You may be thinking of RealArcade or Real - they were always part of GameHouse. In fact the downloader is still the RealArcade downloader. It was tagged by my AV as a trojan last week but my initial report as a possible false positive came back clean immediately. I don't get that at all!
I cannot get a response from Alawar. I have emailed them twice. The first time I got a message that I would hear back in a day (never did). They have had a blank screen for their free game of the month for 2 months now.
Now this garbage of a "club" to play games is stupid. Since the new Montezuma game is available from BigFishGames, they are just cutting off their nose to spite their face! It's just gonna hurt them.
BTW - Alawar is making attempts to get business elsewhere. I just noticed that Opinion Outpost (surveys) will now allow you to "buy" an Alawar unlock code (supposed to be up to 250 games but I have not figured out what games are allowed) for 30 points. That's basically, $3. Not bad for just answering questions but I usually save up to 50 points and get a $5 Amazon e-card. :-)