Humble Indie Bundle V Released 145
New submitter Splintercat writes "The Humble Indie Bundle V has just been released, featuring Psychonauts, LIMBO, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP, and Bastion for Windows, OSX and Linux. Ubuntu software center support has also been added as a method of downloading."
Pretty good bundle (Score:5, Informative)
Worth it for Psychonauts alone, if you don't have it. I'd never heard of any of the other games but I've been told they're all pretty spectacular.
Re:Pretty good bundle (Score:5, Informative)
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Amnesia is so amazing you didn't bother to finish it?
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See these player reactions (Score:2)
See these player reactions
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1RKuM57nPA [youtube.com]
Real men... uh... get scared, too...
(No, I don't dare to play it)
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Funny joke, but heck, Psychonauts is great, but its last level (Meat Circus) is so frustrating/hard that I've largely given up on it.
I presume the computer version (I played it on PS2) is absolutely exactly the same game? (Obviously, some of the other games might be fun too.. I haven't played the other Humble Bundle games I bought previously yet, except for a few minutes of World of Goo.)
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I don't think any non-Steam versions have it, but the Steam version was patched to make Meat Circus easier. It also has Xbox 360 gamepad support.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzYb3UDGtjc [youtube.com]
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That is, if you didn't play it 10 years ago on the Xbox. Also, Psychonauts left me with a "hm, that was neat" feeling more than a "wow, that was amazing" feeling. But that's just me.
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I already had Bastion, so I bought the pack as a gift for a friend (with Bastion) and then bought it for myself (without Bastion).
Obviously had I done it the other way around I'd have lowered the average price, but I paid more than the minimums for both packs anyway.
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What I meant to say in my other reply is that Bastion is just superb.
Combat mechanics are a bit repetitive, but the overall package is a genuinely groundbreaking gameplay experience, and that's always a joy - first time I've had one since Battlefield:Vietnam.
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And the narrator... A reason itself to buy the game :)
A Bone to Pick with Cave [youtube.com] :D
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I was going to say the same about Amnesia. A spetacular game that doubles as a very potent laxative. Really, this bundle seems to be the best yet.
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Couldn't agree more. Amnesia is the only game that I've ever played where I had to stop playing it too late at night because it creeped me out. I highly recommend playing the game in a dark room with headphones.
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Absolutely. Buy it just for Psychonaughts!
I already bought it earlier in the year (otherwise I would have jumped on this) and it's funny, inventive, crazy and a delight to play. A top-notch game, one of my favourites of all time.
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I haven't played Psychnauts yet, so this was the perfect opportunity.
I'll be seeding all of the games and soundtrack torrents from now until at least a week or two after the bundle closes.
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Apparently Notch agrees. He is listed as the second highest contributor.
He's pretty much always the highest single contributor. The other "guy" is a group of people who pool their money solely to be the highest one.
An all-star pack (Score:5, Insightful)
Including the scores in FLAC is awesome. More games need to do this.
If you ever wanted the best-of-the-best indie games, this bundle is full of them and well worth paying for.
Pretty awesome. (Score:2)
Yes, I'm going to say it again (Score:5, Insightful)
Suggestion: the game plays better with a control pad, so consider acquiring one of those if you don't have one already.
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Suggestion: the game plays better with a control pad, so consider acquiring one of those if you don't have one already.
I've seen this claim made before... and it's never been true IME.
I mean think about it. There's a reason game companies are so careful not to let PC users compete against console users in games where speed/accuracy matters like first-person shooters. That's because the mouse-and-keyboard people would slaughter the control-pad people.
First-person shooters are not a magical exception. The mouse and keyboard is inherently superior in every way to the control pad.
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For those who are skeptical: Link [engadget.com]
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Suggestion: the game plays better with a control pad, so consider acquiring one of those if you don't have one already.
I've seen this claim made before... and it's never been true IME.
I bought my Xbox 360 controller when I got Batman: Arkham Asylum based on advice I had been given. That game was a bit of a mess. I know everyone seem to love that game, but I found it disappointingly frustrating to play.
That is until half way through when I decided to see what the mouse/keyboard was like. All of a sudden I was fighting with the finesse that Batman should have. It was not longer a chore just to get Batman to look around, it was just a flick of the mouse.
I do believe that for some people, th
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First-person shooters are not a magical exception. The mouse and keyboard is inherently superior in every way to the control pad.
