In the never ending pursuit to make a rogue-like out of everything you can think of, here is Balatro which has turned Poker (kind of) into one. The basic premise is, each round you draw a pool of 8 cards and you have (typically) 4 hands and 3 discards to make as many high-scoring Poker hands as you can and reach the Blind value. Each hand has an associated point value and multiplier, and each card that contributes to the hand also adds its own card value to the points. Once you defeat the current blind, you go to a shop where you can use your hard-earned cash to buy various upgrades.

Celestial cards upgrade the value of a particular hand, spectral and arcana cards have various abilities to manipulate your deck by adding, removing, or modifying cards, and then there are Jokers. Jokers are where the real meat of the game comes from, as their varying abilities and large selection allow you to build out your strategy. You can really stack your multipliers into insane values, and as you climb through the increasing antes (and boss antes with often annoying effects), you try to ultimately defeat Ante level 8 for a "completed" run (although there is an endless option after you make it there).

There's a handful of decks as well to choose from with their own unique effects, and as you beat the game with each one you can choose to increase the difficulty with that respective deck for more and more challenge. All that is to say, I really don't have much else to say about Balatro other than it is damn addicting. Easy to pick up and play a few hands, try out different combos, and build out your collection as the game keeps track of which cards you've picked up before. Definitely recommend if you want a nice, chill time-killer that you will also slowly grow to hate.

Reviewed on Apr 14, 2024


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