Local Thunk Didn't Play Any Roguelike Games During Balatro's Development...Except Slay the Spire

Balatro developer, Local Thunk, recently shared a fascinating development history on their personal blog. Surprisingly, they revealed they avoided playing most rogue-likes during Balatro's creation—except for one.

Their development timeline notes a conscious decision in December 2021 to abstain from playing additional rogue-likes. Thunk explains this wasn't to improve the game, but rather to embrace the experimental nature of their hobby. They desired to make mistakes, reinvent the wheel, and avoid simply borrowing from existing designs. This approach, while potentially sacrificing polish, prioritized the creative process.

However, a year and a half later, this self-imposed rule crumbled. Thunk downloaded Slay the Spire, exclaiming, "Holy shit, now that is a game." The reason? They were troubleshooting controller implementation in Balatro and sought inspiration from Slay the Spire's card game controls. Fortunately, this late discovery prevented unintentional design mimicry.

Thunk's post-mortem offers further intriguing insights. The game's initial working folder was unimaginatively titled "CardGame" and remained unchanged throughout development. The working title, "Joker Poker," also reveals an early conceptual phase.

Several scrapped features are detailed, including: a system where card upgrades were the sole method of character progression (similar to Super Auto Pets); a separate currency for rerolls; and a "golden seal" mechanic that returned played cards to the hand after skipping blind draws.

The final number of Jokers (150) resulted from a miscommunication with publisher Playstack. Initially planned for 120, a subsequent meeting led to the decision to increase the number to 150, deemed a more appealing figure.

Finally, the origin of the name "Local Thunk" is revealed as a programming-related inside joke stemming from a conversation with their partner learning R programming.

Thunk's blog post offers a wealth of additional details on Balatro's development. IGN wholeheartedly agrees, awarding the game a 9/10 and praising it as "A deck-builder of endlessly satisfying proportions…the sort of fun that threatens to derail whole weekend plans…"