Balatro

The king of deck building roguelikes. At first glance, Balatro feels almost entirely RNG. Starting off as any poker game, that’s by design. After a handful of runs, you’ll understand that this game is rooted in rewarding purposeful decision-making. It's here the game begins to open up. In this game, you build an engine centered around discovering joker combinations and manipulating your deck. Your long term goal is to optimize your hand scoring by improving your deck, jokers, and economy. Each run is unique and the decisions you make in each run feel meaningful. You’ll decide things like if spending money one round is worth losing interest next round on potentially better options in the shop. Or which planet cards to prioritize, down to crafting your deck. Balatro has varying levels of difficulty in the form of stakes and types of decks, each with different rules and conditions that make the game challenging even after hundreds of hours. Another great benefit as a deckbuilder - it's incredibly easy to put this game down at any given moment. Being able to step away to change a diaper or be Dad was a huge plus for me. 10/10 - Looking forward to what LocalThunk has cooking in the next update. Earning C++ was a blast! Pros Endless possible runs Decision-making at every turn Rewarding progression Cons No more Gold Sticker Jokers left to earn