Balatro is a poker game with a twist. With rouge-like deck building and the addition of joker cards, this game provides a fresh take on the game of poker. It was developed by the LocalThunk and published by Playstack. LocalThunk is a small developer group based in Canada. This is their first game released on Steam. Balatro has already garnered success with a score of 92 from Metacritic. Many other major magazines have given it very good reviews.
Balatro’s is described as “a hypnotically satisfying deckbuilder where you play illegal poker hands, discover game-changing jokers, and trigger adrenaline-pumping, outrageous combos.” on Steam. Players combine legitimate poker hands with Joker cards to create different builds. Different cards are used to create different synergies in the game. Those cards include: different Decks, Jokers, Tarot cards, Planet cards, Spectral cards, and Vouchers. With 150 different Jokers, players have many options to create a winning hand.
Players must earn more chips than their opponents (devious blinds) in order to progress. The further the player progresses, the more access they will have to hidden bonus hands and decks. In order to win, players must defeat the final boss which is the biggest and baddest blind. Players have to use their cards and different strategies they have learned to get an edge to beat the final boss.
Playstack, the publisher of Balatro, is a small publisher looking to find the newest game talent. They support developers to create innovative and captivating games.They work with creative teams and have created a broad portfolio of games. Other games they have published include: The Last Faith, Mortal Shell, Ak-Xolotl and more. Balatro has put Playstack on the map and shows the bright future they have as publishers.
Balatro is available on Steam, PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch. The demo had over 200,000 downloads and millions of hours of gameplay.