This just isn't true, it's all about how the game is designed. You wouldn't play Katamari Damacy with a mouse and keyboard, or Street Fighter, or Super Mario Bros. Psychonauts was clearly designed with a control pad in mind.
Obviously, being designed for a control pad isn't enough - as you point out, FPS games are always better with a mouse and keyboard, as are RTS games, and anything with a lot of menus. But platformers are usually better with a control pad. I remember struggling through Oni with a mouse
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On every major platform. Those are nothing, except the xbox360, for which there's a release:
http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/Product/Full-Game-Psychonauts/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d8024d4a07d2 [xbox.com]
There you go, have fun!
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>>>It works on my PS2? Or my Nintendo Wii? Or Xbox360?
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>>Those are nothing, except the xbox360
The PS2 hold the record for the best-selling console ever. And the Wii is the best-selling of this generation.... outselling the other two by 40 million units. I wouldn't call that "nothing" unless you're just trolling because you hate Nintendo and Sony.
Psychonauts for PlayStation 2 (Score:2)
DRM free (Score:5, Insightful)
here it is on every major platform, DRM free
It works on my PS2?
Or my Nintendo Wii?
Or Xbox360?
It appears you may have cut off guises' comment out of context. Those are not DRM-free platforms; they require all code to have been approved by the console maker.
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Never heard of these games (Score:1)
Only heard of "Psychonauts" which I have on my PS2 (or Gamecube...I forget which). Are the other games worth wasting my time on? If not I'll skip it.
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Re:Never heard of these games (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Never heard of these games (Score:5, Insightful)
It's tough to give a blanket recommendation given I (nobody) can really know what you'll like, but my thinking on this is these games are available at such a low cost, it is worth getting them just to play for an hour each. And support the concept of multi-platform DRM-free gaming. With this bundle, you even get the soundtracks in 2 formats! If it turns out you like one, that's like icing on the cake.
I've thrown in $15 - $25 for each Humble Indie Bundle so far, and have found a few real gems in there. My favorite so far as in HIB 2 (I think): Space Chem, which is basically an organic chemistry puzzle game.
Anyway, I played Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP on my iPhone, partway, and look forward to having it around on all my systems. It's got simple graphics, but a quirky sense of humor (written dialog) and some great background music. I'd say check it out. YMMV as far as Metacritic scores, but I'll also note that all games in this bundle score well, above 80/100.
Limbo Linux port (Score:5, Informative)
Unfortunately the Linux 'port' of Limbo is actually just a Wine wrapper. It doesn't even run for me, some say it works worse than running the Windows binary in Wine, or have reported various problems and bad performance.
Pretty lazy when every other game has managed to make a proper native Linux port.
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"Proper native Linux port"... maybe but more often its just some flash thingy that runs very poorly. In my experience you have to count on half or more of any given bundle's games not working.* It is really a blind guess, and support is awful. This time I am going to pay $5 or so (to charity) and only up the amount later, if the games run.
*Notable exception: the introversion/dredmor bundle
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On the bright side if it does run for you, it SHOULD be reasonably bug-free. Unlike, say oh idk, the Linux port of Super Meat Boy from HiB4 which came out in December and now six months later is still chock full of bugs (all of them have been completely ignored by the porter since he already has our money)... including a major one which results in the game crashing on the last boss... So, you know, there's that. :p
More bundles (Score:5, Informative)
If you're into indie game bundles. There are currently several other active bundles:
Groupees Build a Bundle [groupees.com]
Indie Gala [indiegala.com]
Indie Royale Graduation Bundle [indieroyale.com]
Bundle in a Box [bundle-in-a-box.com]
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And you can have a look at the rest of the list at the Indie Kings bundle tracker [indiekings.com], although not all of the 18 listed bundles should really be there (eg. The Blackwell Bundle [gog.com]). However, there is even a couple of free bundles to grab.
I also notice that they missed out on the Just Adventure - Pay What You Want Special 3 Maybe 4 Great Games [justadventure.com]. Now I just need a time machine to play all these games.
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If you're into indie game bundles. There are currently several other active bundles:
Groupees Build a Bundle [groupees.com]
Indie Gala [indiegala.com]
Indie Royale Graduation Bundle [indieroyale.com]
Bundle in a Box [bundle-in-a-box.com]
Except for Bundle in a Box, every one of those bundles seem to involve steam, and I won't support DRM (even so called "permissive DRM").
