Humble Bundle 3: Frozenbyte

April 12, 2011 11:11 AM

The Humble Frozenbyte Bundle. It's back! The third Humble Bundle (previously: 1 2) includes Trine, Shadowgrounds, Shadowgrounds: Survivor, and more, all from indie Finnish developer Frozenbyte. Pay what you want and choose how to split the proceeds between the EFF, Child's Play, Frozenbyte, and Humble Bundle Inc.
posted by kmz (34 comments total)

I forwarded #2 to my family as an idea for a stocking stuffer for me and I didn't get it. But I thought someone might have bought it but saved it for my birthday, didn't order it. Not then either. On the day after my birthday I went to order it myself...deal was over. Also, my wife had cut her hair to buy me the watch.

So this time, I'm going to buy it come hell or high water.

_{And why can't they leave the deal open longer than a couple months?}
posted by DU at 11:15 AM on April 12, 2011 [2 favorites]

I already have Trine (fun!), but Shadowgrounds looks pretty cool. I'll have to pony up for this.
posted by brundlefly at 11:25 AM on April 12, 2011

Yeah, well, I would get this too if I either had -

A] A job or
B] Some way to actually pay for it, like a debit card or something.

I keep being poor and out of work when these things come though. The first Shadowgrounds is fun, though. Bought it back on Steam when it was still pretty new.
posted by Samizdata at 11:35 AM on April 12, 2011

I missed 1, got 2 and did the deal where if you paid more than the average you could get 1 as well, and just picked this up. Between this and the Potato Sack Pack, I've got a ton of games I need to play now. And Portal 2 in 7 days.
posted by deezil at 11:36 AM on April 12, 2011

Samizdata, you specify the amount that you want to pay. You could always pay a penny, feel vaguely guilty, and then pay extra to assuage your guilt the next time there's a Humble Bundle that comes around when you are in a better financial situation.
posted by Flunkie at 11:38 AM on April 12, 2011

Errr...actually, I guess I'm not buying it. They all look basically like the same game and there's way too much blood for my kids to enjoy (which is to say, any, since they are the most squeamish kids I ever heard of).

Unless there's a way to get #2 by buying #3 like there was with getting #1 from #2?
posted by DU at 11:48 AM on April 12, 2011

Samizdata, on second thought, check your MeFi mail for a gift key. Have fun.

DU, the "#1 from #2" thing was not published at the time of the sale (if I remember correctly); rather, they later updated it saying that anybody who had already purchased #2 would get #1. Maybe they'll do the same.
posted by Flunkie at 11:51 AM on April 12, 2011 [8 favorites]

DU, hold on for a few days and there might be. That's what happened with Bundle 2.
posted by deezil at 11:52 AM on April 12, 2011

All I really want is Braid (although I'd probably play some of the other #2 things too). But you can't buy Braid for Linux, despite it running there according to the Humble Bundle thing. I don't get it.
posted by DU at 11:55 AM on April 12, 2011

I bought the first two largely in the interests of supporting DRM-free Linux-supporting games.

Still haven't played them. I reckon I'll give this one a pass.
posted by Zed at 11:58 AM on April 12, 2011

But you can't buy Braid for Linux

FWIW, it worked fine under Wine for me (regular Braid, not the Humble Bundle version), and I usually have terrible luck running anything under Wine.
posted by enn at 11:59 AM on April 12, 2011 [1 favorite]

It's too soon for another one of these -- I think they're tapping the well dry.
posted by Malor at 12:03 PM on April 12, 2011

They all look basically like the same game and there's way too much blood for my kids to enjoy

DU, You might want to take another look at Trine.

"I'd like to advertise that our latest game, Trine, doesn't have a single drop of blood or other gore."

(That 2nd link leads to a forum post that includes instructions for disabling blood in the Shadowgrounds games, but they have horror themes that might otherwise be inappropriate for your kids.)
posted by straight at 12:07 PM on April 12, 2011

Also, Trine is as fun to play as it is gorgeous.
posted by straight at 12:09 PM on April 12, 2011

It's too soon for another one of these -- I think they're tapping the well dry.

Is this referring to Bioware asking $60 for another Dragon Age game, EA asking $60 for another Call of Duty game, Ubisoft wanting another $60 for more Assassin's Creed, or Nintendo asking you to buy Mario 64 again on yet another handheld console?
posted by straight at 12:20 PM on April 12, 2011 [1 favorite]

Are any of these worth playing?

