I don't know. I just don't give a fuck, yo!

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[kalirion]

If your PC was built during the last 7 years, it shouldn't any trouble running Gish or World of Goo, or even Penumbra for that matter.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[elrous0]

It may not make sense, but for me there is a sense with the console that I'm getting the same experience as everyone else out there, that I'm not missing out on anything. With the PC, if I wasn't running a game at the highest settings, it felt like I was getting a sub-par experience. I knew that someone out there with a better rig was getting the best experience out of the game and I wasn't. It's real easy to fall into that kind of mentality in the PC world (I knew a *lot* of other guys who were pretty much constantly upgrading). It becomes a chase where you never really get the mechanical rabbit.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

PC Games generally will work well on high/max settings on a top of the line 2-3 year old system. Now, a mid-range system from 3 years ago is a different story, generally you can do an incremental upgrade of CPU and/or video card though and get through a few years.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

Buoyancy floats my boat you insensitive clod.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Draek]

It may not make sense, but for me there is a sense with the console that I'm getting the same experience as everyone else out there, that I'm not missing out on anything.

If it has a PC port, no you're not. And if it doesn't... well, you still had to pay for that 62" HDTV, didn't you?

In gaming, like in everything else, the moment you start feeling you must compete with other people on equipment (ie, "e-peen") is the moment your wallet falls down the drain and you become another poster-child for that famous phrase, "a fool and his money are soon parted". It happens to the best of us, though, some with videogames, some with guitars and some with photo cameras (as did to me), but the solution isn't to pretend everybody else is the same as you, they aren't and they won't. The solution is to simply grow out of it.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[DMalic]

most of these games will run on virtually anything, and even "real" games like bioshock will run on $50 each cpu/mobo/vid card.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[DMalic]

Just turn the resolution to 1024x600 or so (I think that's what the big console 720 titles are upconverted from) and leave the settings high. Almost anything will run well at that.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

WoG runs on my Acer AO751h netbook. The refresh rate is noticeably lower than on my desktop, but more than playable.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[apoc.famine]

Penumbra isn't all that taxing. The game was made in 2007, but the engine is more similar to something like the UT2k4 engine, with more physics and less speed.

I'd be surprised if a 6 year old machine couldn't run Penumbra. It's not overly taxing.

However, it's a fantastic game, despite that. It's a "First Person Horror Puzzler". While there is some limited combat, most of the game involves avoiding it. It's a pretty creepy game, for sure. And it is a puzzle solving game. I enjoyed the hell out of the series.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

I have not had this experience. Yearly? Upgrading the WHOLE PC? I had my last computer 2 years before oblivion and the only thing I did to play oblivion was spend $150 on a new video card. That lasted me until July of last year when I decided to buy a new rig, not through necessity but because I wanted to. Since the new rig is far beyond what is required for games right now I don't think I'll have to upgrade again for a while unless I just happen to want a second PC.

Re:Wish they would do more of this for consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

lol, that's silly. You run games on locked down hardware with no advantages, just disadvantages (DRM, must use expensive peripherals from one company (2x-3x the cost of a normal hard drive), no personal servers if the gaming service ever goes down (i.e. XBox Live! games on XBoX 1).

If you don't want to upgrade your video card... DON'T. Knock down the quality settings of the game to acceptable levels.

"But wait, I'm not getting everything out of the game!" -- you're also not getting that for the console. If a game is written for the normal PC of today, the graphics, detail, etc. would knock the crap out of what a console could produce. If you're happy with what a console can provide, then you'd set the modern PC-written-first game to normal / medium and the screen resolution to 720p (that's about 1280x720). Even Intel Graphics accelerators could reach that, I think. =p

In contrast, my current rig can run COD Modern Warfare 2 smoothly at 1650x1050 (monitor max) with textures details all set to high / very high after the first few minutes (~15-20 fps for the first 2-3 minutes; I suspect it's loading textures into video memory in the background). I'm running a 7 year old AGP based rig. I upgraded the RAM and Video card (Radeon 8500 from my older Pentium 3 system to an HD3850) at the total cost of about the same as your console. The game rings in at 11GB, which means that the 360 had to lose about 3GB of (presumably) texture data somewhere. I could probably try 1080p, but that would require me to move my computer to my living room... too lazy. =P Before the video card upgrade, I was running most games at 1024x768 acceptably -- which is just a touch below 720p.