Bundle in a Box did say DRM-free, but I also noticed a few of the games in the bundle had the 'steam' icon. They also had the 'download' icon, so I assume that's optional, which would make it acceptable. Still, they're not doing the cross-platform emphasis that the Humble Bundle has, so I would still give preference to Humble.
No Linux support (Score:2)
None of those bundles even care about Linux support.
HIB at least does, even if sometimes it's WINE bottles or Adobe AIR. (And they are getting a considerable amount of flak for that too, because that shit is not acceptable.)
OS X logo ? (Score:3)
Fine bundle (Score:2)
Finally, a sale that coincides with payday. Bundle is worth it for Amnesia alone. (Frictional Games does some neat stuff; their physics in the Penumbra series was pretty amazing.) Installed via Ubuntu Software Center, works great.
Cross platform via wine (Score:5, Informative)
Limbo on Linux is a wine bottle [ziemecki.net] that runs with very poor performance. Trying to improve performance via the latest version of wine exposes a recent bug (shader model 3.0 [winehq.org]). Psychonauts on Linux is a real icculus [wikipedia.org] port, but is just a wine bottle on Mac.
Don't consider wine compatibility as the type of support for Mac/Linux that I expected from the Humble Indie Bundle.
Re:Cross platform via wine (Score:5, Interesting)
disappointing, but they have an excuse, don't know how valid it really is:
from the FAQ:
Q: Why is Limbo for Linux a wrapper?
A: Unfortunately the audio for Limbo is middle-ware which could not be properly ported.
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Limbo is the only game on that list that was originally developed with Microsoft's XNA tools for the 360 arcade, so I'm not surprised that they ran into problems porting it.
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And Bastion is cross-platform via Mono (I wonder how that'll go on Slashdot where the groupthink is to love HIB but hate Mono).
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Groupthink to hate Mono?
So you are magically not part of this groupthink?
Some people, these days probably a minority hate Mono. I am one of them. It is a trap just like silverlight.
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Groupthink to hate Mono? So you are magically not part of this groupthink?
No, I'm not. My /. profile should explain why.
Some people, these days probably a minority hate Mono.
I guess that's why every Mono-related story has a bunch of emotional hatred posts all modded to +5, Insightful.
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Cross platform via flash (Score:2)
And Samarost & Machinarium were wrapped flash. I have never actually played Samarost.
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MS's .NET languages are all hamstrung by the CLR they're running on. Yes, it's relatively easy to drop into the "unsafe" native calls, but that's not a feature that makes it better - it's a feature required by short comings of the CLR, otherwise known by various terms such as "compromise", "band-aid", or "failure".
"crap MS language that MS can't even internally agree on what it should be and do."... couldn't make sense of this? are you talking about the Net platform, or a specific language, ... or what.
.NET's primary feature is multi-language support. C# was supposed to bring the wonders of Java managed memory to Windows developers, and of course better it. MS itself originally stated that C# (.
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MS's .NET languages are all hamstrung by the CLR they're running on. Yes, it's relatively easy to drop into the "unsafe" native calls, but that's not a feature that makes it better - it's a feature required by short comings of the CLR
No, it's a feature required for those circumstances where the base class library does not yet provide certain functionality. I'm not aware of any limitations in the CLR itself (i.e. the VM) which preclude from adding some functionality. It would be pretty surprising, anyway, given that its bytecode and execution model are flexible enough to support the entirety of ISO C++.
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MS's .NET languages are all hamstrung by the CLR they're running on. Yes, it's relatively easy to drop into the "unsafe" native calls, but that's not a feature that makes it better - it's a feature required by short comings of the CLR
No, it's a feature required for those circumstances where the base class library does not yet provide certain functionality. I'm not aware of any limitations in the CLR itself (i.e. the VM) which preclude from adding some functionality. It would be pretty surprising, anyway, given that its bytecode and execution model are flexible enough to support the entirety of ISO C++.
And amazingly enough that need is not decreasing with time.
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those options are not worst than the way other platforms offer to interact with native calls. e.g. Python ctypes or as mentioned jni. Most of the times you dont even need to go that far, and if you find repeatedly far from the runtime, then you are using the wrong tool.
I didn't say there were. What I did say was that MS claimed C# was the way of windows programming for the future. And then they failed to deliver by delivering a half-ass language.
