The folks at Humble Bundle decided to light a tinderbox yesterday with an announcement that outlines a shift in how sales of its game charity bundles will work: It’s removing the slider that determines how much of a bundle’s purchase is donated to charity and replacing it with an “extra to charity” toggle, which places a hard cap on the donation amount to 15%. Traditionally, gamers have been able to determine exactly how much of their fee goes to charity vs. to Humble itself, up to 100%. Now, a minimum of 85% will be diverted to Humble and the publishers of the games in each bundle.
The change is set to be “tested” in May, while sliders for existing bundles have been taken down to “understand customer behavior as [Humble starts] to roll out the new design.”
This proposed adjustment ticked off supporters of the long-running charity-oriented platform as fans threaten to drop their subscriptions over what they see as a removal of choice in how their donations are directed in a way that benefits Humble and game devs much more than charity, which was the point of Humble in the first place. The Humble subreddit is most displeased, with some folks calling it the Not So Humble Bundle and Unhumble Bundle. “I’ve found a way to keep it at 0% ;),” one dude wrote. “Good bye, unhumble!”