Bottom line? I have more flexibility to run a much larger variety of games, input controllers, payment methods. You have the ability to pay a lot for games that I could run years ago, and are dependent on a monopoly for all your hardware and software services (RRoD?. All multiplayer for XBOX 1 games no longer working? $50/year+ for things Steam gives for free?) Congratulations, you're one of the millions of people who are holding back the detail and graphics quality of games because of fail impulse control.

sadeq

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.bodaniel.com/ps3
http://www.bodaniel.com/equity-loan
http://www.economic-news.co.cc
http://www.bodaniel.com
http://ketabati-sa.blogspot.com

I am honored by your visit

They look like shitty games from the 80s

[Anonymous Coward]

They probably play like them too...

PayPal/Amazon/Google CO

[ThePhilips]

Why no plain "payment with CC" option?

I haven't used PayPal account for quite sometime (they changed their status in Europe at least twice already; a major pita to reauthorize myself again after the years) and I do not think other options would let me buy the bundle from over here.

Re:PayPal/Amazon/Google CO

[Killer Orca]

You can pay through paypal without an account there, they just process the order. All you do is select the paypal option then click the radio button that says "pay by credit card".

Re:PayPal/Amazon/Google CO

[GumphMaster]

... and keeping hunting for the link on each successive page that will let you continue without creating a PayPal account. PayPal go to great lengths to coerce people into signing up for an account by making it seem compulsory and making these buttons the obvious ones.

Re:PayPal/Amazon/Google CO

[ImNotAtWork]

Because the credit card companies charge a lot for their services. Some universities stopped taking credit cards since 2% of Full tuition really starts to hurt.

Noble, but sad

[GodfatherofSoul]

I've seen plenty of these experiments; especially from musicians. What ends up happening is everyone pays jack squat for the application and the artists scratch their heads dumbfounded that all the fans, claiming they were sticking it to the man by pirating music, are now sticking it to the artists. That being said, I'll probably contribute even though I'm not interested in the product (as I have before) because I dreadfully want to see this work.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Reason58]

Average contribution $7.75

Re:Noble, but sad

[grnbrg]

Except that the totals currently show otherwise...

- Total raised $55,481
- Average contribution $7.74
- Number of contributions 7169

Re:Noble, but sad

[joey]

Wow, it was under $1000 when I paid this morning.

Also interesting that someone paid $500. And 3 others, >= $200.

Re:Noble, but sad

[sourcerror]

That doesn't sound that bad, considering they're bundling at least 2 year old games, so the people who were ready to pay higher prices have already bought it. However I don't think being purely donation-ware would keep them profitable.

Re:Noble, but sad

[eqreed]

Except that I wasn't planning on buying it at all. Now I'll buy it and pay something for it. Something > Nothing.

I'd imagine that most people who wanted it would have already bought it by now. They're squeezing money out of people who wouldn't have bought it at the higher price.

Although, I have a feeling that sales will plummet after this week.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the totals currently show otherwise...

- Total raised $55,481
- Average contribution $7.74
- Number of contributions 7169

I only donate in geeky amounts. Here are some recommendations

$1.87 (on a motherfucking cop) - rap geek
$11.11 - binary geek
$10.66 - european history geek
$14.92 - american history geek
$13.37 - computer geek
$31.41 - math geek

Re:Noble, but sad

[icebraining]

If this was a music album, I'd pay 1 cent first, listen to it, and *then* pay an appropriate price. That's how it should be, imho. But my payment average would be half of the reality.

Sales like these should give you an option to pay after *or* pay something before but be able to pay more afterwards without counting as a second sale.

Re:Noble, but sad

[kalirion]

Plus you can get some relatively cheap advertising for donating. For example I stopped by analogpixels.com to check out who this #2 contributor so far was....

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

This one doesn't give the option to pay nothing. In the past for these kinds of things I, and I assume a lot of others, would pay nothing as I have no way of paying for things online (no CC).
This would drive the average way down and make it look that way.

Having it so that you actually have to pay SOMETHING means that you're only getting the people who actually can pay, and are bothered to fill in the forms, so I'd imagine only a tiny percentage of them would pay pretty much nothing.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Quantumstate]

I agree with this. $20 for just World of Goo seems too much to me. I played the demo and the depth is limited compared to many non-indie games. I paid a reasonable amount in my opinion for the collection which is more than they would have had otherwise. It is not unusual for games to drop massively in price, I personally don't buy new PC games because they are too expensive for me. If you find a steam sale you can pick up great games (e.g. Civ4 and Empire Total War) for fairly cheap (~£7) just a couple or years past their release date.

Re:Noble, but sad

[mcsqueak]

$31.41 - math geek

Shouldn't math geek really be $3.14? At least then the decimal is in the right spot...

