Humble Bundle releases EA/Origin bundle (opens in new tab)

The involvement of Origin means this is really a loss leader. Buy a small library of EA games on Origin for $25, and suddenly you have a starter library. They sell you the razor at a low cost, donate to charity (good PR footnote), and then they can hopefully sell you more blades.

They need this because Steam has a head start of years, with many people who have huge libraries they won't want to leave, and the availability of titles from almost every publisher but EA. And customers are likely as not to look at purchasing things on Origin as not just being DRM (which Steam also is), but having to deal with running and operating yet another client instead of having almost everything in one place.

This is to EA's strategic benefit whether or not they receive any money via Humble Bundle.

Note that EA / Origin is not getting money from this, their share of the money is given to charities (see the text box right under the game list on the page).

One note on complaints that I hear about Humble Bundles that consist of titles from big publishers (such as the recent THQ bundle).

There are multiple Humble Bundles. The Humble Indie Bundle is not the only Humble Bundle. There are ebooks, music, and big publisher bundles as well. Just because a Humble Bundle is not all indie titles does not mean it's not a Humble Bundle.

Kind of interesting that these "corporate" bundles always remove the EFF from the list of charities.

The last time I used Origin, I think it summoned a demon.

I remember when Humble Bundle meant DRM free and cross-platform. Man, did they ruin that brand.

One mac and zero linux games. Am I counting that right?

This looks like a good deal, but I heard something about Origin being full of spyware. Is there any truth to this or is it just FUD?

Does anyone managed to activate a game on origin? It's loading forever here.

As much as people detest Origin, they really forget how awful Steam was and sometimes continues to be. I just launched the Desktop application, and it literally took 30 seconds to become usable. About 30x slower than a browser takes. I can't speak for Origin, but the market could use some competition, and it will also hopefully drive the DRM schemes to become more open, at which point we can ultimately build a non-centralized platform.

Seems like a smart move. It could help to dampen the perception of evil attached to EA's reputation, whilst making a sizable ($1m+) difference to a number of charities.

That said, it would be nice to see a greater choice in the number of charities. My own preference would be to donate to smaller and more focused variety. Or, even combining it with charitable crowdfunded projects. eg[1][2]

Although, it may also be logistically harder to pull that off.

[1] http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/kite-patch

[2] http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/let-s-build-a-goddamn-tesl...

More than anything, I am bewildered by the general attitude here. Steam is the good guy, and Origin is akin to a malware? Pepsi and Coke, in my opinion. (I have never used Origin, but I intend to install it for this bundle)

Reposting my comment from the other discussion:

I don't understand why people are complaining about the Humble Bundles lack of indieness and humbleness now. They have been very popular for a good amount of time, voiding its ability to call itself humble. Even though they popularized themselves through indie games, the humble bundle chose not to restrict itself to just indie games. You also have the weekly sales, which also adds to their delivering of non-indie games. And from an average user standpoint, it seams odd that people are complaining about inexpensive games.

This deal sounds great, but I'll take a pass. There's no point in denying that EA is doing something good, but knowing their way of doing business leads me to believe that they're just doing this to make Origin more popular and get more possible future customers. That's certainly not a bad thing, after all they're a company that wants to make more money, but I choose to avoid participating in anything they do.

Very disappointing. They should concentrate on DRM free, cross platform bundles. Recently they have too many "Steam only" stuff. Now Origin? No thanks.

Bought this and activated all the steam keys. Haven't heard anything good about Origin but since I've never tried it myself I decided to give it a go. Seems to be a steam knock-off and the first thing it told me was that key redemption was currently down. Its like they only want me to use steam.

the only games that require origin is battlefield and sims. Worth getting the rest if you ask me.

Ha, gross. Why would the Humble Bundle people associate with EA?