When Balatro was released and started generating the buzz of ten thousand furious hungover hornets, I was intrigued. After all, in recent years, the roguelite has risen to become one of my favorite genres, and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed stellar examples like Dead Cells and Hades.
I didn’t dive in immediately, though. I’m an absolute poker newbie, and foolishly and naively thought that actually mattered.
The deckbuilders I so enjoy, such as Slay the Spire, are games that revolve around cards, but they aren’t card games per se. Here was a title based around an actual card game, and one that I didn’t remotely understand.
You can’t read Lady Gaga’s poker face, or so I’ve heard, and that was the absolute extent of my understanding on the subject of poker. A couple of months after its release, though, I was gifted Balatro, and thought it would be rude of me not to give it a good try so I could pass along my impressions along with my gratitude.
Predictably, I got absolutely nowhere in my first several runs. I had no idea what I was doing, what to buy in the shop, which Jokers to pick up. I was a flailing...