Re:Noble, but sad

[Hurricane78]

What the hell? Do you have any proof for the “plenty of experiments” you are supposed to have seen? (Especially, how have you seen what everybody paid? Unless you are close friends with them...)
I think you’re just trolltalking out of your ass.

I know that at least Nine Inch Nails and Moby had big successes with that, and actually made more money that way. And lowering prices on Steam to 25% of the old price also made them more money.

Being nice to your clients can mean that they are nice to you too. Who woulda thunk that?? ;)

Re:Noble, but sad

[Hurricane78]

Remember that this was likely to be a donation / split payment.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

What ends up happening is everyone pays jack squat for the application

Except that the totals currently show otherwise...

- Total raised $55,48
- Average contribution $7.74
- Number of contributions 7169

Hmm... $7.74 split between charity and developers evenly equals $3.87 to developers, split among five development outfits equals 57 cents per developer. Sounds like "jack squat" to me.

Re:Noble, but sad

[h4rr4r]

Yeah, were really screwing them with the mere $95k they made in the first day. How ever could someone survive on more than $13k a day.

Re:Noble, but sad

[h4rr4r]

If you are not going to pay for it just go to pirate bay already you cheap fuck.

Re:Noble, but sad

[tux0r]

Hmm... $7.74 split between charity and developers evenly equals $3.87 to developers, split among five development outfits equals 57 cents per developer. Sounds like "jack squat" to me.

$0.57 × 7169 = $4086.33... Other benefits aside, I'd certainly be happy with a low-cost word-of-mouth promotion allowing me to pick up four grand that was otherwise unlikely to come my way...

Re:Noble, but sad

[butalearner]

No, math geek should be $6.28. Two pi is far more useful.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Draek]

Weird. I remember an interview with the founder of Magnatune, back before they went subscription-only and still had the "pay what you want" model for albums, and he said that the average was also between $7-8, though the minimum was $5 rather than zero.

I wonder, is it a coincidence or is the $7-8 price range somehow special? a balance between "low enough to throw away on a whim" and "high enough to be worth dealing with the bureocracies of actually paying", perhaps?

Ahh well, two data points is far too small to be drawing conclusions in any case, but I still think it's interesting.

Re:Noble, but sad

[DMalic]

That's weird to hear. PC games (even at the overinflated retail prices which are set to account for distribution, retail cut, promotion and advertising, physical product, etc.) are one of the cheapest things I can think of. Music, books, and movies are ridiculously overpriced to me, but games are dirt cheap. My logic: Music: I've got 20,000 songs I already like competing for attention. Unless your stuff is really extraordinary, it's never going to get much listening. Books: I read a book in a couple hours and rarely ever re-read. Pretty spendy. Getting a non-DRM'd digital version legitimately can be a pain, and I don't really want a physical copy. Movies: Watch once, rarely ever rewatch. Ridiculously spendy unless you Netflix. Have to transcode it into a format that doesn't suck (x264 rip) myself. By contrast, games (through Steam at least) are mostly buy and forget without ever having to worry about losing your copy or digitizing anything.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Lotana]

Why don't you visit Australia!

Brand new game: $99.95
About 5 months after release: $89.95. Some games stay at this price for years
About a year or more: $49.95
Cheap bin before they vanish: $29.95 (Some $19.95)

This is in Australian dollars which is about 90 cents US.

Depending who you are, it might be cheap, but in general these prices are not to be sneezed at.

Books are overpriced as well though, so you do have a good point. Computer books at the shops are always well over $100.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Tei]

Normal people:

$12.34

that is also his password.

Re:Noble, but sad

[DMalic]

I think I'll stay away from Australia, thankyouverymuch :-)

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

you forgot the number theory geeks you insensitive clod!

when i'm at a restaurant and the waiter brings me the bill, i always round up to the next higher prime number.

"$96.45 you say? make it an even $97"

Re:Noble, but sad

[TBoon]

I wonder, is it a coincidence or is the $7-8 price range somehow special? a balance between "low enough to throw away on a whim" and "high enough to be worth dealing with the bureocracies of actually paying", perhaps?

Or maybe the wast majority of people pay either $5 or $10? Both are within your definitions of cheap enough for impulse purchase, yet enough to be worth hassle, and make you feel you actually paid for it. Sure there are some that pays next to nothing, and some that pays a lot more than the average. A distribution curve over ammounts paid for something like this would be interesting to see...