.NET's primary feature is multi-language support. C# was supposed to bring the wonders of Java managed memory to Windows developers, and of course better it. MS itself originally stated that C# (.NET, C# with C++/CLI were the only two languages really supported at that time) was to be the one and future language for programming in windows, including the system. Recall Longhorn [microsoft.com]?
Since VS2002 vb .net was also included but I give you that the focus was really on C#. The OS team never delivered on the bindings and structure to do real system programming with .Net that has been quite obvious for years now and .Net found its place being very popular on other kinds of applications.
Yes, it serves fine as a Java competitor, if it could only get to be a little faster. At least it's faster than Ruby, Grails, et al.
Maybe not everyone wants to use C# to do system programming and the language fits their needs? It seems a bit far fetched to call the whole thing misguided because it does not fulfill your expectations on a specific area that pretty much everyone knows by now is not its main target.
Ah - there's the rub. Systems programming was one of C#'s original purposes. I never said when the systems coding took place. It was years ago. I would not try it today, it'd be pointless,and quite po
Re:Cross platform via wine (Score:4, Interesting)
Using Mono to make it easier to port applications developed for Windows to Linux is something that even RMS doesn't particularly object to. The reason why it was controversial was because the Mono developers were trying to push it as a platform to develop new Linux desktop applications, which exposed the Linux desktop to legal risk from Microsoft and their patent portfolio and meant that the applications actually worked better under Windows than Linux. In fact, I think this is the first Windows application I've come across that's been successfully ported to Linux using Mono rather than the otther way around.
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The reason why it was controversial was because the Mono developers were trying to push it as a platform to develop new Linux desktop applications, which exposed the Linux desktop to legal risk from Microsoft and their patent portfolio and meant that the applications actually worked better under Windows than Linux.
I would strongly disagree with the assertion that application written using Gtk# (which is what Mono folks have been pushing for) "works better under Windows than Linux". In fact, due to Mono providing a lot of its own handy but implementation-specific features, it's pretty easy to end up with an app that only runs on Mono. It would still run on Windows, since Mono itself runs there, but it wouldn't run on .NET.
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In fact, due to Mono providing a lot of its own handy but implementation-specific features, it's pretty easy to end up with an app that only runs on Mono.
There are actually Mono-developed libraries - such as one of their sets of SQLite bindings - that now only work under Microsoft .Net and not under any recent version of Mono. I know about this because a C#-based project I occasionally use relied on them and then suddenly stopped working under Mono for everyone after an update.
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Yeah, I was surprised to hear that. I thought the Linux/Mac versions in the HIBs were almost always native ports. If they can't manage a native port, they shouldn't advertise that game as being "compatible" with Linux/Mac. (Getting it to run under WINE is your own business, then.)
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To some extent, I think it depends on how good the compatibility is. If WINE were a flawless compatibility layer with no performance hit, then I'd have no objection. However, if I buy it because it's advertising cross-platform compatibility and it doesn't run well on my platform of choice, then I think I'm going to be angry regardless of the method of porting it.
Amnesia (Score:2)
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I would gladly make mention of what the game is. But I forget.
As always Linux (Score:3)
users on average pay/donate more...
Re:As always Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
And our reward is lazy, Wine-based "ports".
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Well, I paid 14.50 at the Steam store in total for three of those games (Bastion, Limbo and Sword & Sorcery) before the bundle came out. Don't like the port? Don't buy it. The developers don't owe you anything. Besides, check the pie chart, even though the Linux buyers pay close to three quarters more, there's at least 6 or 7 Windows buyers for every one of them.
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Don't know why I keep buying these (Score:3)
Tempting offer, but past experience indicates (for me, at least) I get only 50% of my games worth:
Games that I tried & worked: World of Goo, Lugaru HD, Aquaria, Osmos, Revenge of the Titans, Cortex Command, Frozen Synapse, VVVVVV, Steel Storm, Avadon, Canabalt, Cogs, Darwinina, Multiwinia, Uplink, Dungeons of Dredmor
Games that didn't work, despite my efforts (and sometimes insistence trying to get support): Gish, Penumbra: Overture, Samorost 2, Braid, Machinarium, Trine, Shadowgrounds, Shadowgrounds Survivor, Jack Claw, SpaceChem, Trauma, Crayon Physics Deluxe, Cogs, Hammerfight, Zen Bound 2
Games that were promised but never actually released: Splot
That said, World of Goo, Frozen Synapse & Dungeons of Dredmor alone were worth all the frustration.
