I played thirty minutes of Recettear...
They're all quirky Japanese 'indie' games, the kind that would sell like hotcakes on GOG because everybody would want to support the publisher.
Recettear basically has two parts, one part Dark Cloud-like action RPG dungeon crawling for treasure and one part business simulator to sell the treasure you found. It's adorable, quirky, interesting and repetitive.
Which probably describes a lot of Japanese games :P

Also not available in the UK.
Since they all involve Origin, no loss for me as I won't buy any Origin games.

The Pioneer Bundle €3.58

- Sid Meier’s Colonization (Classic)
- Sid Meier’s Covert Action (Classic)
- Sid Meier’s Pirates! Gold Plus (Classic)
- B-17 Flying Fortress: The Mighty 8th
- Silent Service
- Dragonsphere
- Command H.Q.
- Across The Rhine


//sry..double post

I can recommend Recettear (bought it for a fiver in an awesome bundle) - it is a fun diversion that I've sunk at least 50-75 hours into. It seems simple, but there are secrets within secrets in that game. I thought the dungeon crawl sections were like The Secret of Mana, myself, which enjoyed immensely in my younger days..

<Spoiler>
If you 'craft' any unique items - keep them, they are ingredients for unique(r) items, which are needed for unique(r)e(r) items. (aka Lv 1, Lv 2, Lv 3, etc...)
Some people only visit your shop when it is in evil mode. I like the evil temple wallpaper and tablecloths for this. However, this scares 'good' heroes, so be aware. I've not determined how to set light and dark yet, probably not far enough in.
Some people like to wheel and deal, and others (grumpy mothers) want the right price the first time.
If you can sell without wheeling and dealing, you can score a bonus that chains like 2x 4x 8x etc... For me, once I learned this, it was how I beat the game. I only have one card though, apparently there are 8? Katana / Wakizashi / Bow / Te (Priest - Hands only?) / Mage - he's a punk. Wants his stuff for list or something. / Dark something?
</Spoiler>

Oh, and there are some very Asian items like that stinky spiky poo smelling fruit that tastes like tapioca (banned most places) Durian? and shark fin soup (health potion).

As for Chantelese, I couldn't get into it. It was gut wrenching 3d with 2d sprites on a 4:3 screen. Perhaps it is optimized for 16:9 screens only? Then I got distracted by UFO: Aftershock (with Okim's awesome ACM Mod, 300+ hours), so I didn't try the next game, Fortune Summoners. There's probably a lot of shared graphics between the three.

You should be able to find demos for all of them. I played the demos of Chantelise and Recettear for a bit but couldn't get into them yet. Chantelise seemed a bit pointless and boring, Recettear had a slow start with lots of talking and instructions, but I still plan to give it another try someday due to all the love it gets from fellow gamers. The demo of Fortune Summoners got me so hooked that I bought the game with the small release discount, and to me it was totally worth the asking price - I loved it.

It's a mostly linear JRPG with an average plot but great characters and humor and some free exploration and puzzling, almost metroidvania-like, and the usual simplistic turn-based combats have been replaced by 2D platforming action combat, which many reviews described as difficult to get used to or too hard, but I didn't have any issues with it and thought it was interesting and fun (and I'm really not that skilled). You just need to learn how to react to certain attacks instead of mashing buttons. The main character is mostly a melee fighter, but at some point you will gather spellcasting allies, too, and while you can only control one character at a time with the AI taking over the other party members, you can switch between them whenever you want to (which is also used for some puzzles, Lost Vikings style).

I didn't like the savegame system at first but got accustomed to it; you can't just save wherever you want to, to save your game you have to rest at an inn. There is quite a bit of backtracking, in case that bothers you, and the monsters will reappear if you enter an area you already passed through, but I didn't mind it that much, since I enjoyed the combat (and when you don't feel like fighting, you can just jump and run past the monsters - they don't appear out of nowhere, they are clearly visible and moving around the levels and you can hop over them etc. just like in a real platformer). The story isn't fully concluded at the end, leaving room for a sequel, but IIRC it doesn't end abruptly or with a cliffhanger, it's still satisfactory enough, and in any case it doesn't matter all that much, as the actual fun is in the puzzling, platforming, fighting, humor and nice graphics. I don't fully remember but I think it took me something between 20-40 hours to beat the game, and I thought it neither too short nor overstaying its welcome.

The most similar game I've played that I could compare it to is Dust - An Elysian Tale, but it's also quite different from it (more JRPG, combat less hack-and-slashy, a bit more tactical).

Just a sidenote, the games are available DRM-free, too, but probably not as cheap as on Steam.

Fortune Summoners is by a different developer than Recettear and Chantelise and it's independent of them. I think the only things they share are the publisher, the Japanese anime style and the focus on little girls as main characters.

Here's the catch to those who missed it (like me) [url=http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:7wuQ44k_NlQJ:www.amazon.com/b%3Fnode%3D10076151011+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk]http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:7wuQ44k_NlQJ:www.amazon.com/b%3Fnode%3D10076151011+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk[/url] Some are repeats and MONOPOLY was regionally restricted

Does Ubisoft (Uplay) do gift codes, and if so, how do you redeem them?

You have to start Uplay (their client), choose Activate Product and fill the code. You have to click on the uplay tab. Activate Product it's in the middle of the screen.

Ubisoft has activation codes, where you can activate uPlay games bought elsewhere, in the uPlay client.
Ubisoft itself does not have gifts (buying for someone else) from the uShop, as far as I know.
At least not atm.

Ah, I found it! Click on "Looking for games?" in the middle, then it will pop up.

Thank you~!

Thanks to everyone for their input on the Carpe Fulgur games.
:-)

How to Survive and its bundles are 90% off today on Steam.

Prices:
How to Survive -- $1.49
How to Survive - Dead Summer Days Bundle - AUG'14 -- $1.69
How to Survive - Storm Warning Edition -- $1.99

http://store.steampowered.com/app/250400/

Starting 2015 Like a Boss Bundle from LazyGuysBundle

$2.99 or more for

- Biglands: A Game Made By Kids (Desura & Steam)
- The Ingenious Machine: New and Improved Edition (Desura & Steam)
- Dreaming Sarah – Early Access (Desura & Steam)
- Yelaxot (Desura, Greenlit)
- Cubot (Desura, Greenlit)
- The Interview (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- GunWorld (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- David (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- Rotieer (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- One Snack Please (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- Bernie Needs Love (Desura, Steam Greenlight)
- Spellbind (Desura, Steam Greenlight)

and all DLC as well, so really worth checking that one!