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot:

$0.50 - 50 Cent fan

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

you forgot $4.20 - stoner geek

Re:Noble, but sad

[Quantumstate]

I see your point. Maybe it is because I am a student but I don't spend money on that kind of stuff either. I get novels from the library, read once for free, take them back. I rarely watch films and don't personally own a DVD. I don't really care about music either. Occasionally I will open up Spotify but most the time I don't play anything or play background instrumental pieces from Jamendo (CC music e.g. Celestial Aeon Project).

As far as I am aware I don't have any illegal software or Music on my PC (I have a backup of my sisters stuff which might be a legally grey area in terms of music but I don't use it, it really is just a backup).

My parents taught me to be careful with money (mainly by example) and I genuinely don't care that much about not having videos/music. With games I like to play them fairly seriously and I mostly play strategy games which have a lot of scope for re-playability especially if you include online play.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Yamata no Orochi]

He specified that he wouldn't be taking advantage of the offer because he has no way of paying for things online.

Dial it back a little, tiger.

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the totals currently show otherwise...

- Total raised $55,481
- Average contribution $7.74
- Number of contributions 7169

I only donate in geeky amounts. Here are some recommendations

$1.87 (on a motherfucking cop) - rap geek
$11.11 - binary geek
$10.66 - european history geek
$14.92 - american history geek
$13.37 - computer geek
$31.41 - math geek

$1.87 (on a motherfucking cop) - rap geek
$11.11 - binary geek
$10.66 - european history geek
$14.92 - american history geek
$13.37 - computer geek
$31.41 - math geek

187 - Murder
$11.11 - Greatest amount possible with 1's and 0's
1060 - Battle of Hastings
1492 - Columbus' discovery of America
1337 - L33tspe4k

I don't get the last one...

Re:Noble, but sad

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't get the last one...

I got it as soon as i had submitted the post. I am just not used to seeing that number with so few decimals here on slashdot =)
3.141 - pi

BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Anonymous Coward]

Mac OS X *is* BSD, and it is the best designed, most secure, most reliable, most usable BSD ever made. Why would you use anything else?

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Anonymous Coward]

Mac OS X *is* BSD, and it is the ... most usable BSD ever made.

I consider price to be an obstacle to usability.
That being said, I do my gaming in XP.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Nadaka]

You might get best designed and most usable (for point and clickers), but most secure and most reliable is kinda pushing it.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[PyroMosh]

Why would you use anything else?

Because you don't own Apple-approved hardware to run it on, but you want (legal) BSD anyway?

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[by (1706743)]

Mac OS X *is* BSD, and it is the best designed, most secure, most reliable, most usable BSD ever made. Why would you use anything else?

I use shell expansion of the * character -- so *BSD expands to NetBSD, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, etc. It doesn't expand to Mac OS X.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Anonymous Coward]

Best designed implies the engineering know how to make the most secure and reliable operating system in history. Apple has undeniably demonstrated that with proper engineering, even something originally based on open source can be fast, reliable, secure and usable.

Why would you use anything else when nothing else compares even remotely?

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Nadaka]

SELinux, there. Beat your vaunted security by orders of magnitude.

When I said best design, I meant pretty, not technically masterful. Mac OS X isn't anywhere near as good as you are claiming.

It is good. But it isn't godlike compared the competition.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Svartalf]

I seriously doubt the validity your remarks about "secure".

Comparing the results of the Pwn 2 Own contest, having similar attack surfaces and only lasting 2 minutes doesn't engender visions of "secure". In fact, it was Windows that people thought would last only that long.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[Miseph]

If nothing else remotely compared, there would be no reason to use anything else. Of course, since there are several perfectly comparable, good alternatives, it can be left to reasonable choice whther someone wants to use OSX or something else.

Or did you mean to imply that OSX is the only good operating system there is? A patently flawed and untrue assessment of reality (although the RDF sometimes makes it a challenge for people stuck inside to realize how grossly out of touch they are).

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[selven]

Because it's proprietary, expensive (VERY expensive - you need to buy a new computer for it), actually not the most secure (partly because the others are too obscure for anyone to bother targeting, partly because of OS-level virtualization (ie. jails), partly because of Free/OpenBSD's policies of minimalism), and because it's diverged quite a bit from the other BSDs, so you can't say one's anything close to a substitute for the other.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[vegiVamp]

It does expand to MacOSXhasbeenclosedsourcedbutusedtobeBSD, though.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[RichiH]

Mod me -1 nitpick, but you mean globbing, not "shell expansion".

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[MasterPatricko]

I seriously doubt the validity your remarks about "secure".

Comparing the results of the Pwn 2 Own contest, having similar attack surfaces and only lasting 2 minutes doesn't engender visions of "secure". In fact, it was Windows that people thought would last only that long.

