Humble Monthly dropped in favour of Humble Choice

Humble Bundle has announced it is retiring its Humble Monthly subscription scheme, replacing it with a more expensive offering dubbed Humble Choice - but offering those already subscribed the option to retain roughly what they have now for under a 'Classic Plan.'

While Humble Bundle is best known for its pay-what-you-want games bundle model, the company long diverged from its original plan to give independent developers a means to reach a larger audience and gamers a way to pick up DRM-free copies of games at a low price: Back in 2013 the company launched the Humble Store, a more traditional fixed-price storefront, and soon followed it with a subscription service dubbed Humble Monthly. Subscribers to the Humble Monthly service received 10 games a month, revealed gradually in the run-up to release, along with discounts on purchases from the Humble Store.

Humble Monthly, however, is going away: Humble Bundle has announced it will be retiring the service and replacing it with Humble Choice, a more expensive subscription offering fewer games.

Under the new Humble Choice, subscribers will be offered a choice of three subscription tiers: Lite at $4.99 a month, which offers access to the sixty-game Humble Trove collection, a 10 percent discount on the Humble Store, and 'limited' access to originals and beta releases; Basic, which costs $14.99 a month and offers just three games a month plus 'unlimited' access to originals and betas on top of Humble Trove access; and Premium, a whopping $19.99 a month for nine games and a boost to a 20 percent Store discount. For contrast, Humble Monthly currently offers ten games a month, Humble Trove access, the betas and originals, and a Store discount for just $12 a month.

To head off complaints from subscribers who are facing a $2.99-a-month increase to receive seven fewer games or a $7.99-a-month increase to receive one fewer game, current Humble Monthly subscribers can opt for the Classic plan. Under Humble Choice Classic, users pay the current $12 a month and receive everything they get as current Humble Monthly subscribers - but it won't be available to new users, and will disappear as an option if you cancel your subscription and choose to rejoin at a later date.

Details on the Humble Choice platform - so called because users get to pick which three or nine games they keep out of each month's offerings - can be found on the official website.