AMD's Never Settle Bundle Goes Indie

👤by Tim Harmer Comments 📅21.04.2014 11:51:28





It was only a matter of time before AMD refreshed their Never Settle Bundle to account for their revised product stack, which had gone woefully under-provisioned in this regard since the end of last year. Well today is that day, and from the 21st of April each new gaming card sold - from their monster R9 295X2 all the way down to the modest R7 240 - will once again offer a choice of titles to redeem at the owners leisure. Highlights in the new Never Settle Forever rewards program include the upcoming Murdered: Soul Suspect, the recently released Thief, and acclaimed indie action platformer Guacamelee!.





This new Never Settle bundle makes use of the now familiar Gold, Silver and Bronze tiers, with GPU SKUs being assigned to each depending on their value; Radeon R9 cards apart from the R9 270-series are part of the Gold Tier, the R9 270- and R7 260-series' encompass the Silver tier, whilst R7 250 and 240 GPUs are part of the value oriented Bronze Tier. Each tier contains a selection of titles appropriate for the GPUs allocated to it, and from which you can make three, two or one choice for Gold, Silver and Bronze respectively. Indie titles are bundled into 'Indie Packs' that reflect their lower retail value, containing two Indie games whilst only using one of your allocated choices.

Included as options for the first time are modern Indie titles and Classic PC titles from yesteryear, reflecting the recent surge in popularity these types of games have seen. They may be relatively modest in scope, but indies like DYAD and The Banner Saga nonetheless offer dozens of hours of enthralling gameplay - in many cases much more than your average AAA frag-fest. Classic titles are more of a mixed bag, but in the case of Total War: SHOGUN 2 Never Settle Forever has at least one genuine great on their hands.



By virtue of its yet to be released status the highlight of the Gold and Silver tiers is triple-A title Murdered: Soul Suspect from Square Enix. Not quite at the level of AMD technology integration as Thief - Mantle and AMD TrueAudio Technology won't be a part of this new action-adventure game - it should nonetheless implement roughly the same level of AMD in-game enhancements seen in (the excellent) Tomb Raider. Thief itself should also hold some allure for those who have yet to pick it up, offering atmospheric gameplay and the chance of additional AMD-specific technologies for GCN GPUs.

Although certainly restricted by comparison, the Bronze Tier is not to be sniffed at. We're not in the habit of recommending games, but real time strategy enthusiasts will want to take a long look at Shogun 2, whilst dotted among the Indie Packs is something for everyone.


Full game list and regional availability


Anyone who has taken up the new Never Settle bundle can also take advantage of three months of Splashtop game streaming, $10 off AMD's RAMDisk system enhancer, and a AMD themed item pack in free-to-play MMO shooter Firefall.

There's also a fourth tier open only available by purchasing a custom desktop system with AMD GPU: the Ruby Tier. Intended to promote the use of AMD performance GPUs (i.e. the R9 Series) in systems built by system integrators, this option unlocks four choices rather than three from the Gold Tier. Ruby Tier rewards are only available from selected system retailers worldwide.

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As before, the Never Settle Forever bundle redemption provides digital codes rather than physical disks. The codes for certain titles will only be sent when they're available, for example Murdered: Soul Suspect is set to go on sale on June 3rd and codes for it will be available between now and its release date. Note that you can make your selections at any time, and so holding off until reviews are released may be sensible. The bundle could also be updated at any time to include new games and so saving redemptions is also a valid strategy, especially in the Gold tier.

For more information on the Never Settle bundle check out the NSF microsite. Official terms and conditions state that the campaign period runs from April 21st through to August 31st of this year.



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