Unfortunately the times in Pwn2Own mean nothing; the researchers work for months beforehand perfecting their attack and then simply implement it on the day. Often, the reason the macs get hacked first is that the researcher wants a new mac. No operating system is objectively secure; even relative comparisons are pretty meaningless.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[logjon]

"Often, the reason the macs get hacked first is that the researcher wants a new mac." Ludicrous.

Re:BSD is *fully* supported: Mac OS X

[plastbox]

I do my gaming in =/ because, come on.. what percentage of games aren't huge let-downs?

ate my tags

[KingAlanI]

Slashdot ate my sarcastic tags.

Re:ate my tags

[Barny]

Don't worry, the people who appreciate sarcasm can detect it well enough, the others will, unfortunately, mod you down.

Getting close to Dawkins

[Anonymous Coward]

All perceived altruism is obscure selfishness.

Licensing Disconnect

[kainewynd2]

From the website:

We don't use DRM. When you buy these games, they are yours. Feel free to play them without an internet connection, back them up, and install them on all of your Macs and PCs freely.

Now, from the EULA:

1.1 License Grant. 2D BOY hereby grants to you a non-exclusive license to use a single copy of the object code version of the Game for your personal, non-commercial home entertainment use on one personal computer or other compatible electronic device. You may sell or transfer your copy of the Game to another person along with, and subject to, your rights under this EULA, only if you do not retain any copies.

Emphasis is mine. It looks like Marketing might want to talk to Legal here...

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[godrik]

IANAL, but I feel that you can install it on as many machin as you want provided you only use a single one at a time.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

Godrik nailed it. It doesn't matter how many machines you install it on since you're the only individual licensed to play the games.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

The real reason it doesn't matter is because they can't do shit about it. It's meaningless. You can disregard it without thought or consequence and nothing will happen no matter what you do.

Of course, you could always edit the installer and remove/alter the agreement. My personal favourite method. The agreement is between two parties, so they must agree to it as well. I can write anything I want just like they can.

I own several large companies as a result. Out of the goodness of my heart I allow them to continue business.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

Who on /. actually follows the EULA? We all know they have yet to be proven in court to be legally binding. Therefore, I will install my Goo on as many of my boxes as I please. ;)

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

a) Legal and Marketing are the same person
b) What you are referencing in the EULA is not DRM, you can check out a blog post on the wolfire site (http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/03/Where-does-DRM-come-from) or read up anywhere else on the internet to become more educated on DRM.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

no, that is consistent with what he is saying:
Use != install.

So according to the EULA you can install on as many devices as you want, however you can only USE (read: play) one of those installs at a time.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean Kyle Gabler might want to take to Kyle Gabler? We're not talking about a 10,000 person company here. He probably just did a Copy and Paste and didn't care if it was technically inaccurate.

What do you think Kyle is going to do to you if you copy it to a couple of computers in your house instead of what the boilerplate license agreement technically says? Care at all? Track you with DRM? Come after you with expensive lawyers? They're letting you pay whatever you feel like for goodness' sake. If you paid a buck and want to install it on 100 computers, just say you paid a penny per copy.

These guys just wanted to get it done.

Re:Licensing Disconnect

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't use DRM. When you buy these games, they are yours. Feel free to play them without an internet connection, back them up, and install them on all of your Macs and PCs freely.

Note how it says YOUR. As in, install it on all of YOUR computers. It says nothing about giving it to all of your friends as well. So saying that you can't keep a copy if you give it to your friend makes sense. Especially since your friend could just go online and get it for as little as he wants. Still, the fact that they expressly allow you to sell or transfer the game to a friend at all is surprising.

Nice, I submitted this hours before

[h4rr4r]

Good Jerb Slashdot editors

Missing option:

[Madsy]

I abstain from buying because I don't think I can pay enough for so many games in good conscience. The games are decent, and the 20 USD I can afford now wouldn't do the games justice.
The whole "experiment" is useless without this option, in my opinion. They're going to see a bunch of people paying 1 cent going to EFF and conclude "what a bunch of cheapskates", when there is a good amount of people who either could buy later (after the offer limit), or refuse to buy that many games hands-down, because they actually *value* those games at 70-80 USD and think it's too much money to spend.

These kind of people won't show up in the statistics.

Re:Missing option:

[harrkev]

Well, if you DID give $20, then the developers would have $20 more than if you did NOT buy. I think that this is kind of the point of this.

Re:Missing option:

[grumbel]

You could always just pay and not download all the games, as each game is a separate download.

Re:Missing option:

[h4rr4r]

That is $20 they otherwise would not get at all, so go for it. It is also about 3 times the average.

