As previously reported, there’s one last big bundle due this year. While it was clear that it would end up in direct competition with the Indie Royale, nobody could have guessed that it would be happening just a day after the fourth ‘core’ Humble Indie Bundle. Today, Eurogamer/Get Games’ entry into this indie bargain festival begins – the Little Big Bunch, in conjunction with the GamesAid charity initiative. Five good-to-great Windows PC games for whatever you want to pay (minimum $1.50, though) – gameplay trailers and thoughts on the full lineup after the break.

An odd but varied mix of games in this pack. Top billing, once again, goes to Frozen Synapse by Mode7. This multi-award-winning turn-based cyberpunk tactics game was the centerpiece of a Humble Bundle just a couple of months ago, and if you missed out on it then, you should absolutely get it now even if you’re not usually the kind to enjoy strategy games. The rules and interface are simple, but the gameplay is astonishingly deep and highly psychological in multiplayer

Next up is Curve Studios’ (creators of the recent freeware gem Stealth Bastard) Explodemon, a SNES-esque 2.5d platformer inspired by Mega Man X, although some have drawn comparisons to Splosion Man, a game developed almost in parallel with it. I’ve personally heard quite a lot of praise for this one, and have been eager to get my hands on it for a while.

Third on the lineup is something very, very silly. Mommy’s Best Games recently threw their lot in with Devolver Digital and Croteam to produce Serious Sam: Double D, a completely nonsensical and gleefully explosive 2D interpretation of Serious Sam. The core gimmick that makes this one so interesting is that rather than cycle through your arsenal as you normally would, you can find mounting brackets that let you vertically stack your guns into enormous, messy combinations that all fire simultaneously. Fun times.

Number four is where this pack starts getting unusual – New Star Soccer 5 is a 2D football (I’m British, I can call it that) game with tongue wedged firmly in cheek, no shortage of inspiration from the classic Sensible Soccer, and even a dash of minigame variety, portraying the daily lives of your overpaid team members outside of the pitch. Not played this one, but I’m definitely interested in trying it after seeing this trailer.

Lastly, and most unusually, the fifth entry in this pack raises the question of whether we can even call it ‘indie’. Oddworld: Munch’s Oddysee is an updated, polished up port of one of the first games released back on the original Xbox, updated to modern spec by Just Add Water. Indie or not, this is a rather clever 3D platform puzzle game with a dark and twisted sense of humor and a charmingly brutal nature-vs-industry setting. Perhaps not as good as the also-updated Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath, but well worth a play anyhow.

The DRM in this pack is a mixed bag – some are direct, DRM-free unpackers, Munch’s Oddysee requires you to get it from Get Games itself, and Serious Sam: Double D is a Steam key. As mentioned, all games are for Windows. It’s an interesting pack. I do hope that it sells decently, especially as GamesAid is a rather respectable organization. They’re going up against some tough competition, and even in a pay-what-you-want sale, it seems that you need something special to really do well these days.

[Little Big Bunch]

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This article’s game is OIO: The Game for the PC (code redeemable on the official site) by Uncanny Games

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