Breakout 2024 poker roguelite hit Balatro is coming to Apple and Android mobile devices, according to solo developer LocalThunk. That’s great news for all of us currently invested in creating the highest-scoring poker hands, and bad news for our productivity related to anything else.
Publisher PlayStack announced the port during a Reddit Ask Me Anything over the weekend, although it didn’t have any more details on a potential release window. In a recap thread over on the Balatro subreddit, it was confirmed LocalThunk would be working on the mobile ports.
On Monday, the publisher also announced the game has already sold 1 million copies since it released on Feb. 20 for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. It was ported to macOS on March 1.
The AMA is filled with trivia and other news for fans who can’t get enough of weird poker. For example, PlayStack confirmed it’s looking into official merch, including card decks that match what you might unlock in the game. LocalThunk also announced a daily challenge mode is in the works … or, rather, that it’s “in the cards.”
Balatro’s success has a lot to do with its excellent game loop, where the player adds jokers and regular cards with various effects to a typical deck of 52 playing cards. The goal is to make it through eight rounds (or antes) of poker by scoring above a certain amount of points, although this becomes increasingly more difficult as you go. Your job is to craft a strategy that’ll net you the most points. It’s also a great game to play if you like watching numbers go up, or want to brush up on some math.
There’s also the “skip blind” mechanic, which allows you to skip rounds for individual rewards. You might be able to get a rarer joker in the shop, for example, or be able to get extra cash. In the AMA, Local Thunk said this was one of the hardest mechanics to get right:
When the game first went public, there was a very very basic version of this mechanic whereby skipping BOTH the small and big blinds gave you a very very paltry reward (a gold seal card). Nobody skipped for this reward in general, but the framework was in place. After the game went public this issue was exposed, and adding individual skip rewards with variety felt like the natural progression from that original idea! It was a massive improvement, and if really started feeding more into the entire ‘risk vs reward’ ideology behind Balatro.
However, LocalThunk doesn’t think there will be more mechanics added over time, although there might be “more options, more opportunities for emergence, more secrets.”
LocalThunk also reconfirmed our story about how to pronounce the game’s title: “It’s pronounced ‘Balatro.’”
The whole AMA is worth checking out if you want more insight into Balatro, a game that might just ruin your life if you don’t set some ground rules for how much you can play it each day.