Re:Missing option:

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought of that as well. But somehow it still doesn't feel right.

I guess you've just got to ditch the feeling and go with the logical choice. It seems to be in the interest of everyone to do so.

Re:Missing option:

[ProfMobius]

You can also pay $20 now, and if you have more money before the end of the promotion, give again.

Not giving anything is a lose for everyone. You don't get the game and they don't get the money.

Re:Missing option:

[carp3_noct3m]

There are many kinds of people who won't show up in the statistics, simply because you can't account for everyone. I literally have bought on on steam every one of these games because I already love to support indie devs, as I think they are our future, but now, do I donate 1 cent or 10 dollars for games I already payed for? I'm sure there are other like me who have bought most if not all of these already and now would like the cross platform support. Its hard to tell motive from statistics, and the end result being that non-DRM indie devs get good publicity, good funding for future developments, and can show the gaming industry you don't have to, need to , or want to be anything remotely like ubisoft to be good and successful. If I had the spare money I'd toss them as much as I could justify, just so that we can blow their socks off and make some news headlines. (It is also notable that music artists that have done this and bypassed the middle man have also had huge successes, NiN for example)

Re:Missing option:

[carp3_noct3m]

Oops, well I realized I havent bought the lugaru HD.

Re:Missing option:

[Lotana]

You can always buy them as a gift for someone.

There is a checkbox on the bottom to get the gift code. I am sure you know at least someone that would appreciate it.

Re:Missing option:

[Clovert Agent]

I abstain from buying because I don't think I can pay enough for so many games in good conscience. The games are decent, and the 20 USD I can afford now wouldn't do the games justice.

That's just silly. Whatever you pay, they lose nothing - it's not like you're buying below cost. If you don't buy, they lose.

I'm sure they'd welcome the $20. Besides, a product is worth what people are willing to pay, and right now the market says these games are worth $8 - the site shows the average payment. At $20 you'd be paying over the odds. I can't see them being unhappy with that.

The whole "experiment" is useless without this option, in my opinion.

You might think so, but although the numbers are relatively small, they're tangible, and that's not the only benefit. World of Goo pulled in an average of $3 per download in the last sale. This package is currently at a fraction under $8 - probably in the ballpark for a bundle, though I'd have guessed $10. It's also about what I'd expect to pay for a package of games like this in the frequent Steam discount sales.

When I checked, the total raised was $162,687. That's 160k more than they had before, even divided by seven individually, as well as a LOT of free publicity, and why not?

So although the numbers aren't big, it still looks like a worthwhile exercise to me.

Re:Missing option:

[Asic Eng]

Come on now - in the amount field they put "$29.95" in gray as a suggestion, next to that field they state "For instance: 10, 20.50, or 100.00". Can they really make it more clear? They are happy with the $20 - you want the games, go download them and give them the $20.

BTW: the experiment is not useless - it doesn't matter if some people don't want to buy now, or don't want to buy a bundle, or whatever. They want to see if it's worthwhile for them to make such an offer - it's not relevant for that why some people don't take the offer. If you want them to do that again in the future, you need to give them some money. Even if it's just a dollar.

If you feel you got too good of a deal and don't have more cash now - why not give something charity at a later date?

Re:Missing option:

[Spacejock]

For my own 'donationware' apps I make the point that I'd rather have 10 people contribute $5 each than have one person decide they can't afford $25.

The internet is Big. Really Big. And if a million people tip in $7 or so (the current average) you have a sizeable chunk of change.

For more on this see JA Konrath's blog, where he explains exactly how much he's making selling his ebooks on Amazon vs royalties his publisher pays him. Different industry, similar result.

Re:Missing option:

[Full Metal Jackass]

Then just pay $20 and only download 25% of each game.

Re:Missing option:

[Gaygirlie]

I too would so much love to buy this bundle but as I already made a post on their forums I can't afford to pay as much as I think they deserve and I can't in good consience pay as little as I can now afford and still get all the goodies.

If I can't afford to pay what they deserve then I surely don't deserve the games, atleast how I see it.

That said, I am buying the bundle as soon as I can afford it :)

Re:Missing option:

[kalirion]

I think the developers would prefer that you went ahead and paid $20.

Personally I paid $20 and feel fine about it. I would've only paid $10 if it wasn't for the charities. Then again, I already owned (well, rented from Steam) 3 of the 5 titles.

Re:Missing option:

[ukyoCE]

Yeah, that was my take on it. I already bought World of Goo (and wasnt that impressed with it) and didn't care much for the Gish demo. But I still paid $20 for the bundle knowing little about the other 3 games.