I've kind of moved to consoles because they allow me to play slouched on the couch with a beer, and my computer just isn't as comfortable. But linux-friendly is a big plus for me, and if it's that easy I might give something a shot.
posted by Stagger Lee at 12:48 PM on April 12, 2011

So these all play on windows right? I'll probably drop in my fair share and just call it a donation since I can 100% say I don't have time to play any of these. Maybe the girlfriend will be able to get some enjoyment out of them.
posted by RolandOfEld at 1:13 PM on April 12, 2011

Stagger Lee, Trine is definitely worth playing. I'm not much of an avid gamer, but I really enjoyed making my way through it.
posted by purephase at 1:18 PM on April 12, 2011

Trine is small, fantastic and beautiful. Think the Lost Vikings meets Avatar.
posted by Sebmojo at 1:33 PM on April 12, 2011

Also are people actually saying they can't afford a 'pay what you want deal', that they aren't sure it's worth it? Is that what people are saying?
posted by Sebmojo at 1:34 PM on April 12, 2011

Don't know about anyone else, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't saying that.
posted by Zed at 1:38 PM on April 12, 2011

WHOO. I love buying these every time.
posted by thsmchnekllsfascists at 1:40 PM on April 12, 2011

Trine is worth whatever you pay for this pack. It's an excellent co-op game and its single player mode is fun too.

I just gifted a copy but I already have Trine so I'm probably going to skip this one.
posted by Memo at 2:12 PM on April 12, 2011

Worth it for Trine. The Shadowgrounds games are ok overhead shooters.
posted by graventy at 2:44 PM on April 12, 2011

Looks like Trine is the game to play from this set. I'm in!

Just looking at their stats -- at the moment, it says that the average payments are Linux $12.01, Mac $6.31 and Windows $4.15. But Linux is about 25% of all payments, Mac is 17%, and Windows is 58%. By my calculation, that means 11% of purchasers are on Linux, 14% are on Mac and 75% are on Windows. (of course, purchasers may be planning to download for more than one platform and get to choose only one for the purposes of statistics)

Somehow this has a tie-in with the other recent thread in which home adoption of Linux was discussed, but I'll leave the inference up to you.
posted by jepler at 3:46 PM on April 12, 2011

I'd heard a lot about Trine. Just started it and, damn, it's gorgeous.
posted by Splunge at 4:16 PM on April 12, 2011

Ahh... my poor 2006 MBP can't handle Trine smoothly. Bummer.
posted by thsmchnekllsfascists at 6:01 PM on April 12, 2011

.. and also as a data point for any linux folks, apparently trine may only work with nvidia graphics. Doesn't work on my intel i965 and it's reported to fail with the same error on ati cards. Phooey!
posted by jepler at 6:08 PM on April 12, 2011

But linux-friendly is a big plus for me, and if it's that easy I might give something a shot.

Don't waste your money. Trine and Shadowgrounds just segfault for me. The support chat person was useless when he finally showed up after twenty minutes of my bitching to an empty chat window. Of course, there is no published list of requirements, so who the fuck knows. This is definitely a half-assed Linux port. Maybe next time they should go back to their previous model of selling games that actually run.
posted by enn at 7:05 PM on April 12, 2011

I think it's pretty interesting that the average price payed by linux users is roughly twice that what others pay. If this is indicative of what linux users will pay, you would think game developers would pay more attention to that platform. But maybe it is a pain to develop for...
posted by thetruthisjustalie at 9:58 PM on April 12, 2011

enn-
I also can't run Trine on my macbook pro. There's no list of hardware or software requirements on the site, so I figured the games would run as easily as all of the games from the previous 2 bundles. Apparently they're meant for a newer version of osx, kind of a shame.
posted by kittensofthenight at 11:19 PM on April 12, 2011

Is the version of Trine that's shipped a native Linux port, or will I have to piss about with Wine? I can't seem to find much info on the Trine website, just some stuff on LinuxGames back in December about them starting to port.
Oh, and it looks like there's a problem with getting it running on OsX with Intel graphics adapters (which might be your problem kittensofthenight):

Mac system requirements

Operating System: Mac OS X 10.6.5 or better
Processor: Intel Mac
System Memory: 1 GB RAM
Graphics: OpenGL 2.0 compatible video card with 256 MB shared or dedicated RAM (ATI or NVIDIA)
NOTE: Please be advised that Trine does not run on Intel graphics solutions (such as Macbooks from 2006-2008 and the new MacBook Pro 13" models from 2011). The game does run on most Macs from 2009 onwards that have a distinct graphics chip (such as those with NVIDIA GeForce 9400M but graphics details need to be turned down for smooth gameplay).
Hard Drive: 600 MB
Other: Keyboard, Mouse with Secondary click enabled

posted by SyntacticSugar at 3:36 AM on April 13, 2011

I always end up buying these then download them through steam and then...get distracted and end up playing Team Fortress 2. But maybe I will end up playing these, Trine does look pretty interesting.
posted by lilkeith07 at 4:49 AM on April 13, 2011

I think it's pretty interesting that the average price payed by linux users is roughly twice that what others pay. If this is indicative of what linux users will pay, you would think game developers would pay more attention to that platform. But maybe it is a pain to develop for...

No more painful than other platforms, but no less, either, and with a smaller user base. Linux users' per-user contributions to the indie bundles have always exceeded the other platforms, probably because we're so grateful to have been noticed at all.
posted by Zed at 8:56 AM on April 13, 2011