As a poker fan, I’m always looking for new poker games. I’m particularly keen on finding games that use poker in interesting new ways. For example, the RPG We Slay Monsters and the roguelike Poker Quest, both of which use poker hands as a combat system. If it’s a poker type game, even better if it’s a steam deck.
Poker-inspired roguelike deck builder Balatro ticks all these boxes nicely, quickly becoming my favorite game of 2024 before the year even started. I played the free demo every day over the holidays, and now that the full game has been released, it’s completely taken over my nights. I’m not alone. Within 72 hours of its release, Balatro has already sold 250,000 copies. Every time I sit down to play a few rounds, I see more people on my friends list playing Balatro.
Naturally, I jumped at the chance to speak with Balatro’s independent developer, LocalThunk. We talked not only about the game and its origins, but also about our shared love of poker. Turns out I was a little wrong on the last part.
“Funny thing is, I don’t play poker at all,” LocalThunk told me. That’s pretty funny, because Baratolo, well, Contains quite a lot of poker. The Steam page even describes it as “the definitive poker roguelike.” Starting with a standard deck of 52 playing cards, you earn chips by making poker hands such as straights, flushes, and full houses, play against bosses called blinds, and earn cash when you win rounds.
But it wasn’t the love of poker that led LocalThunk to create Balatro. One deck builder in particular was a strong inspiration. “I love the concept of Luck Be A Landlord, which is a roguelike game where there are no enemies, and you’re just trying to get a really high score,” he says of LocalThunk. As for Baratolo, “the game itself is actually based on a lot more.” big 2This uses poker hands, but you play them from 8 or 13 cards or something. ” he says. “So it’s not based on poker, it’s based on that game.
“We knew that poker was a really good thematic nexus that a lot of people could use as a starting point to understand some of the mechanics of this game. You could even use poker terminology. We were also able to use some of the visuals, “blinds, ante, tips, etc., as a way to create a sense of cohesion throughout,” says LocalThunk. “But I don’t play poker. I’m not really interested in poker.”
As someone who has played over 70 hours of Ballatoro over the past two months, I can attest to the effectiveness of using common playing cards and well-known poker rules to lure players. The entire game is 30 hours, but the free demo alone gives him 40 hours. For the game. I already knew the cards, suits and hands, so even on my first run I already understood the basics. Just like LocalThunk doesn’t think about or play poker, I don’t think about or play deck builders, so even a friendly deck builder like Slay the Spire doesn’t make sense. It usually takes some time. But with Baratolo, he immediately felt like he was in a familiar place.
It has no hit points, no damage, and isn’t attacking anything. It’s almost like solitaire.
local thunk
”[That] This was done very deliberately. Because it’s about other games…Personally, when I’m playing a game, I get annoyed when they use a lot of those kinds of terms like HP, poison damage, experience points, etc. ” says LocalThunk. It’s a very gamer-like term, but I don’t play games much. So these things, to me, feel like they add so many layers of complexity. When I made the game, I wanted it to have no hit points, no damage, and no attacking anything. It’s almost like solitaire. ”
That’s not to say that Ballatro doesn’t end up being quite complex. What feels like poker at first quickly becomes something very different as you play. After each round, you can spend your winnings at the Card Shop to enhance your standard deck into a collection of strange, ridiculous, and often extremely powerful cards with additional perks. Booster packs add additional playing cards to your deck, and tarot cards allow you to transform your deck by copying cards, destroying cards, and changing the suit of cards. Over time, he may have 12 aces in his deck and be able to easily play 4 or his 5 cards. Also, instead of his standard 13 hearts, you could have twice his number, or even triple his number, making him a flash machine.
And then there’s Joker, who is the cornerstone of the Baratro strategy. Some add a multiplier to every hand you play, some to specific hands, and some allow you to hold more cards at once or discard cards more often. Certain joker combinations can produce very high-scoring hands, and many jokers have their 4 cards instead of 5 form a flush or straight, or copy cards from their hand. This completely breaks the rules of poker.
I’m not very good at this game.
LocalThunk about his game
The longer you play, the stranger and more powerful your deck becomes, and you’ll need every advantage to defeat the Baratro boss. Each boss introduces special rules meant to upset the balance. That is, you limit yourself to only one type of hand and deal cards. It could turn face down, face card or joker debuffs, or worse.
If you watch clips of people playing Baratolo, you’ll see how broken decks can win spectacularly, earning millions or even billions of points not just in a round, but in a single hand. “I’m not very good at this game, so it’s very shocking when something like that happens,” LocalThunk said. “I’m surprised when people can do things like that because I can’t do it.”