I get some games to try out, and they get $20 they wouldn't otherwise have. I worry a little that they'll have statistics to say "look, cheapskates!" but I do trust that they'll think and look a little deeper, and know that these are all dollars they would never have received absent this promotional pricing.

Same thing when I bought Commander Keen off Steam and haven't actually had time to play it. I played the demo so much as a kid that they really deserve the money, no matter how much I play the discounted Steam copy.

Woot. I'm in for $10 - Devs 100%

[robi2106]

yeah, I'm a bit of a cheapskate, but I'm on a gaming & fun budget each month, so I gotta watch things. Gotta save some money for Zeevex Cards for diamonds for Runs of Magic. :-)

Turn down quality, drop rez, the consoles do

[CritterNYC]

If you're satisfied with the console, you can be quite satisfied with PC gaming and dialing down the resolution and quality appropriately. Most major Xbox games don't even hit 720p (let alone 1080p) and often play at 30fps, so even though you have that nice 1080p monitor hooked to your PC, dial the resolution down in the game to get the same playability. Remember that every console is using outdated hardware in comparison to a current PC.

Re:Turn down quality, drop rez, the consoles do

[djdanlib]

Excellent point that too often doesn't cross anyone's mind! Wish I had mod points for you!

I am still pretty happy with an AGP Radeon x850... still plays WoW, SC2 beta, Civ4, Roller Coaster Tycoon, UT2004... all kinds of fun stuff, at respectable quality settings at resolutions similar to (or higher than) console games.

just went over 80.000 $

[pwilli]

Seems the experiment runs very well. The slashvertisment surely helped to spread the word.

Biggest problem for such Indie-Developers is imho not the intentional lack of DRM and the resulting unlicensed copying of the games, but the lack of media coverage. As the numbers show, there are enough people out there who are willing to pay for games, even if they could get them for free. And I was one of them.

btw. while I typed this, the counter went over 84.000 $. I wonder how much they'll collect over the remaining 6 days.

Re:just went over 80.000 $

[Anonymous Coward]

now 100.000$

that's 10.000$ per developement team and 50.000$ for charity that likely wouldn't have been earned at all without this deal.

Support Indie developers + support charity + get some cool pattformindependent games = holy trinity of geekdom

Doubled in 4 hours

[sd.fhasldff]

About 4 hours later, total sales have roughly doubled:

- Total raised $103,758
- Average contribution $7.96
- Number of contributions 13038

I can't help but wonder how long this thing has been running. The article claims "7 days", but considering the current timer state (6days19hours35min) and the article timestamp (-5hours), that appears unlikely to be entirely accurate.

Re:Doubled in 4 hours

[ProfMobius]

The timer is the remaining time before the end of the promotion. Can sound strange, but yeah, they already made $151k from 19000 people in 8 hours. 6 days 16 hours more to go.

Was $10.00 too little?

[Anonymous Coward]

I very rarely play standalone games, and prefer MMO's. But if one of the kids gets some fun out of one of them, then it was a bargain. Hell at $10.00 I sent all mine to the developers. My hats are off to you guys. Sorry I couldn't spend more. Damn MMO's eating up all my spare cash.

Rising mean value

[ProfMobius]

The awesome part, if you followed this promotion since the begining is that the mean value people are giving keep on rising.

If I remember correctly, it started at $6 and now, it is a $7.99 (Apple would be happy ;)). I guess people don't want to appear as cheap and give a bit above the mean.

Anyway, in something like 6h, they already made $115k, which is pretty awesome. I wonder how much the total will be buy the end of the promotion in 6 days.

Re:Rising mean value

[tehcyder]

Anyway, in something like 6h, they already made $115k, which is pretty awesome. I wonder how much the total will be buy the end of the promotion in 6 days.

£5K, as I have just made a bid of negative $110K.

Mwah ha ha ha.

People giving twice ?

[ProfMobius]

I was wondering if I'm the only one who gave an amount around the mean, but now I have tested the games for a while, I think I will give more in the next few days.

All those games are of really high quality. The devs deserve more IMO.

Re:People giving twice ?

[bersl2]

If you want to give more to Wolfire, at least, you can also consider pre-ordering the sequel Overgrowth; it's still in production, but if you pre-order, you get a weekly alpha version of the game to fool around with and to make content.

Of course, that money doesn't get split out to the other devs (who probably also have new games in production) or to charity, so if you're not concerned about getting something more for your additional money, nobody's stopping you from buying in a second time.

Just my thoughts...