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My bad. Cogs did work on my android phone, not very fluidly, but worked. Didn't try it on the (debian) desktop.
And yes, perhaps I am expecting too much from my oldish hardware, but there are many games that I thought should work (notice that those that don't are not necessarily the ones with the fanciest graphics).
Answering your own question? (Score:2)
"That said, World of Goo, Frozen Synapse & Dungeons of Dredmor alone were worth all the frustration."
Also, if you feel like you're only getting 50% of the worth, why not then just pay about half what you would otherwise expect if the games all worked? Or shift the balance so less money goes to the developers and more goes to Child's Play or the EFF?
(Also, are you playing on Linux or something? I haven't had any issues getting the games to run. Admittedly i haven
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That is exactly what I intend to do from now on. Pay $5 to the charities and up the amount if the games work and I feel they are worth it. The thing is, it is not so much about the money as it is about waiting for the download to complete, fiddle around with the installers, browse forums looking for answers, and the general frustration about things not working.
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I know the waste of money. (Score:2)
Things that worked for me, on either Ubuntu 10.10 or Debian 6.0.5. I have an R300 card, and use the free drivers.
Worked: World of Goo, Lugaru HD, Aquaria (both builds), Osmos (music stutters), Revenge of the Titans, Cortex Command, Frozen Synapse, VVVVVV, Steel Storm, Dungeons of Dredmor (after much patching!), Gish (both builds), Penumbra: Overture, Machinarium (wrapped Flash), SpaceChem (.NET), Trauma (wrapped Flash), Hammerfight (really shitty with a trackball; had to use bluetooth mouse), Night Sky, And
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Dual Opteron 240s ;-)
Seriously, that used to be my configuration. But now I have ditched that and use a way more mainstream, albeit oldish PC. On neither did the games work very well. Even those that don't seem so demanding in terms of resources. (Samorost 2?)
Sword & Sworcery (Score:2)
I may sound like a salesman but seriously, grab this just for the (choice of FLAC or mp3) soundtrack of Sword & Sworcery - it is really that good. [bandcamp.com]. And the game is not bad either - looking forward to the others which are new to me....
Bought it Thursday (Score:1)
My son still doesn't know on what platform to download, he never saw it coming :)
More important: he now knows that it's fairly reasonable to pay for things one enjoys.
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The story was submitted yesterday.
And approved today. Would you like to loose your user privileges?
I'd rather tighten them.
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And approved today. Would you like to lose your user privileges?
I'd rather tighten them.
You forgot to correct loose to lose. :)
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Had I corrected that one, I wouldn't have been able to make such a clever, clever joke at OP's expense!
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what is POEG the acronym for?
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Would you like to loose your user priviledges?
Er, you are asking that of "dyingtolive", right?
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You always get the whole bundle. What you get for paying above the average are bonuses, not part of the original bundle. It's a "thank you" for going the extra mile.
Sure, it probably boosts the contributions, but for crying out loud--you're talking about getting a handful of decent games for under ten bucks. How much of a cheapskate does one have to be to whine about that, when retail games for major platforms average $50 to $60?
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I comprehended what you wrote just fine, I simply didn't agree with it. There is the bundle itself, and then the bonuses--you want the bonuses, you pay over $x.xx. Simple. You don't have to like it, but you went so far as to claim the HIB folks are violating their own principles (as if you are the arbiter of what those principles may be.)
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As a Linux zealot^Wuser, I was going to contribute over 5x the average, but seeing here that some of the ports are Wine and Mono, I decided to only contribute about 2x the average. But, I know there is no way for that action to signal the reason for my displeasure back to the developers so they can behave better next time; hmm... I suppose the best course is to still make a generous contribution so next time they treat Linux with more respect.
You want to send a message? How about donating generously, but changing how the funds are allocated so that the developers who are offering nice Linux support recieve more of your money than the lazy ones that you feel aren't doing enough. You can specify exactly who gets money and how much they get.
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Or just complain about the support issues frequently. Problem is, for all the zeal we Lusers have, we're not really the complaining type (at least not via the proper channels), I mean, you complain in front of your zealous friends, but what of the actual user support tickets?