I won’t hide it; I have a lot of disdain for Black Friday. Not only does this deal-stuffed day encourage bad spending habits, materialism, selfishness, and disregard for one’s fellow man, but it also forces far too many retail workers to spend time away from their families in order to man crowded cash registers. This year in particular made me angry because of many stores’ decisions to start their Black Friday deals at midnight, forcing employees to go to bed early on their Thanksgiving holiday in order to be ready for their mandatory shifts.
For this reason, I paid no attention to the deals being offered today, nor did I visit any stores. I spent time with my family and basically went about like it was a normal day. However, after the day was over and I had started working on stuff for the night, one of my friends linked me to the Indie Game Music Bundle. Well, holy crap. This is one Black Friday item I couldn’t pass up; in fact, I think it’s so good that I’m now writing this post about it.
For whatever price you want (at least $1), you can get ten of the best indie video game soundtracks out there right now. Some of the albums included in the bundle are the Minecraft soundtrack, the Super Meat Boy soundtrack, and the VVVVVV soundtrack. The other soundtracks included are just as good. If you decide to donate at least $10, you’ll get an additional seven albums of the same caliber.
While I’m usually the kind of person who’s content to stream my music instead of owning it, this was one purchase I was happy to make. Not only did I get 17 albums, all in 320kbps MP3 quality, but I also get to support the independent artists who usually don’t make jack for money. For that, I’m willing to somewhat participate in Black Friday.
I’m not sure how long this bundle will last (It’s 3am on Saturday right now and it’s still up), so if you’re wanting to get these albums, I’d recommend you grab them quickly. Remember – all of the music here is available to stream absolutely free on the artists’ Bandcamp pages, but picking up the pack will help support them and allow you take the music with you on your iPod or whatever.
[UPDATE] The deal is now over, but you can still head over to the site and check out all the artists on Bandcamp. For more free video game music, check out my review of the excellent Bastion soundtrack.