[QuaveringGrape]

I paid $30 for my copy of the bundle. That was about 4 hours ago, when the total was at ~$56,000 and the average price spent was $7.95. At the time of this writing (9:05 EST) the total is at $114,678, and the average has gone up...three cents. Still, that's up. :D

Re:Just my thoughts...

[WNight]

It's not bad for games you've never played, when you weren't going to buy anything. At that, a user paying a penny is at least someone likely to download and install the software - free advertising like piracy, but to pre-qualified purchasers. You'd normally pay to get Google to direct someone to your site, hoping they'd try a demo...

I don't know why you think the price would go up over time though? It's the fundamental problem of closed source payware, before you pay you haven't played and once you've played and might pay more, you aren't going to buy again. Perhaps if they didn't bill until you'd had time to play them and gave you a chance to add a tip when you finalized it.

THIS is how you fight piracy

[mykos]

I would gladly give my money directly to developers, or have a middleman that skims very little of the hard work of the creators. I will be buying all these games and routing money to the developers primarily, along with EFF and CP.

Just Paid $5

[NerdENerd]

I had the demo version of World of Goo from Steam and kind of enjoyed it but didn't think it was worth $20. I paid $5 for World of Goo and probably wont even download the others. The 99c iPhone games have really spoilt my expectations of what games are worth. In my Amiga days I would not have thought $20 for a game like world of Goo was a bargain but now I can get addictive games like Angry Birds and Doodle Jump for 99c while on the bus my perspective has changed.

Re:Just Paid $5

[my $anity 0]

Well, I had world of goo already, and paid some more for these titles. Haven't played much, but Gish is very good (but I find it sorta hard) and Aquaria is good as well. Lugaru looks interesting. They're worth shots, I think, and you have bought them, after all.

Giving it a try

[Electrode]

Paid $50, that was all I could muster.

World of Goo was the only game I had heard of before, and this is the first time I've played it. Definitely worth more than the ~$7.14 the devs got from me!

Haven't tried the others yet.

Great stuff

[mdwntr]

And if you have a few $ left after this (ok 10 of them), have a look at Osmos also. Great game, Linux + DRM free etc. http://www.hemispheregames.com/2010/04/28/linux-osmos-release/

Bought it

[Anonymous Coward]

$100.00 for the cause of Linux gaming. Would have been nice to have a comment field so all the devs at the various companies would get the message. As it was, I talked to one of the guys at Wolfire over IM and made my feelings known to him at least.

I already bought and played through all the Penumbra series games on Linux this past winter. Really good. Can't wait for Amnesia!

There was a full-game beta of Aquaria for Linux around that time and I dabbled with it. The initial story didn't do much for me, but it is very pretty. It really is like an underwater Metroid though, so I'll probably play through it.

World of Goo is cute. Lemmings with oil blobs.

Lugaru is very raw, but its successor, Overgrowth, looks like it could be good. I'll throw down to support Wolfire while they make it.

Re:Woot. I'm in for $10 - Devs 100%

[owlman17]

Likewise. I paid $10 - Devs 100% although I do realize that the bundle is worth far more. It was an unplanned purchase on my part. Lots of expenses this month. I would have gladly shelled out $30-$40 if this was an on-going offer instead of just several days. I have a feeling a number of people share my sentiments. In any case, the experiment appears to be a smashing success, in terms of demonstrating that this is a workable business model and that a number of people want to see more quality games on Linux.

Pay $100 or more

[supersloshy]

If you pay $100 or more (split any way you like), you get a complimentary EFF Pioneer Level Membership.
Source.

Linux and Mac stats

[aneroid]

Just bought the bundle. The stats right now are:

- Total contributed $1,133,822
- Number of contributions 123,924
- Average contribution $9.15
Win: $8.03 | Mac: $10.22 | Linux: $14.56 (was 14.55 ten minutes ago)

Worth noting that the average Linux contributor pay more than the avg Mac who also pays more than the avg Win - for games. Maybe, 1.) Game dev companies should take notice of that and 2.) That's the proportion of how desperate they are for games and hence, happy to pay up. Yes, the OS you contribute to is selectable by you but how many of the 123k+ contributors are faking it?

btw, the top contributors are: Anonymous - $3333.33; Anonymous - $1337.0; Anonymous - $1000.0

I'm really glad there was an "Open Source Extension" since I wasn't aware of this before - yes, that makes me a terrible /. member. Quite happy to support Indie game devs.

Re:Linux and Mac stats

[aneroid]

Also, I'd prefer if the "key" was not in the link. Can obviously be picked up by non-contributors. Very easy for sys admins too.