pay-what-you-want posts

You can add another indie game trying out the "pay what you want" business model that has become more and more popular lately. This time developer Chronic Logic is offering its 2D platformer game Gish for any price a person feels like paying for the game. The title was first released in 2004 and was offered as one of the games in the Humble Indie Bundle earlier this year that also used the "pay what you want" model.

As usual with these kinds of deals there is a minimal payment for getting Gish. In this case it depends on which payment system you use. Paypal or Amazon payments require a $1 minimal fee while payments from SWREG require a $5 minimal payment. A new version of Gish is also available for download that adds 64-bit Linux support, over 40 community levels and removes DRM set-ups.

We've seen some indie games like World of Goo and other try out a "pay what you want" business model as a temporary sale. It's been highly successful for those brief periods. However another indie game developer is trying out a similar move for one of its game in a somewhat different way.

Developer Radical Poesis has decided to set up its indie tower defense game Immortal Defense as a "pay what you want" title (with a $1.75 minimal payment to cover various fees). As the developer states on its web site, "This is not a sale, but a test of using this model as a permanent price." While the developer adds that it could go back to a fixed price, "we do like this model and hope that it can work as the standard price for indie games." Immortal Defense itself is a game with 150 levels, a level editor and no DRM set up. The developers also use a portion of the game's sales for Kiva, "a microfinance site which lends money to people and personal businesses in developing nations."

[Via Blue's News]

Everybody's doing "pay what you want" sales lately, and frankly, we are so glad they are. With so many mainstream, expensive titles coming out, these sales have been keeping our wallet from getting too light. Caster is the latest of the indie scene to join in on the fun, and it is definitely worth your notice. Also, it's not a potential scam!

Caster is a lo-fi 3D game based around terrain deformation and shrubbery. While that may not sound especially compelling, the game is a ton of fun, especially since you become a jumping, running machine later on in the game. It's all the ridiculousness you have come to expect from cartoons, but in the package of a game. You can check out a previous review of the game (for Mac) right here on Big Download.

Download the Caster Demo on PC or Mac right here on BigDownload!

The Humble Indie Bundle - a pack of six games available for whatever you want to pay for it - has now ended its deal, raking in over $1 million in a single week. This alone is impressive, but what is also cool is that about 30% went to charity. The developers made a detailed breakdown of all money received as well as money received after merchant costs (credit card fees, Paypal fees, etc) that can be viewed separately.

Along with this news comes another surprising tidbit. Out of the six games featured, four will be releasing their source code to the general public for budding game developers to pick through. The four games that are releasing their code are Aquaria, Lugaru HD, Gish, and Penumbra. Only Lugaru HD is currently available, but the other developers are busy converting their goods to open-source and will be releasing them soon! This is great for freeware communities, as all of these engines are worth working with.

Pay what you want has become the newest craze in the indie community, with developers offering the deal left and right. Now comes the best deal we've ever seen regarding this new payment scheme. Five classic indie games are available in a pay what you want bundle, and as a kicker, the bundle also includes two charities for the division of money. Altogether, the bundle is worth $80 if bought at standard prices for each game.

The games included in the pack are World of Goo, Gish, Aquaria, Penumbra Overture, and Lugaru HD. We've raved about most of these games on the site before, and with good reason. They are all incredibly good, and one of them (World of Goo) pioneered the pay what you want gimmick. The two charities involved in the deal are the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Child's Play. You can pay what you want and divide it however you want, from even among all involved to giving to a single developer or charity. You get all five games, free of DRM, regardless of who you give the money to.